*Collaborative post.

The beauty salon is the first place people think of when they need to fix their hair, have a manicure done, etc. With over 43,000 beauty salons in the UK, there is no argument about the level of competition in this industry. This has helped create a vibrant beauty industry with several career opportunities. However, the industry faces some challenges, and below are a few.

• Hiring staff with diverse expertise

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Recruitment is not a straightforward task in the beauty salon. Indeed, the owner has to hire experts in various beauty fields. This includes cosmetology, hair styling, nail technicians, massage and aromatherapy, etc. Sometimes, the salon owner may find experts skilled at more than one beauty service. Other times, they are not too lucky. More importantly, there is the problem of finding workers with the requisite skill but few years of experience.

The recruitment terrain here can be quite daunting, especially without planning to go about it. For example, hiring a worker with diverse skills may seem like a good idea to cut down on paying extra salary. However, the repercussions may be dire. That multi-skilled beauty worker can only perform one task at a time. And you may not have enough hands to attend to all your clients on high-demand days. If you plan to outsource parts of your salon service to a professional, that may depend on your management structure.

• Choosing the right beauty products in adequate quantities

Without a doubt, beauty salons keep in stock a wide range of products to aid work. Moreover, the beauty manufacturing industry continues to make it a mission to flood the market with countless products. Additionally, more brand names in the industry push their products to as many salons as possible. The most important factor here is that clients and customers are spoilt for choosing beauty products.

As a salon owner, the challenge is knowing how many of each product to stock up on. Certainly, you may not be able to satisfy every client who asks for a specific beauty product. If you don’t have what a client requests, you risk losing a customer. How can you resolve this? The trick to getting it right is to stay abreast with trends in the industry. The fear of losing a customer should spur you to stock up on trendy beauty products needed in a salon. As Sarah McKenna, founder of Vixen & Blush, puts it, fear can be a motivational tool when put to good use. 

• Price distortion

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This is pretty common in various industries and sectors. The beauty salon business is no different. Reducing beauty service fees is an unfair technique used to draw more customers, especially by newly-opened salons. Usually, this happens to the detriment of existing beauty salons. This is a significant challenge facing the business, considering that more are opened in the UK every year. Fortunately, more salon owners are being creative in improving their customer retention. Indeed, while challenges may not be eliminated, you can find a way around them.