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You’ve finally arrived! Full client schedule, lots of referrals, long client waiting list. After serving your spa employer faithfully for a few years you feel that the time has come for you to strike out on you own. Now you can be your own boss, set your own working hours, and take a vacation whenever you want to. Better yet, it’ll be you who’ll now reap the profits from your services instead of the business you work for. And if they can be successful, why can’t you be just as successful, maybe even more so? You have a head bursting with great new ideas that you’ve been itching to try out. How could you go wrong?
Easily. While there are good reasons to pursue your own venture, and you can potentially build a successful business of your own, it will serve you well to have a very clear idea of what you’re about to undertake, the pros and the cons. An idea that looks so simple and safe on the surface can contain unexpected realities that may make you regret your decision to go it alone. Just ask any new or seasoned entrepreneur what it was like to start out as a business owner and they’re likely to tell you about sleepless nights, nervous days, and narrow misses in the checking account balance. There’s a running joke among spa owners who have had an employee leave to become a competitor:
Q: How do you get even with an employee who quits to start their own business in your neighborhood?
A: Tell them you think it’s a great idea!
Let’s consider some of the not-so-appealing aspects of business ownership. You’ll want to make sure that you understand the full scope of responsibilities, risks, and ethical considerations involved in such a decision before boldly setting out into the world of business.
 It’s not just a practice, it’s a business.
Remember that larger slice of the service dollar pie you were anticipating? You’ll get “all the money” now, but you may not keep it for long. There’s equipment and fixtures to be bought, linens and tools, and other professional necessities, all of which cost money. You’ll need to pay the rent, the phone bill, the utilities bill, buy the supplies, buy business cards and brochures, cover insurance and licensing fees, and a long list of other expenses you may not have thought about and certainly didn’t have to worry about as an employee. In addition to being responsible for payments, you must also do the work of buying the goods and writing the checks for them. Likely when you start out you will also have to handle appointment scheduling, confirmation calls, customer transactions, product pricing and stocking, accounting and bank deposits, advertising, inventory management, not to mention potential problems with the facility you run your practice from. It’s simply amazing how frequently things can go wrong with even the most compact of spa or salon operations. Like doing laundry? You’ll do laundry! And if you don’t plan to handle all of these tasks yourself, then you’ll need to add payroll expenses and management responsibilities to your duty roster.
 Tally up all of these expenses and see how big that slice of pie looks now. Pause to really think about the value of the time you’ll spend on these rather dull tasks that you could’ve spent performing aesthetic treatments or personal activities you enjoy; it often amounts to very long unpaid hours every week. Is something shrinking here, like your free time and income? Is there a possibility that you’ll work harder for even less take-home pay than when you were employed by someone else? You can be certain of it. Many business owners report that the worst boss they ever had was themselves—they got the hardest work, longest hours, worst tasks, lowest pay, and the least appreciation as a self-employed professional. Independence can take on a whole new meaning when seen in the bright light of reality.
What you have been earning as an employee, beyond your percentage of the service fee, is the privilege of doing the work you are trained to do, and love to do, in a focused and professional manner. Just as you might pay someone to clean your house or wash your car, you have paid the company you worked for through shared service fees to make your career more enjoyable and efficient. You’ve paid for “career management services” such as scheduling and marketing, that you will now have to provide for yourself. You may love performing facial treatments, but will you feel the same way about managing your accounts payable, balancing your checking account, unclogging the toilet , shopping for supplies, or trying to make sense of an advertising contract? Perhaps you will enjoy those tasks, but most people choose an aesthetics career because they have a strong affinity for working with people, not forms and ledgers.
At least I have my loyal clients to support me!
Assuming that your clientele will follow you to your own business is a risky assumption. Any move will lead to the loss of customers, even a move just down the street. Customers are free-willed and sensitive. They may not like the changes that you think will make your services better. As you start up your new venture, you may be at least a little distracted by the task of relocating and setting up shop. Will you really be at your best during this critical transition time, especially if everything isn’t exactly going according to plan? Subtle shifts in your attention can lead customers to feel that you’ve lost interest in them, that they’re not as important to you as they used to be.
 New workplaces present an unfamiliar environment to which your customers must adapt, and then like at least as well as the business where you worked before. Your steady clients are looking for peace and comfort as much as skin improving results, and your move has changed one element of the experience unpredictably. Rarely does relocating a practice produce an immediate book of waiting customers. Is the new location convenient for everyone you work with? Does it add driving time or parking challenges? Did a client come to you because she could link her appointment at the former location with another appointment or task (like picking up the kids from school) which was nearby? There are a lot of factors we can’t necessarily anticipate; a full book is an assumption you can’t necessarily count on but will now need more than ever to cover the new costs of operating on your own..
And, ethically speaking, whose clients are these? Let’s take a look at this important issue. You may feel justified in “recruiting” the share of clients that you built up over the time you worked for your employer. You likely worked hard to develop and maintain customers every day. Besides, your clients seem to want to work with you and not someone they don’t know and trust, so it may seem natural that they should get your new business card, or know how to follow you to your next destination.
 Now put yourself into your employer’s shoes, remembering that you are potentially considering becoming an employer yourself. Did you bring all of the customers you worked with into the spa all by yourself? Did the employer have any influence in terms of advertising, managing the business, providing schedulers, cleaning, repairs, supplies, training, and other essentials required in conducting a practice? And reviewing the list of costs earlier in this article do you still believe that the boss’s job involves little more than loading profits into the trunk of her car? In most cases, she has worked hard, often behind the scenes, to build assets, and clients are assets. Does she really not deserve to retain this client business? Think forward to the time when you have your own employees–how will you feel if they walk away with an important chunk of your business? Why not give them the steamer and the facial chair while you’re at it? Clients can and do successfully survive a transfer to another aesthetician, and often prefer to do so rather than go to a new business. In this situation, the bottom line is this: don’t do to others what you don’t want to happen to you as an employer. Keep your karma clear!
 Independent or just plain isolated?
A solo career in aesthetics, with its many “outside the room” demands and tasks, can sap the skin care professional of energy and enthusiasm. I’m talking about the time and financial means needed to keep pace with a rapidly evolving industry. Many of the independent aestheticians I’ve met over the years were either too exhausted, too broke, or too preoccupied with daily responsibilities to participate in continuing education. Sole practitioners are frequently afraid to take time away from their businesses for stimulating professional classes that could help them learn to run it more efficiently or profitably. The practice becomes a trap in itself, even more limiting than what working for someone else is sometimes perceived as being. It can be a lonely and unrewarding experience lacking the camaraderie and knowledge sharing available in spas employing teams of aesthetics professionals. If you value this aspect of your career be sure that you have a sound plan for maintaining some element of it once you’re working on your own. Stay connected and current.
An independent aesthetics career can be richly fulfilling in numerous ways, provided that you’re clear about the benefits and realistic about what it will demand of you. Creative people will love the freedom to design treatment programs, the company image, and maybe even the look and feel of the facility. Yet that same creative force will feel frustrated and stifled by the numbing routine of business chores that accompany a team of one. The more business-minded individuals will soon experience the troubling dilemma of being unable to grow the company while constrained by a full treatment schedule. In fact, the only real way to operate an independent business successfully is to face the fact that it cannot be done alone. Suddenly you’re not solo anymore, but now managing others who may ultimately dream of running away with a slice of your pie! Food for thought.
Best of luck to you! |
