ACCORDING to plan

When setting up a salon, it can be hard to know where to begin. Elaine Beattie shares her top tips for crafting a business plan

You have to start with a business plan, looking at the summary of the business, what the business actually is.

The name is key and it’s one of the hardest bits at the very beginning. I don’t mind saying I chose mine over a bottle of wine! I came up with the name All About You - Urban Beauty Retreat and now it’s followed into my consultancy business as well, which is All About You Salon and Spa.

It’s great to have a fancy name, but if it doesn’t state what you are or what you do, there’s no point. It could help to come up with your mission statement first.

A mission statement is always important because that defines who you are, where you want to get to, and helps your clients understand what you’re all about as a company. So, my mission statement is: “At All About You we are dedicated to creating a personalised oasis, which meets our clients’ expectations using premium products and a relaxing environment, ensuring every visit is all about you.” It’s a bit cliché, but it works.

What should a business plan include?

• Company description

• Market research

• Salon services and products,

• Service offering

• Pricing

• Staffing plan

• Booking system

• Client journey

• Financial planning

Location, location, location

My very first salon didn’t have great parking, it wasn’t very visible and I learned from that hugely.

I was downstairs in a hotel to begin with, and I didn’t have any branding outside, so I had to promote the business in different ways. My advice would be to make sure you’ve got good footfall, and also consider what type of businesses you want to be beside.

I’ve got two beauty businesses next to me, a nail bar and a barber, and that drives more footfall into my salon. Never feel scared of new competition, it’s healthy and it drives more people to the area as well.

Daring to be different

To stand out from your competitors, it’s important that you have a unique selling point.

That can really be down to choosing your pricing, for example, affordable luxury or cheap and cheerful. You could offer a full range of services or specialise. You could offer express services or focus on all the finishing touches.

There isn’t one or the other that’s right or wrong. It depends on what you want your business to be and how you want your business to evolve.

This USP should carry through into your branding, salon offering, even the operations and layout of your space.

Looking to the future

There are lots of options for looking at where you want to be in the future. You could be a sole trader business, a limited company, or multi sited.

In my experience, when you first start out, you want to offer everything, you want to have lots of different brands, offer a whole wide range of facials, loads of different manicures, loads of different massages.

After about six months to a year, you’ll probably find that you’ll have a handful of treatments that are profitable and are very popular within your salon and that’s when you can really evolve. Ultimately, you really need to understand who your client is and who you want to target.

Elaine Beattie is owner of All About You - Urban Beauty Retreat in Newcastle and All About You Salon and Spa Consultancy. With 38 years’ experience, she worked for brands, spas and cruise ships before opening her own salon.