We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Shaila Paredes. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Shaila below.

Alright, Shaila thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Before we get into specifics, let’s talk about success more generally. What do you think it takes to be successful?

I think everyone will have a different answer as to what they think success is or looks like. To me, being successful in my industry means being able to come into work everyday and not have it feel like work. I am very grateful for my amazing clients that keep me booked and allow me to have a great time while dong what I love for the past 10 years and counting.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Let me introduce myself. My name is Shaila Paredes and I am the owner of Brows by Shaila inc at Sola Salons Brentwood. I am a Brow Specialist that started my career 20 years ago. After graduating High School I attended Esthetician school knowing I wanted to do brows and makeup. After getting my certificate I was fortunate to be able to apprentice under Eugenia Weston, owner of Senna Cosmetics. During my apprenticeship I not only learned the art of Brow Shaping and make-up application but it also taught me how to deal with different types of people. Since then I have worked for other Brow Artists and Make-up brands until 2013 when I decided to venture out on my own. I am so grateful and proud to be able to say that I have worked for myself for the past 10 years. I accredit that to my loyal clientele that I have built by sticking to my philosophy of “less is more” when it comes to brows. I have always believed in keeping everyones brows as full as possible by not trying to create a new shape, but instead enhancing everyones natural shape. I also believe in creating a welcoming and relaxing space for clients to feel pampered and hopefully leave feeling more relaxed and beautiful.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

For the first 10 years of my career I worked for other brow artists and I really got to see what I liked and didn’t like in how they ran their business. At times, it could get frustrating because I wanted to be able to control the environment in which I saw my clients or make small adjustments like play the music I liked but I couldn’t. All of my experiences just motivated me to want to venture out on my own, but it can also be a scary thing. There came a time when I just wasn’t happy at my previous work place and I decided to just go for it and rent a space in a new building that wasn’t even built yet. I knew that it wouldn’t be easy because starting in a new place meant building a new clientele, but I knew that I could do it. The first year at Sola I definitely had my moments when I would have a slow day and question if I had made the right decision, but I pushed myself and did what I could to build. In between clients I would walk around the neighborhood and pass out my card and leave them in mail boxes (I know now thats illegal) and I introduced myself to all my coworkers and offered to do their brows if they referred me clients. The first year wasn’t easy but Im still here 10 years later and I can say it was definitely worth it.

Let’s move on to buying businesses – can you talk to us about your experience with business acquisitions?

I have never bought a business but I did decide to open another location a few times. I am very lucky to be able to stay busy at my studio and there were times when I felt I had plateaud and I wanted to do it all over again from the beginning so I decided to open a 2nd location. My last adventure was renting a studio at a Sola in Orange County. It was a beautiful location and although I knew I could build there with time, I found myself not only working more days but also found it hard to try and build a new business when you have another one that was busy and needed me on the days I wasn’t there. It was a fun adventure but I learned that unless you want to hire employees, It is best to have 1 successful business that you can dedicate all your time and attention too…”less is more”.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.browsbyshaila.com
• Instagram: @browsbyshaila