We were lucky to catch up with Alyssa Lalla recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alyssa , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Risk taking is something we’re really interested in and we’d love to hear the story of a risk you’ve taken.

The biggest risk I took was creating my business. When I came up with the idea of having my business I was just 16 years old I started out doing makeup, but then Covid hit and I was working a regular 9-5 job. When I turned 18 I was going to college, and still working a regular 9-5 job. I decided to take a risk and start practicing lash extensions, at this time I was not doing makeup consistently so my business wasn’t running. After a couple of months of practicing lash extensions I had an opportunity to work in a salon performing this service, and this was a big risk for me. I ended up leaving college and leaving my 9-5 job to focus on my business, every decision I have made has been for my business, and they have all been a risk to take. Now I’m 20 years old a licensed esthetician, owning my own salon suite and performing many services other than just lash extensions.

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

I am a 20 year old licensed esthetician, I’ve been in the industry for almost over 2 years now and I professionalize in beauty maintenance. Over the past year I have been focusing on building my brand, LyssasBeautyEmpire, “Where beauty grows within”.
Building this business from scratch has not been easy especially in the society that we live in I can say it’s hard to ask for help and it’s hard to take classes that you generally get no real education on. I built LyssasBeautyEmpire all alone, no classes, no help all self taught. Being in this industry has had its fair shares of ups and downs, but
I have realized that it’s more than just providing a service for my clients, but also creating an experience, not a lot of people talk about women’s beauty, nor do they show case the other services women get in order to feel beautiful. I’m building a brand to show case all of this. I want women to feel beautiful in their own body, when they come to me they wake up and feel beautiful about their eyelashes, I’ve also tapped into other services than just lash extensions, such as waxing and facials. A lot of women are shy when it comes to waxing but I’m trying to build a platform where women know it’s ok to be shy, and it’s perfectly normal to get waxed. One of the main things I’m very proud of when it comes to my business is knowing that I’m able to make women feel beautiful inside and out.
I continue to give gratitude to my beautiful clients, new and returning for always trusting me to make them feel beautiful each and every time they visit me. This is only the beginning for LyssasBeautyEmpire, there is a lot to come for the upcoming future.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

One lesson I had to unlearn is to not let people take advantage of your work. When I first started out I was a beginner so a lot of people would not pay me or I would do things for free. Some people expected because they knew me or came to me from the begging that they would get a sale or half off on services. It was a hard me to put my foot down, even till this day it is a bit hard for me to be tough but in order to make it in this industry you have to stand your ground and gain the respect for your business.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

Building my audience on social has been hard for me, it took me a while to really set the audience that I want. It took a lot of posting, a lot of messaging girls and asking them to model for me. Eventually I started taking strategies and putting them together to build my social media platform now. If I had any advice for anyone who is interested in this industry and don’t know where to start or feel like what they post has to be perfect my answer is, don’t worry about what you post and making it perfect, you will learn along the way what best suites you and your business. Post consistently because the more you post the more you’ll get recognized and come up on the social medias algorithm. Don’t feel afraid to post your self as well, people want to get to know the face behind the brand and the more you show your self and your personality people will look forward to watching your page.

Contact Info:

• Website: LyssasBeautyEmpire.as.me
• Instagram: LyssasBeautyEmpire
• Youtube: Lyssa Lalla