We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Courtney Wacker a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Courtney, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?
“To create gorgeous, lived-in hair color that genuinely looks expensive, luxurious and seamless for months after your appointment. We strive to provide our clients with an unparalleled customer experience unlike anything they’ve ever encountered. Honesty and authenticity are at the forefront of what we do, and we believe that our clients deserve to feel educated, beautiful and excited about their hair long after they leave our salon.”
Our Misson statement as listed above is what we strive to do to serve our customers, but my mission to my team is much much deeper than this.
As someone who grew up in the toxicness of our industry, I dreamt of giving more to more to my staff. The salon industry has been plagued with abuse, belittlement, berating and many, many other things for a very long time. As someone who experienced every form of this from mentors, owners and co-workers throughout my career I made it one of my life goals to make sure that I created a safe, toxic-free work environment for my staff. Breaking away from the horrible traditions we so desperately need to leave behind!
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
As someone who grew up with an alcoholic father and absent mother, I never had a stable home life, which led me to never really have a stable academic life, either. I spent a lot of time growing up thinking there was something wrong with me because I never really wanted to go to college or follow a “traditional” path like so many of my friends did.
I always loved the beauty industry, though. And from a very, very young age, I loved (and I mean LOVED) everything about going to the salon. The way it smelled, the energy in the space, the sounds of the dryers. Most of all, though, I loved the way I FELT when I was there and when I would leave.
In middle school I started getting more into fashion, and along with this came more exciting haircuts and styles. By my sophomore year in high school, I had short hair, was coloring and cutting friends’ hair, and was well on my way to becoming the stylist I am today!
Shortly after high school, i applied to apprentice at the salon I had gone to all through high school. It was, in my eyes, the ONLY option as it was the best salon in the city I was applying to. To my surprise, I was hired nearly on the spot and began my apprenticeship in the fall of that year.
The excitement quickly wore off when I discovered the way salons work on the INSIDE. From the outside they can seem like these wealthy, fancy, fun, “everyone loves everyone” spaces, but unfortunately, the reality for the majority of them is very, very opposite of this. There is a very clear hierarchy, cattiness, jealousy and competition, fighting and more. I still vividly remember the first time my mentor said something that really put me down and how much it crushed me. I took the abuse (as everyone did back then), and kept focusing on doing hair and learning the techniques I was being taught. Eventually, I parted ways with that salon and found my way through a couple of others until I landed in the salon that I would call home for nearly 5 years before going out on my own.
Within the first year of becoming an independent stylist, I knew that I wanted to open my own salon someday. I wanted to write a love letter to our industry about how we could still run successful salons and treat people really well doing it. I wanted to show what it looks like to raise stylists with love and compassion instead of beating them (emotionally) into submission. I wanted to show what a salon without a hierarchy could look like when it was thriving. I wanted to protect new stylists coming into the industry from what I experienced. But most of all, I wanted to do my part in being a supportive, kind, ego-free mentor to the people who trusted me with their careers.
Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?
When I opened Urban Indigo Hair Co. in 2015 it was as a salon suite. By the time I expanded into 2200sqft in 2021 I had become a mom, started showing signs of a chronic illness and would soon be hit with the most traumatizing and scary years of my life.
I had not been feeling well (sudden nausea, dizziness, other pretty severe GI issues) since the birth of my daughter in 2019. Everything was pretty sporadic and would only show up once a month or so though, so I pushed it off and kept moving forward with life. We signed the lease to Urban Indigo in April of 2021 and by June my symptoms had ramped up and had become pretty severe. When we opened the salon, we opened as a chair rental salon and I had one person come with me. She was my only renter (and had discounted rent) so I was responsible for carrying most of the costs on my income.
Around Christmas of that year, a former hairstylist friend had reached out needing somewhere to go after being asked to leave her rental situation. This should have been the first red flag (and the fact that I had already cut ties with her once) but nonetheless I offered her a space in my salon to rent and she brought a friend with her. She was planning on opening her own rental salon so the stay was supposed to be short (spoiler alert-it was not short) and sweet.
By December of that year, I could hardly keep any food down and would come to find out my gallbladder had gone bad. I didn’t end up having surgery to remove my gallbladder until march 1st of 2022 and by that time I was very, very sick.
I was somehow still able to grow my rental business (this illness I was dealing had become chronic. I was basically living with the stomach flu every single day and was only able to tolerate about 5 foods. These foods were still causing severe GI upset-but they didn’t actually make me throw up so I was doing okay). I grew to 4 renters and we were able to pay the bills without me behind the chair. My first renter left at the end of 2021 because her rent was supposed to increase to the normal rate and she didn’t want to pay that. But with 4 people we were able to keep the doors open and I could focus on my recovery and getting better.
The problem was that the first renter I brought in was trying to steal my entire business from underneath me. I had given her a place to work and she had decided that she wanted what was mine and tried very, very hard to take it. Once I got wind of what was going on (group text that didn’t include me, her bashing me to the other stylists, etc) I opted to kick her out. We asked her to leave and she refused, so we had the police department escort her off the property. This unfortunately put a sour taste in the other renters mouths and I offered for them to leave as I honestly just wanted everyone gone. I felt so betrayed and so angry that someone I helped had done something so horrible, especially when I had been so, so sick and was trying to so hard to hang on!
I September of 2022 we removed that renter, I soon after got covid (which knocked me out for 6 weeks) and by October 1 everyone was out of my salon and things looked very, very different for me. I went from having all bills paid to being the sickest I’ve ever been with no income other than mine. A seven chair salon with only one person working in it. I was embarrassed, ashamed and so, so down.
I had two choices. Give up, close the doors, or I could try again.
So I got to work (before I opened I had done all the prep for employees as well as renters-so I did have things in place. I opened a rental salon because I didn’t think anyone would ever want to work for me-hello years of abuse, beratement and belittling shining through!) and decided that I had to at least TRY to hire employees. That’s what I did. February 14th of 2023 I hired my second employee ever and that was the start of us getting to where we are now!
I was FORCED to change the direction of my business because the way I was treated by the renters I had showed me how much that business model wasn’t for me. They were lazy, entitled, rude and selfish. They didn’t follow their leases, never cleaned, never helped out and just expected everything be done for them. It was honestly such a learning lesson for me. That experience forced a pivot I didn’t necessarily want or ask for, but ended up being such a blessing, genuinely.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
Not only have I had to navigate normal, everyday business struggles, I’ve had to do it all with severe, chronic illness. I have built a team in less than 2 years that generates 6 figures of business a year. I had to get creative on training, how to run my salon remotely and I had to get very, very transparent and very very honest with my staff and with myself on my limitations and what I can and cant promise. Becoming ill has changed my life in so many ways-but the most beautiful thing that has come from it is the people who I get to work with everyday. They are kind, supportive, and genuinely grateful to be part of our team. I deeply believe that my resilience and my fight to keep my business alive is a testament to my love for this industry. I want to be here. I belong here.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.urbanindigohair.com
- Instagram: /urbanindigohairco
- Facebook: urban indidgo hair
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