We were lucky to catch up with Derek Davenport recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Derek thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you recount a time when the advice you provided to a client was really spot on? (Please note this response is for education/entertainment purposes only and shouldn’t be construed as advice for the reader)

Over the years, I’ve had the pleasure of working with so many unique individuals all with their own stories. These stories have inspired me in so many ways throughout my career and have encouraged me to make both personal and professional changes in my own life. As business owners, there are always risks we can take and these can be very scary. I was discussing risk taking with a client during their session and they said to me “take the risk. who cares who is watching.” That advice early on in my venture as a business owner has pushed me to continue taking risks and pushing to better my brand.

Derek, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I have been a licensed esthetician for 8 years now and have owned my own practice, Urban Routine Wellness, located in Wichita, Kansas for close to six years now. My brand has evolved a few times since opening and we operate as a wellness center because we offer an array of diverse services. We currently offer injections, hair, skin therapy, massage, laser hair removal, and eyelash extensions (to name a few). Our mission with my company is to help individuals regain their confidence and power back. We believe in building better humans whether that be wives, husbands, brothers, sisters, etc. What has set us apart is our evolving services and continuing education to be the best at what we do. My team and I also create an inclusive space for all individuals and how they identify.

I fell in to this industry after working corporate during my early 20’s. I left corporate to run a holistic, five star spa in Dallas, Texas. During my time as a general manager, I fell IN LOVE with skincare. I pursued my license at the Aveda Institute in Dallas, Texas and moved back to Kansas in 2015 to be closer to family and grow in my craft.

Looking back on my time of being a business owner, I am most proud of the growth of my business. Along the way I’ve taken risks that sometimes have worked and sometimes have not, but each risk has taught me more about owning a business and myself. It’s allowed me to pivot when needed and continuing serving our community.

If you could go back in time, do you think you would have chosen a different profession or specialty?

If I had to go back, I would absolutely choose this profession again. It has been one of the most rewarding journeys in my life thus far. I’ve been able to help and connect with so many individuals all over the world. With our industry being so progressive, it never gets stagnant and requires us to continue learning all the time.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

This question comes at a relevant time. In 2022, we decided we wanted to expand to another part of time and open our lifestyle concept that included personal training/ boot camp style classes. We selected a large location that we felt fit our needs. A month after we signed the lease, we had to shut down our main location downtown due to safety issues within the building. For three months, we rented out two different spas to get us through while we had two build outs going on to relocate our downtown location that was shut down and open our new location located on the East side of town. After opening, I quickly realized that having two locations was not filling my cup. I was spending a lot of energy getting both up and running. We had worked hard since opening the brand in 2017 to create a unique experience and I feel like that had been lost a bit when we were trying to navigate two locations. Along with the energy of running two locations, my husband and I have five children we have adopted out of foster care and we were losing quality time with our kids that we didn’t feel was right. We want our family and business to both get time that they deserve and one not taking from the other. With all of this in mind, we recently made the difficult decision to close the bigger location and move all operations to our downtown location.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.urbanroutinewellness.com
• Instagram: Derek_urbanroutinewellness