We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Germaneke Drone a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Germaneke, appreciate you joining us today. One of the most important things we can do as business owners is ensure that our customers feel appreciated. What’s something you’ve done or seen a business owner do to help a customer feel valued?
One of the things that I feel like my customers appreciate is the personal relationship I create with them in my shop. It’s a journey that we’re on and I want everybody to appreciate their hair journey at least in my chair. I want you to appreciate your hair journey I want you to fall in love with your hair because how we treat our own hair is how our hair will show up for us so the biggest way I show my customers that I appreciate them is investing in their hair. That’s why I want to create my own product line for conditioning and maintaining healthy hair while it’s in protective styles, and I feel that’s gonna be the most beneficial thing I can do for anybody that comes in my shop is taking their hair serious. What my hands personally do for their hair, I want them to care for their hair like I care.
Germaneke, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
My business is a pandemic baby at its finest. It started as something that I thought was really cute and then found out really fast that it’s a lot of responsibility. With that, I found so much of who I am from starting my business. My business has made me more responsible, more accountable and more intentional with everything that I do. When I was working at aviation, I thought that I was the most important employee on the floor until I started working for myself, and I instantly seen why I was being called into the office on a regular basis. I want to fire myself every day there’s not a day where I show up to work and I feel like I’m my best employee but because of that I aspire to be my best every day. The world of a braider is very oversaturated, especially in today’s age because it’s so accessible to become a braider. You can watch a few YouTube videos and become a braider but one thing I knew is to take the business seriously. I didn’t wanna play with nobody’s craft, there are men and women that show up to this career daily grinding and feel like they never really see the light in the end of the tunnel for me not only am I trying to match and meet every one of my clients needs whether it be a style I’ve never done or a style that I’ve become a professional at . I want to take the hair care journey to another level in the world of braids. The history of braids, alone, commands respect, and I feel like the story that can be told the fellowship that can be shared the generational wealth that can be generated is inspirational. for me braiding is a vehicle to help me do the things that I feel like I was here to do and that’s bring heaven to earth. I want people to leave better than they came whether that be from a joke and they laughed or from motivation because they hear I started or just joy, because I just naturally enjoy being goofy and fun. I feel like I don’t need to show my differences in my business. I really aim to show the similarities and the strength fellowship, the strength in collaborating. The strength in partnership is what’s going to take everybody’s business to the next level because it’s not about why you should be in my chair. I want to be attached to promoting the next professional and collaborating. Preparing the future entrepreneurs giving them gems. It’s not just me. I want it to be we! That’s how we will build stronger communities. Braiding was my vehicle to breaking bread to fellowship to sit down and sharing knowledge and sharing wisdom. I want to grow my fan base to a point where they feel a part of a community where they can ask questions where they can feel like they have guidance where they can feel like they found a friend that they can meet up with and have a drink with or they met a girl that they never thought they would have met, but because we found common ground in our hair it creates a movement to where we’re proactive in multiple arenas. I like creating so the content that I create is vibrant and inclusive and entertaining, but at the same time, educational and encouraging and motivating, I want when people experience my content they feel the value the value is in the smile they had or the “that girl is crazy!” or “that girl so goofy to me!” Those are valuable to me. Students in high school are confused scared unsure, and I want to help them. Help Find some stability. I want to help them find common ground. I want to help them find themselves whether or not they don’t wanna braid. They will find character building resources and my workshops. They will find light, and focus in my courses, they will find mentorship in my internships. I want to show the world what a little girl from Kansas City can do.
Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?
I started with $20. It was the pandemic this is before we knew there was PPP loans before we knew about stimulus checks before we knew about unemployment statuses. All I had was $20 and my lease was about to be up. I had two daughters that I had to be Present for, failure was never an option so I started with helping my sister with a new hairdo and then a cousin saw that and then a friend saw that and that’s what created my braid journey. It started from word-of-mouth, but from my struggle, I found my strength.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
I thank God that the responsibility is not just on me, because I was created my belief system and knowing that I was created takes a lot of stress off of me. There has been times within the last year where bills consumed every part of my profit and I was down to a dollar, but something about getting into my spiritual bag Always pulled me out to where that next week I made twice what I was needing to survive for the next coming month and each time my resilience was present I unlocked a new level. My faith was tested each time. I felt like man I should really just work on airplanes again this career this lifestyle has shown me so to hold on , because as soon as I’m getting to a place where I’m ready to quit, my angels show me why I need to hold on because there is so much more that I can do with the gift in my hands
Contact Info:
- Website: https://Hairgoalsbygerm.as.me
- Instagram: HairGoals.bygerm
- Facebook: HairGoals By Germ
- Linkedin: Germaneke Drone
- Youtube: Thee_goofygurl
Image Credits
Lesabre Photography
Germaneke Drone