We were lucky to catch up with Hali Serrer recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hali, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

I was working without a goal and didn’t know why I had this career other than the facts being I love playing with hair and I have a deep desire to know people.

The typical salon environment was one that overwhelmed and overstimulated me. My experience in these salons since 2016 was that I felt like a machine pumping out haircuts and megawatt smiles, in hopes that my clients could not tell my brain was absolutely fried as I waited for my next opportunity to check my phone in the bathroom. Fast paced, sales driven, numbers driven. I get it, I want my bills paid too. It took the heart out of it after a while. The client/stylist connection began to feel obsolete and I knew something had to give.

It was me! I had to give myself a purpose because I had lost it. I wanted to give a kick-ass haircut and know the people who were trusting me with the one accessory they can’t take off. Hair will make or break how you feel, which I hate, but I’ve got one life to live so I might as well feel fabulous.

The mission of Soleil Studio and branching off on my own is to provide excellent service without feeling rushed. Creating a community with my clients. Providing a focused one-on-one service experience for my peeps to feel seen and heard! I wanted to give what I had not yet found in a salon environment.

I had to stop believing in other people’s dreams and have my own. Maybe that’s also a little bit of my mission statement. Light the fire under your own ass and see where it gets you.

Hali, 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 name is Hali.

I grew up watching my mom paint her nails red and bleaching her hair to look like Gwen Stefani, so naturally I had to be a hairdresser. I did not realize this and became a classically trained ballerina. My only dreams to dance with ABT, until a serious knee injury my senior year of high school derailed that. I sucked at school and wanted to be creative, so I went to beauty school. I hated it and went back to school. I hated my four year degree program and went back to hair. Here we are.

I assisted in a salon on Mackinac Island doing nails and wedding hair, worked in a small mom and pop shop in the UP, eventually came to Grand Rapids to make some roots, unbeknownst to myself.

After being aimless in what I wanted out of my career I had my lightbulb moment last year to open up my own salon suite. Nine months later fate would have it that a storefront fell into my lap and now it’s a whole salon.

I think I’m still learning to discipline myself properly. On what I have no idea, sometimes I feel like I throw ideas to the wall and see what sticks and it’s working pretty wonderfully thus far.

Concerning my craft I am obsessed with using my hands to create something cohesive and interesting to the eye. I want something with beautiful lines to catch your attention, to add or subtract from the features, to help clients see themselves in a different light. It’s pretty fantastic.

I create custom haircuts and color services suited for each client and their hair type/lifestyle.

My problem solving for clients include- finding the optimal style to wake up and go with, products that suit their hair and desired goal, and my favorite, how to create something they get longevity out of. The goal is to get a cut or color that grows with you, not against you.

I think what sets me apart from other salons and stylists is that my business model, albeit sounds crazy, I want my clients to come in as little as possible. Life is busy, I love getting my hair done, but if I could get a haircut that I don’t have to worry about for 4-6 months while on a rad product regimen, that would be stellar. So that’s what I do.
And it works!

I am most proud of allowing myself to be open to whatever comes my way. I did not intend to be a business owner. I did not intend to have a storefront. I would not have it any other way. My dream and I found each other, and I don’t think it would have happened had I not just said BRING IT.

What I’d like people to take away from me and what I do, is that I have a personal and professional responsibility to provide them with the opportunity to see themselves the way they want to be seen. That I know the beauty industry is gross and so are the standards that come along with it. That we can also find community in this and spin it on its head, make it our own thing where we connect as people with a mutual understanding that you want to look and feel your best, and I want to help you get there because I don’t know what else to do with myself in this life. It’s neato!

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

A lesson I had to unlearn is that my dream is not worth pursuing because it isn’t as big as someone else’s dream.

I wanted to be a ballerina, I hated myself for years for not ending up famous and perfect, yada yada. I did that with hair, too. Comparison is the killer of joy, and I killed my joy by seeing hairdressers with sponsors, all the tools money could buy, all the things money could buy in life. You know, the thing we all do.

So I thought my little dream of having a little salon for my little community was crap because it wasn’t THE BIG THING. What’s the big thing? The thing you’re not that you want to be but probably won’t ever be. I am not going to be rich and famous I am going to own my cute little salon and be someone’s mom probably and honestly, that sounds like the best time ever.

Shoot your shot, if you want to be something, be it. It’s also ok if you don’t end up that thing. What you become is probably just what you’re meant for. I had to accept I will not be all the things, but I will be good at what I am.

How did you build your audience on social media?

I started my hair page a few years ago, posting hair and whacky anecdotes about my life. People seemed to enjoy that and it brought in a lot of clients who enjoyed my silliness and stayed for the good haircut, too.

I’m not influencer popular by any means, not my objective, but I know everyone who follows me is a real person in the community who is acutely aware of what I am doing.

Engage with your community, don’t call them an audience you’re not performing. They might pay you for a service but you don’t want what you do to be anything but you being yourself. I know that speaks to my community and they value that mentality. Corny is corny for a reason, just be yourself. The right people will find you.

Contact Info:

• Website: Soleilstudio.site
• Instagram: soleilstudiogr

Image Credits
Aslyn Lapham Hali Serrer