Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Sarah Collins. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Sarah, appreciate you joining us today. Folks often look at a successful business and imagine it was an overnight success, but from what we’ve seen this is often far from the truth. We’d love to hear your scaling up story – walk us through how you grew over time – what were some of the big things you had to do to grow and what was that scaling up journey like?

Lucky Locks started out as a journey of a girl who constantly had her eyes peeled for magic and was toeing the edge of burnout from being on a computer for 100% of her job.

My name is Sarah Collins and I am the founder of Lucky Locks, a now world-wide community of women who exist to provide the magic that a little every day glitter can bring to people’s days.

At the time that sparkles entered my orbit, I was a graphic designer and photographer working to build my “tiny yet mighty” visual marketing company, Neon Grounds. In my 20’s, I had worked for small advertising agencies to well known footwear brands and quickly learned that I had no energy to build someone else’s dream, so I committed to pour into my own. It was a great few years of freelancer freedom until I realized I still felt a bit trapped and that there was creative energy brewing inside of me and I needed to do something about it. So I made up a company called Lucky Locks and turned it into my design client — one where I was simply exercising my creative muscles in a way that wasn’t dictated by a paycheck or another company’s creative vision. I took gorgeous portraits of my sparkled clients, I built a website and I designed these stunning, gold foiled business cards for Lucky Locks in hopes that after I put sparkles in peoples hair, I would hand them said business cards and convert them into design or photography clients. While people were always charmed by the cards and my marketing, winning them as design/photography clients only panned out a small handful of times. However, people did hold on to these luxurious cards and reached out to me for more sparkles. Soon enough I was receiving more money in exchange for these services than I had been for what I had attained my college degree… so I slowly began to trade out my professional title of “Graphic Designer & Photographer” for a more whimsical one — “Sparkler”.

One evening I was set up sparkling in a quirky little pie shop that also offered financial advising. There was live music and wine, and a woman who would propose an opportunity that would blow up my side hustle far beyond my intentions. She had invited me to pop-up at Nordstrom for a Mother’s Day event, which honestly felt like a flop…customers looked at me sideways and scuttled away when I offered a free sparkle if they were a mother. So, instead I sparkled all of the employees which ended up catching the attention of customers for weeks afterwards, which then prompted Nordstrom management to invite me back regularly for well over a year. The amount of traction and brand awareness I gained from that corporate relationship was the snowball that started the wonderful avalanche of opportunities and growth that would lie ahead.

I had this feeling that Lucky Locks was bigger than me as people in every state I traveled to asked where and how they could have the sparkles too — so I invited my little sister on as my first brand partner to bring the sparkles to another state, which prompted me to lay the foundation for what we call “The Partner Program”. Individuals continued to ask where and how they could be sparkly too, but more and more people began to express interest in sharing the magic with their communities in the same way my sister and I had been sharing with ours. I was excited and honored to pave the path for other women to become bosses of their own schedules and to help them earn their own income in a way that felt life giving and fun.

From 2016-2023 we have grown to a network of over 70 Brand Partners who operate their own Lucky Locks and 100+ Salons who serve our product and I couldn’t be more elated about the community that has been knit together by these sparkly strands.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

My name is Sarah and I wear many hats as a graphic designer, photographer, sparkle empress, business owner and more. I founded my company Lucky Locks in 2016 where we have built and continue to grow our community of mobile, self employment women all over the globe. We provide magical hair adornments at events and to individuals for appointments

Lucky Locks is a luxury level up from hair tinsel — instead of a plastic based product, ours are silk based strands that comes in the widest range of colors on the market (over 40 colors). They are heat, bleach, dye and brush resistant, and with our installation method can last in your hair for several weeks to several years!

Any advice for managing a team?

We encourage personal dialogue between each partner via social media and private group discussions so that we can learn from and encourage each other. As the founder, I make myself available to everyone for personalized support and do not place myself on a pedestal where I cannot be reached. I love to help my partners learn from my mistakes so that their success can be expedited. We try to keep the energy high and feed off of each other’s stoke and support.

Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?

I always thought that to become self employed I would need to work a 40 hour a week job and stash away some savings before venturing off on my own…so that is what I did. I have a resistance to debt and owing anyone anything, so this business has been entirely self-funded. We’ve had many reach out to invest in our growth, but have not been in the place to take anyone up on it. Our growth has been slow and steady as I’ve wanted to be thoughtful about every move and so slow and steady is how it has had to be.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.luckylocks.co
• Instagram: @luckylocks.co
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/luckylocks.co/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-collins-642148b/

Image Credits
Seed Photography Sierra Selene Neon Grounds