Hellen ward - the ultimate salon manager
Managing director of the award-winning Richard Ward Hair & Metrospa, Hellen Ward, promised to share with delegates her journey from taking over a bankrupt salon to running a business with a multi-million pound turnover - and this is what she delivered.
"People don't know this but I am a hairdresser," Hellen told delegates at the outset of her presentation.
She went onto explain that early on in her career she realised that she wasn't a "great" hairdresser and that she was more interested in the figures than the creative side of the business.
She decided to focus on the management side, working for a major chain of salons. "I learnt what it was like to manage a business with two staff or 102 staff."
She and Richard were just 26 when they opened their first salon and, she admits, "We were terrified. We couldn't afford to make a lot of mistakes. We knew that if we could give it enough time we could turn things around. I felt that time wasn't on our side. We had to make inroads very quickly."
In those early days the couple were prepared to get their hands dirty. Said Hellen: "We used to go in at 5am every morning and mop the floors - we did everything on a shoestring and slowly everything began to work."
The hard work paid off and since 2005 the salon has been based at its current site on Duke of York Square, Chelsea. And, despite its huge success, Hellen has no plans to roll out a chain based on the obviously effective blueprint.
"We decided to focus on one big salon," she told delegates. "From my days on the road I knew I didn't want to spend my time travelling between salons juggling plates. At least if it was under one roof I felt I could some of the other things I wanted to do with my life such as having children."
It's a philosophy that has paid off, with Richard Ward Hair & Metrospa now turning over £5m per year.
Much of the salon's success comes from the company's investment in its people - it was recently voted outstanding in the Sunday Times Best Companies to Work For - an accolade voted for by the team.
Said Hellen: "We employ around 80 staff and 70% of the styling and technical team are home-grown. We very rarely employ from the outside. If they join us young we can mould them. The staff we grow ourselves tend to work best for us."
Known for their celebrity and even royal clientele, Hellen told delegates it was important not to get to focussed on this element of the business. "Every client to us is a princess. Celebrities make up a very small percentage of clients so we have to keep that in perspective."
Vital to the success of any business, said Hellen was to regularly undergo a health check.
"It's vital to know your target market," she told delegates. "We survey our clients continuously, including their interest in new products. We act on feedback.
When the congestion charge was introduced, for example, we thought about opening on a Sunday so clients wouldn't have to pay it, but when we asked out clients, 97% said they wouldn't visit us on a Sunday if we did open."
It was also important to Monitor the competition, said Hellen, who told delegates she regularly did mystery shopping at other salons.
Hellen also advised all salon owners to analyse and track business performance in every department and track them consistently. "This is the only way to know if something is a trend or a one-off," she said.
Another vital element to a successful business, said Hellen was to
Have realistic profit expectations - "I aim for 10% NET profit. This allows me to reinvest in my brand. I don't believe anything more than that can be sustained.
Another point Hellen was keen to stress in these difficult trading times was that
Value is nothing to do with price. "When the recession hit we took apart our client experience from beginning to end. The one thing all the brands had that we thought would survive was consistency."
Hellen rounded off her presentation by introducing delegates to her Ultimate Salon Management software system. "I believe it's unique because I wrote it," she said.
And with 25 years of hands-on experience behind her, delegates had no doubt she knew her stuff.
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