Education of the Beauty School Student

Many of us in the beauty industry have seen the disastrous effects of inadequate beauty school training. A student graduates beauty school with high hopes of doing a job that they love, only to become quickly frustrated by their inability to make a good living. The exception to this is the student who is lucky enough to have a mentor in the industry that provides them with the real education that they need to succeed. So why, after years of paid education, does a student require more on-the-job training to be a success? The answer is usually an inadequate and flawed beauty school system.
If we look at beauty schools as producers of a product then we can understand that beauty school graduates are a product that is thrown into the marketplace unfinished. The reasons for this start at the very foundation of beauty school: curriculum, requirements, intentions and corruption. First, beauty school curriculum is typically outdated and obsolete. One may assume that doing hair could not have drastically changed over the last decade or two. But with new tools and products coming out every year it becomes imperative for beauty schools to keep up with the times. The use of old textbooks and out-dated styling techniques cripples the student coming into the industry. Veteran hairstylists constantly pursue new education while beauty school students are taught the same old thing. Shouldn’t beauty schools be required to update their curriculum so that the product they produce, the new stylist, will enter the marketplace with the most up-to-date information? The answer would be yes if it were required of the schools to produce a good product.
Unfortunately, beauty schools are based on quantity instead of quality. A good quality school would be interested in producing students that have the knowledge and skills to succeed in the industry. Requirements should be based on teaching the student to run a business, be a salesperson, market their services as well as be a great stylist. Requirements based on hours alone do not come close to achieving this basic standard. Therefore, students graduate with deficiencies and become frustrated when they learn that just doing hair is not enough to build a business.
Perhaps the most flawed part of the beauty education system is the corruption of the schools. Manufacturer Schools, those that are named and based around a major name-brand product, not only have the intention of producing as many students as possible in order to gain profit from tuition, they also intend to brainwash students into being loyal to their hair products. What could be more genius than to produce students that will go out into the world selling your products for you? It is exceptionally good for the manufacturer but not so good for the stylists or the salon owner who hires them. Diversion of hair products from salon-only status to readily available anywhere has ruined the stylist’s ability to make income from sales.
We have all noticed the massive wave of diversion from products sold “at salons only” to available at all major drugstores, super markets and warehouse stores. Major manufacturers have betrayed the trust of the stylists and salon owners who have spent years supporting their products, only to be left with products sitting on the shelves. And yet these products have a huge influence on beauty school education. Not only do Manufacturer schools push the diverted products, most beauty schools become favorable to certain products based on
marketing designed to gain loyalty from the students. Little do the students know that they are being brainwashed to support a product that WILL NOT support them.
“Product Diversion” should be a required subject at all beauty schools. Students need to learn the effects of diversion on their business. For example, a good stylist/salesperson could sell around $7000 of product a month from behind the chair, which would be about half that in profit for the salon owner and 10% profit for the stylist. After the wave of diversion these numbers have drastically reduced. Consumers buy products from the grocery store. The salon owner and the stylist are losing income because of faulty training that starts in beauty school. The most tragic part of this debacle is that new students and those graduating will not even know what they have missed: an industry that supports its stylists. Until beauty schools are required to truly educate the stylist on the business of beauty, then stylist and salon owners will continue to struggle.

Joseph Kellner – The REAL Hair Truth Documentary

Martin Rodriguez

Rate this:

Share this:

Like this:

Related

Published by Joseph Kellner