Hi Kellie,

Short answer (in my opinion) is yes; you would be mad to consider it.

I am also in the North West (Liverpool) by the way.

Here's why I think renting a chair wouldn't be a great idea for you right now:

1. You have a list of 15/20 people who would come to you. Every 6 weeks, that works out at 3 clients per week. If you are renting a chair, you will need at least 7-8 clients per day guaranteed.

2. You have your NVQ level 2 but haven't got your NVQ level 3 yet. You need this, and to get it, you need to be employed.

3. You haven't been hairdressing very long. You might feel very confident, and your work might be great too, but there is loads more you could learn if you were given the chance. There is an easy way to get this training, and that is to approach a well established salon who is linked to one of the big product companies. If you are employed by them, they will send you on those courses, and the technicians from those companies will come into that salon and train you, as well as the salon training you too.
Think about how much you knew 2 years ago compared with what you know now. Now imagine where you could be in 2 years time with even more training, as opposed to getting hardly any and renting a chair.


You know something, I hadn't been hairdressing very long when my first boss, Margaret, offered me a similar "opportunity". She had 2 salons, and offered me the chance to buy one of them for £3,500. It was a small 3 seater salon, and I had worked in it too. I knew the area, and I knew the clients. Despite only being 18, I felt prepared and able to do it.
I asked my father to help me raise the funds and he talked me through it in a clear manner.
He asked me whether I wanted to still be in the same place at 24 years of age as I was at 18 years of age. He showed me that once I had bought that salon, I would be stuck there. He told me that I was only young, and that there was plenty of time to start my own business in the future; why didn't I explore the world a little first?

And do you know...he was right?

I didn't buy the salon, and instead I looked at what was happening "outside" my home town.

Within 6 months I was working in London being trained by some of the best. Heck, I even got a chance to be trained by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth's personal hairdresser - one on one!

2 months later I was lying on a beach in Haiti, listening to my "mix-tape" on my walkman, thinking of my friends and family back in England on a Tuesday morning, where it was inevitably raining.

I toured the Caribbean, spent every weekend in Miami and then headed off to New York and Canada.

6 months after that I found myself doing a World Cruise working in the spa onboard the famous QE2 cruiseship. I jumped out of planes in New Zealand, safaried in Africa, climbed volcanoes in Hawaii, learned to use Chopsticks in Hong Kong, shopped in New York and Hollywood, and snorkelled the Great Barrier Reef as well as visiting the palaces of Thailand and the poverty of India and Indonesia.

When I got back to England I found myself styling celebrities and doing education for salon groups who needed me.

At 22 I opened my first salon, and later that year was nominated as a finalist at the British Hairdressing Awards in London.

I did all that in 3 years.

Are you still sure you want to rent that chair?

Chris, dude... that is quite a bio, I must say. What a lovely life you have started for yourself and you just gave great advice. Very cool.