Build Your Salon With Phil Jackson

You're maxed out, turning clients away, and thinking about hiring someone. STOP. Hiring at the wrong time, for the wrong reasons, nearly broke Phil's own business. Don't make the same costly mistake.In this episode, Phil Jackson shares his essential green lights and red flags to ensure you hire correctly, profitably, and sustainably for your salon.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━THE THREE GREEN LIGHTS TO HIRE:* **80-85% Utilisation Rule:** You must be consistently booked at 80-85% (or above) for at least three months, including quieter periods. If you're not, you have a demand problem, not a capacity problem.* **Raise Your Prices First:** Before hiring, increase your prices by 10-20%. If your diary remains full, your business is strong. If it empties, hiring won't fix a pricing issue.* **Delegate Low-Value Tasks:** If over 20% of your week is spent on admin, laundry, or stock, consider outsourcing first. This frees your time for profitable client work without adding a full-time wage.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

You're maxed out, turning clients away, and thinking about hiring someone. STOP. Hiring at the wrong time, for the wrong reasons, nearly broke Phil's own business. Don't make the same costly mistake.In this episode, Phil Jackson shares his essential green lights and red flags to ensure you hire correctly, profitably, and sustainably for your salon.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━THE THREE GREEN LIGHTS TO HIRE:* **80-85% Utilisation Rule:** You must be consistently booked at 80-85% (or above) for at least three months, including quieter periods. If you're not, you have a demand problem, not a capacity problem.* **Raise Your Prices First:** Before hiring, increase your prices by 10-20%. If your diary remains full, your business is strong. If it empties, hiring won't fix a pricing issue.* **Delegate Low-Value Tasks:** If over 20% of your week is spent on admin, laundry, or stock, consider outsourcing first. This frees your time for profitable client work without adding a full-time wage.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

That last-minute cancellation or no-show isn't just annoying; it's a hole in your pocket and a sign your booking system is broken. You're losing thousands and know a salon deposit policy is the answer, but you're scared. Phil Jackson reveals how to implement it confidently.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Are you running a 'profitable' salon business according to your accountant and software, yet your bank account looks grim? Many salon owners face the crushing reality of reported profits that don't translate to actual cash, leading to sleepless nights and self-doubt. Phil Jackson, your Queen of Salons, cuts through the confusion, revealing why this happens and providing actionable strategies to ensure your bank balance reflects your hard work.This episode demystifies where your money goes and how to fix it, so you can keep more cash in your salon business.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Are you wasting hours on social media for zero new salon clients? Discover how to redirect your marketing efforts to proven strategies that actually fill your appointment book.**Redefine Social Media's Role**Social media is no longer for finding new clients; its primary job is social proof and deepening existing relationships. Use it as a digital portfolio to show your work and personality, posting a couple of quality updates a week instead of daily.**Implement a Structured Referral Programme**Word-of-mouth is the most powerful marketing. Stop just telling clients "tell your friends" and create a proper system with real incentives, like a discount for the referred friend and a reward for the referring client, run as a targeted promotion.**Re-engage Lapsed Clients Effectively**Look at your client list for those who haven't visited in your average return period (e.g., 90 days for hair). Send a "we've missed you" text or email with an incentive. For even better results, make a bra

Is your salon membership programme failing within three months? You're not alone. Most crash and burn, not because memberships don't work, but because of critical execution errors that sabotage success and leave you with a cashflow rollercoaster.In this episode, Phil Jackson, your Queen of Memberships, reveals the silent killers of salon memberships and a simple structure to build a thriving, predictable income stream.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Most salon owners think they know if their business is profitable. They check the bank balance on a Friday and if there's money there, things must be okay. But a feeling isn't a profit plan, and a hunch isn't a strategy.In this episode, Phil Jackson interviews Braden Weinstock, founder of Pretty Data and owner of a profitable Los Angeles salon for 15+ years. Braden reveals why more than 50% of solo pros and independent salons aren't consistently making a profit, and shows exactly how to fix it.WHY CHECKING YOUR BANK BALANCE ISN'T A PROFIT PLANThe problem with running your salon from the bank account: you make decisions and spend money without knowing if you actually have profit. Then tax season arrives and you realize you didn't make money last year. If you're not making money on every client, you're just working to go out of business faster.THE DATA PROBLEM (AND HOW PRETTY DATA SOLVES IT)Salon financial data is scattered: booking systems have revenue but not expenses. Accounti

The minimum wage went up on 6th April, and your team is watching. But with thin margins, how do you handle pay rise conversations without it costing you your entire business? Many salon owners kick it into the long grass and lose good people.This episode gives you a simple plan to manage salon pay rises confidently, fairly, and profitably.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Are you running your salon as a sole trader but feel like your business is outgrowing the structure? Many salon owners reach a point where unlimited liability and higher tax rates start to pinch, making you wonder if there’s a better way.This episode outlines the three clear signs that it’s time to switch your salon to a limited company.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Up to 20% of the population is neurodivergent — and a huge number of them are running salons. But nobody's talking about what that actually means: the chaos, the superpowers, and the systems that make it work.Amy Vince is a salon owner, educator, and self-described neuro spicy business builder. In this conversation she shares her journey from redundancy to salon ownership, her ADHD diagnosis at 29, and why her neurodivergence has become one of her greatest business advantages.ABOUT AMYAmy Vince is the owner of The Hidden Beauty Rooms and founder of The Hidden Beauty Academy. Nearly nine years in the industry, she trains students not just in treatment skills but in the fundamentals of running a beauty business.FROM DIAGNOSIS TO DIRECTION Amy failed maths and English at school but got an A star in art Diagnosed dyslexic at sixth form, then ADHD at 29 Why getting the diagnosis felt like a weight lifting, not a labelTHE CHALLENGES Emotional dysregulation and what a bad day really looks like Forgetting clie

Hitting £90,000 in turnover should be a huge celebration for your salon. For Phil Jackson, it nearly destroyed his business. He missed the VAT threshold for nine months, leading to a massive backdated bill for money he'd already spent. Don't let this happen to you.In this episode, Phil shares his costly mistake and gives you the exact steps to proactively manage your salon's VAT, avoid a surprise bill, and ensure your business grows profitably.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Draft

Picture this: it's your only day off, but your phone is buzzing with DMs about bookings and prices, and that promo email still isn't written. You're physically out of the salon, but mentally chained to admin that doesn't make you a penny. What if a digital twin could handle all this 24/7, freeing you to do what you love?This episode reveals how to build your own AI-powered digital twin to automate soul-draining salon admin, giving you back your time, sanity, and passion for the industry.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Are you endlessly busy in your salon, working all hours, but still feel like you're just surviving? Many salon owners pour their heart and soul into their business only to find it dictates their life, rather than supporting it.Phil Jackson challenges you to assess if your salon business is genuinely working for you, or if you've simply created a job you happen to own. This episode delivers a crucial framework to evaluate your salon's health and start building a business that serves your lifestyle.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Does the UK tax year end on 5th April fill you with dread? Many salon owners feel anxious, unsure what they owe or what they should have done differently. You've got 9 days to fix it.Phil Jackson shares 5 practical, immediate steps to get your salon's finances in order and sail through the tax year end with confidence.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Dread that difficult conversation with a team member? You've rehearsed it, avoided it, and now resentment is building and standards are slipping. Putting it off is doing more harm than good, affecting your salon's culture and bottom line.This episode gives you a simple, four-part framework to approach these vital discussions with confidence and achieve clear outcomes.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━WHY WE AVOID DIFFICULT CONVERSATIONS* **Fear of conflict:** As salon owners, we are people-pleasers, good at building relationships with clients and team members. We dread damaging those bonds.* **Guilt:** You haven't always been clear on expectations, so calling someone out now can feel very unfair.* **The damage of avoidance:** Resentment builds, standards drift, communication breaks down, and team members can become toxic to your workplace culture.PHIL'S FOUR-PART FRAMEWORK FOR EFFECTIVE REVIEWS* **1. Prepare with Focus:** * Know exactly the points you'll cover; you can even script key sentenc

Are you staring at empty slots in your appointment book this spring, hoping social media likes will magically turn into bookings? Stop wishing and start doing. This episode gives you a no-nonsense, three-point spring marketing plan that delivers real clients through your salon door.Phil Jackson, your Queen of Salons, reveals the direct, actionable strategies to fill your books NOW, without relying on Instagram.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Are you working flat out in your salon, always busy, but still struggling to pay yourself properly? It's a common trap: busyness doesn't automatically mean profitability. This episode reveals the four critical numbers every salon owner MUST track to turn their hard work into real profit.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Phil Jackson, your Queen of Salons, discusses the importance of effective quarterly strategic planning for salon owners. He guides viewers on how to properly map out actions beyond just setting revenue goals, emphasising that good planning is crucial for business growth. This video encourages salon owners to develop a clear strategy and focus on goal setting for a thriving business.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

RESOURCES:Memberships Made Easy: the programme for building a salon membership that actually works. https://queenofmemberships.comFalling out of love with the work that built your business is not failure. It is evolution. And a membership might be the most elegant way to make that transition without abandoning the clients you actually want to keep.This week I am answering a brilliant question from Summer at Flourish Beauty and Academy in Devizes, who wants to use a nail membership to pivot toward skin treatments. The answer applies to any salon owner who wants to reshape their column without burning down what they have built.WHY THIS INSTINCT IS RIGHTMost salon owners who want to change direction either do nothing and stay stuck, or go cold turkey and lose the clients they built their business on. Summer has found a third path. A membership is the bridge that lets you honour those long-term relationships while reshaping your column on your terms.THREE THINGS A TREATMENT-SPECIFIC MEMBERSHIP MUST HAVEABSOLUTE C