Why Some Salons Stay Busy, and Others Never Do
By Roei Cohen
Why are some high-end salons packed year after year while others, despite having beautiful spaces and incredibly talented people, seem to spend years trying to get busier?
The answer is simple, but also complicated.
Talent matters, of course. But in New York, talent is everywhere. You can barely turn your head without finding a great hairstylist, colorist, makeup artist, or extension specialist. There are many people doing beautiful work.
So talent alone cannot be the answer.
What I have learned over the years is that people want more than a great haircut or beautiful color. They want to feel known. They want to feel taken care of. And, maybe most importantly, they want to feel like they belong somewhere.
That is something I believe we have been able to build, improve, and perfect over the years at Valery Joseph. We created a community of clients.
And community does not come from a marketing campaign. It comes from how you treat people every single day.
Salons spend a lot of time talking about client loyalty. How do we keep clients? How do we make sure they come back? How do we stop them from going somewhere else? But I think we sometimes forget that loyalty has to go both ways.
Our clients know that when they need us, we are going to do everything we can to be there for them.
It could be a completely normal Tuesday afternoon. Every chair is booked, some are double-booked, the color department is full, and then the phone rings.
A longtime client suddenly has a movie premiere, a gala, a dinner with a celebrity or politician, or some event she did not know about a few days earlier. She had been hoping she could push her highlights another week. Now she needs them done before 5 p.m.
A lot of salons would simply say, “I'm sorry, we're fully booked.” And sometimes, of course, there are situations where something truly cannot be done. But our first reaction is never to say no.
We look at the book. We speak to the colorists. We speak to the assistants. We figure out where there might be an opening. We ask the client for some patience. And then we make it work.
Not by taking time or attention away from another client. Not by creating chaos. And certainly not by making the client feel like she is inconveniencing us.
We do it with a smile.
Because if someone has been loyal to you for years, I believe there should be moments when you show that you are loyal to them too.
That is what service really means.
Catering to a client is an art. It is not just performing the service, presenting the bill, and moving on to the next person. It is the entire experience.
Once our clients are inside the salon, they know they can relax. They know they will be offered our iced cappuccino. They know that if they suddenly realize they also need their nails done, waxing, makeup, another service, or something else before their evening, we will take care of it.
They know the assistants. They know the reception team. They know their colorist and their cutter. Some of them even know exactly which assistant they want because they love that person's signature head treatment and massage so much.
Over time, the salon becomes familiar. It becomes a place where people know your name, know your hair, know what you like to drink, and know that you hate being late for dinner.
That feeling goes far beyond a beautiful blow-dry. And that is where being busy starts to compound.
Because later that week, that client is sitting at lunch with her friends. She probably is not talking about the technical formulation of her highlights.
She is saying, “Valery Joseph made it happen. I called them at noon, they were completely booked, and somehow they got me in, did my color, my blowout, and my makeup, and I was picture-ready that night. Thank God.”
That is the story she remembers. That is the story she tells.
And eventually she brings her daughter. Her sister. Her best friend. Maybe someone at that lunch asks for the salon's number.
That kind of word of mouth is more powerful than almost any advertisement or social media influencer because it comes with a real emotion behind it. You cannot fake that. You cannot manufacture it with a discount. You cannot buy it with PR. You build it one client at a time, one experience at a time, over many years.
Of course, you still need incredible talent. You need great colorists, cutters, assistants, makeup artists, and a team that knows what it is doing. But talented people exist everywhere.
What is much harder to build is a place where clients feel that they belong, where they trust the entire team, and where they know that when they really need you, you will at least try to find a way.
That, in my experience, is one of the biggest differences between a salon that is constantly trying to get busy and one that stays busy year after year.
How do you handle it when a loyal client needs you on a day you're fully booked? I'd love to hear how you make it work, or where you draw the line.
Branding: The Thing Most Salons Skip
By Roei Cohen
Here's what I see most when I walk into salons that aren't ours: everything is scattered. There's no consistency, no pattern to how the place runs. Stylists wear whatever they want, come in whenever they want. The service menu is inconsistent. Even the small things, the drink selection, the magazines, the tools, the products, none of it matches. There's no throughline.
That inconsistency is what makes a salon feel like a hub, a suite where people rent a chair and do their own thing under one roof. Every stylist has their own style, their own rules, their own version of the business.
At Valery Joseph, we built a method. A way for everyone to work the same way, every day. We're aligned in how we do color, cuts, makeup, and nails. We won't do multi-color on someone because that's not us, we do soft, natural, healthy color that enhances the client. Our blow dries have a signature, the Valery Joseph beach wave. It's well known, it's been written about and photographed, and you can get the exact same one at any of our locations, New York, Miami, or the Hamptons. That's the power of branding. It's not just a look, it's a standard you can walk into anywhere under our name.
It starts with how the team looks
We have a dress code. Stylists wear black or white. Assistants wear aprons with name tags, which instantly separates them from the stylists so clients know who's who. The housekeeping team has their own uniform with the salon logo on it, so it's clear at a glance that they work here. The front desk wears a jacket over their outfit to look professional. Every receptionist is trained on a scripted, memorized greeting: “Good morning, thank you for calling Valery Joseph Salon, this is Allison, how may I help you?” It doesn't matter which day, which location, or who picks up. The phone gets answered the same way, every time.
None of this is about control for its own sake. It's about consistency. A client should be able to walk in on any day, with any team member, and get the same experience.
It extends to how the space looks
We have a color scheme that runs through the decor, the logo, and our product line, Valery Joseph Haircare. When someone buys our product and takes it home, or takes it with them when they travel, they feel like they're carrying a piece of the salon with them. That's the point. Even away from the salon, they still feel connected to it.
Not every salon has its own product line, and that's fine. We do, Valery Joseph Haircare, and in addition to that, we also carry a small, curated selection from two other brands, so clients have options and aren't limited to just us. We limit that range on purpose, because we'd rather specialize than carry everything.
The products we use on the floor are the same products we sell. We don't use what we don't sell, and we don't sell what we don't use. Whatever the stylist puts in your hair is what you can take home. And within those two brands, we don't carry the full line, only what our stylists actually love and trust. That curation is what tells the client we've already done the work of choosing the best option for them. You won't have something for everyone, and that's fine, because you're not trying to be for everyone. You're deciding who your client is and building for that person.
Even the price list is aligned
Our prices aren't set by each stylist. They're aligned across the salon. We do have different levels for haircuts based on experience, but we won't offer junior-level services beyond that, because that's not the kind of salon we are. If someone is doing your hair here, at any level, it's because they've been trained by us and have Valery's seal of approval. That's branding too. It's not just what things look like, it's a guarantee of what you're going to get, no matter who's in the chair.
The small touches add up
We hand out umbrellas with our logo on rainy days. Our coffee cups have the logo embroidered on them. We have branded caps for summer, branded bottled water. Wherever we can put the logo, we do, but never in an obnoxious way. It's small, understated, and consistent. That's what sets us apart.
Why it matters to the client
From the client's side, branding makes them feel like they're part of something. Like they've joined a club, a community. It's the same feeling you get from a product with real brand identity: you notice it instantly, and you know what it stands for. Our clients feel that same thing about the salon. They feel like they're part of an exclusive circle, that not everyone gets to walk in here, and that they're included in something bigger than a haircut.
That's the experience you want to give people. Not just a service, a sense of belonging.
It becomes automatic
Once the standard is real, the team carries it without being told. I was looking through our cameras recently at our summer location, which is a more relaxed, open environment, and the entire team was dressed in all white, on point, without anyone reminding them. They already knew when black works, when white works, what fits the brand in that setting. It happens organically once the standard is actually built into how people think, not just a rule you repeat.
The takeaway
Branding is what separates your salon from the one down the street. Great service matters, obviously. But branding isn't secondary to that. It's just as important.
What do you do in your own salon to build that consistency, and where do you feel you're struggling with it? I'd love to hear, share it with me.
