Recession Proof Your Business
I'm Tiffany Nadolny, your host of the Spa Business Building Podcast. I'm a licensed esthetician, massage therapist, and solopreneur in my day spa. With nearly two decades of experience in the beauty and wellness industry, I've learned a few things about building a career and maintaining longevity.
Outside of the treatment room, I'm a wife, mom, to the human and fluffy kind, plant enthusiast, and book lover. Join me while I share my experiences and insight on attracting clients, maintaining and building a thriving business while achieving work-life balance. So whether you're a new solo spa boss or seasoned, this podcast is for you.
welcome back Solo Spa Bosses to The Spa Business Building Podcast. Today's episode, we are diving into a topic that I have been wanting to talk about for quite some time. I'm actually seeing it a lot in groups and in conversations with other service provider professionals and small business owners.
And we're talking about the economy. Kind of sort of. I wanted to talk about how it's affecting our businesses, but what we can do to stay afloat.
Now, I made it through COVID and I will be damned that I will make it through this. But I think we can all say that we are noticing this inflation. We are noticing the price increases.
Everything's gone up. Groceries, gas, interest rates, leisure, entertainment, all of those things. The price of shipping.
All of my product costs have gone up. Rent has gone up. All of those things.
We're seeing these higher prices and we're realizing that it's not only affecting us, it's affecting our clients and it's affecting how they are spending their money with us. What can we do to stay afloat when our clients just can't afford to see us any longer or for the season? So I wanted to share four tips and four ways that I made it through COVID.
And I'm hoping that I can help you to put these into place so that you can make it through this struggle that we're all kind of facing. So I did read an article on JP Morgan just very recently. I think it was published in August of 2024, but I just found it online and was reading through it.
And they are predicting 35% chance of a recession by the end of 2024, and a 45% chance of a recession by the end of 2025. I don't know. Does that seem high?
I mean, a recession sounds terrible, right? Like, we're all seeing the struggle, and I hope that our and they are saying it's a global, not just in the US., a global recession.
So how that plays in for us, I'm not really sure. I really didn't do a lot of research. All I know is that a lot of us are feeling it.
I'm feeling it. My clients are feeling it. And I've had a few clients who have lost their jobs and can no longer receive services from me.
And that's heartbreaking. I don't want to see anybody suffering. And I just hope that there is a turnaround and things start looking up because I don't want to see anybody's business closing.
So on to the tips. The first thing that I am doing in my business to stay afloat is to make sure that I am staying consistent with everything. I'm consistently sending emails.
I am consistently posting on social media. I'm showing up in a consistent way so that my guests can continue to trust me and that I am building that expert knowledge for them. I'm showing up as the expert for them.
So even though they may not be able to come and see me as often as they would like, they will eventually be able to come back and see me. And so I'm the one that they trust. I am educating them.
I am showing a little bit of myself, just being their friend in a way that they need, in ways of emails with education and valuable information. I'm giving that to them through emails and in my post. And I know that a lot of service providers are kind of afraid to give away too much or not knowing what to give away for free when it comes to their information.
And I will tell you that you cannot give away too much information. Showing up as that expert, showing your knowledge and proof of knowledge is by educating them. Continue to do it.
They will appreciate you for it. And when it comes to that time when you are needing to sell, then they won't feel like you're being so salesy because you've given them so much value and so much knowledge that they trust you and they view you as expert and they want those products and that care from you. So continue to show up and show your knowledge, show your expertise, email, and your social media post.
So the second way that I'm showing up for my clients during this time is I am working within their budgets. I'm not working so they can have a better budget. I am working within the budget that they have.
So if that means having a conversation with them, and this just happened to me maybe a month or so ago. I had a client who came in and we were talking about her home care, and she was kind of saying that she wasn't really seeing the results that she had wanted, and I was a little confused because she had the products come to find out that she wasn't actually using the products as much as she should be, and didn't have the products that she should be to see the results that she wanted, and come to find out that she was on a budget and couldn't afford the products any longer, and I just had a conversation with her and asked what her needs are, what she wants, and she really valued the services. She valued the time that she was getting with me and the relaxation and pampering that she was getting from coming in and getting my facials, and she wanted to continue to see me on that monthly basis, but when it came to the products, she couldn't afford both.
So I worked with her. I asked her what products she was using at home, what she liked, what she didn't like, and I suggested a few products of mine that I felt she would get the best results with continued use. So that's how I was working with her budget and what she was comfortable doing.
She really wanted to receive those services, could afford a few products, and I really educated her on the use of her products, because also come to find out she was using too much of the product. She was like two or three pumps, and I told her like a half a pump to a full pump, so she could conserve what she had and not overuse, because her products were really... she was using too much of them, so they weren't lasting as long as they typically would for most clients.
So I was educating her there. But I had no idea that this was going on until I had that deep conversation with her, and it was a good conversation. She trusted me and I educated her, and I felt good about it, knowing that she was happy and we could meet in the middle.
And although she's not using every single product that I have, she is still getting good quality care for me, and I'm happy with where we were able to meet in the middle. So if you're able to work with your client, and maybe they're not able to come in every four weeks like they used to, but maybe you could stretch out that time every six, eight weeks, or once a quarter, whatever they can budget. So as an esthetician, I like to talk to my clients about their home care.
If they're really wanting those results versus relaxation, then I explain to them why home care is important for those results, and to use good home care versus just getting a professional treatment once a month. It's like going to the gym and working out once versus working out daily. As an esthetician, we all know this, right?
So if they're using that continued care at home, they're going to get better results. And if they're not so into that relaxation every month, then we can stretch out those personal or professional treatments longer and come in for just maintenance. So I can take a look at their skin, we can reevaluate what's going on, and we can adjust the home care as needed.
So think of that as an option for you, and how can you build that around your client care? Can you maybe offer some virtual consultations for those who aren't able to get the professional services, want to buy the products from you, but can do a virtual call? Now you're still charging for those calls.
You're not going to charge as much as you would as a professional treatment. You can still charge for your time. Now that's just a suggestion for estheticians.
What can you do as a massage therapist? Can you provide a virtual call to help them with some stretching, whatever your state allows? Not all states allows massage therapists to direct in stretching, but how can you give them a home care regimen so they can stretch their visits out and maybe they can purchase products from you to help them at home?
Whatever that is so that you can really elevate that customer care. Now, that kind of goes into my next one. Is customer care really elevating the experience for your customers?
Really showing them that appreciation, because good quality customer care, in my opinion, goes a long way. And if you're going to own a business, having top notch customer care and giving them that luxurious customer experience, that's what's going to bring them back. They're going to tell all their friends, they're going to tell their family, they're going to be telling everyone they know how amazing you are.
So, when you really elevate that experience for them, and it starts from the beginning and it ends with the after care, but going beyond that, I like to send little thank you notes every once in a while to guests to let them know that they appreciate their continued support. Sending them a text, asking how they are feeling after their service, things like that, it goes a long way. So, I suggest really elevating that care for your clients.
Now, number four. Now, I did this before COVID and it helps me get through COVID, and that was having a savings account. Now, I suggest having three to six months of your expenses and personal pay.
So, what you would pay yourself, have it in a savings account for those slow months when you are unable to pay yourself, when you need help paying some bills. It's going to save you. That's why they call it a savings account.
But this is how I got through COVID. Like, I had some extra expenses when COVID hit. I had just signed a new lease for a larger space, like double the size.
I went from 700 square feet to 1700 square feet. I had signed the lease before we ever knew there was a shutdown. So then we got shut down and I still had that lease.
And it was super scary because I was not bringing in income and I did not know how I was going to keep affording it. I guess the silver lining is that we were shut down, so I was able to renovate the entire space during that shutdown time, which I wasn't expecting. I was going to do renovations a little bit at a time to get up and going.
But it all worked out. But because I had that savings, I was still able to pay my rent and all the other bills because none of that stopped coming in. And I still had to pay myself.
So I highly recommend at least six months. If you can do three months, perfect. Now, what I like to do is I put a percentage of whatever I bring in weekly.
I subtract all my overhead and I pay myself with that. But I put a percentage into a savings account. And if you can't afford to do it that way, if you can only allocate, you know, fifty dollars a week or something like that, it will add up and something is better than nothing.
So I highly recommend starting that savings account as soon as you can. So there you have it, my friend. I like to keep these episodes not super long.
So those are my four tips on keeping yourself afloat during this economic downturn, making sure that you're staying consistent. Keep showing up for your clients even when you feel like nothing's working to bring them back in. And just know that eventually they will come back in.
And if they can't, they're going to send their friends and family who can come back in, who can come in now. So keep showing up, keep sending emails, keep posting to social media, and really lean into that education, nurturing content, and not just all the sales and available appointment content. Number two, working within your client's budget, giving them a way to keep receiving the services or products within the budget that they do have for now.
Number four, really leaning into appreciation and loving on your clients. I'm sorry, that's number three. And number four is building a savings account.
So that is it for today. If you really enjoyed this episode, I invite you to leave a review. Tell all your friends about me because that is how I build my business.
But before you go, I wanted to share with you that the Solo Spa Boss Society is opening up very, very soon. So if you are looking for support and guidance for your business and like the idea of coming together as a community, check out this membership. You'll also learn everything that you need to attract clients and earn more money as a solo beauty and wellness professional.
So if you want to learn more about that, head on over to my website at spabusinessbuilding.com. Until next time, my friend, stay fabulous, stay inspired, and happy business building.
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