Most salon owners know how to build. You hire the next person and take the bigger space. Very few know how to take it apart again when it stops working, and do it in a way that leaves everyone looked after.

In this Mini Moment, Sam and Jen are joined again by Siobhan from Siobhan Hair Artistry. She walks through exactly how she went from a leased six chair salon with three team members back to just her and her mum. It started with a lease conversation she didn't want to have. Then came the harder one with her apprentice, which she only had after she had quietly found a salon ready to take her on.

For any Australian salon owner thinking about going smaller, this is the practical side nobody talks about. It covers the order she did things in and how she kept it fair. It also covers what happened to a full book of clients once the team was gone.

What we cover

• The sudden resignation that started the rethink
• Deciding to reduce your team and your responsibilities
• Moving from leasing a whole salon space to renting two chairs
• Finding your apprentice a good salon to go to before you tell her
• Giving plenty of notice and keeping every change within Fair Work
• Handling clients when your own book is already full
• Why some clients won't follow you to a senior's price point
• Working side by side with family in a small salon

You built it once. You're allowed to build it again.

FAQs

How do I downsize my salon team without burning bridges?

Plan each conversation before you have it, and give people as much notice as you can. Siobhan gave her apprentice eight weeks and had a new salon lined up for her first, so the news came with a next step.

Can I reduce the chairs I lease in a shared salon space?

It depends on your agreement, but an honest conversation with whoever you lease from is the place to start. Siobhan went from leasing a six chair space to renting two chairs, with a three month notice period for any changes.

What happens to clients when a salon downsizes?

Tell clients early and move them into the calendars that can actually hold them. Not every client can come with you, and some won't want to pay a senior's price, so it helps to accept that upfront.

Mentioned in this episode:

💖 Celebrating Our Podcast Partner – Christophe Robin, proudly distributed by McM Imports

We’ve partnered with Christophe Robin and MCM Imports to bring you something beautiful:

➡ Experience the Christophe Robin Discovery Box — curated by pro ambassador Monique McMahon.

➡ Inside, you’ll find her handpicked favourites — the hero products she swears by in the salon.

It’s your invitation to explore the range and discover why Christophe Robin has become a quiet obsession among stylists who know their craft.

Click the link below to request your FREE Christophe Robin Discovery Box, exclusively through McM Imports. 👇

MCM

💛 A Limited Time Offer From Our Amazing Sponsor, Timely 💛

➡ Timely is the easy to use booking and payments system that puts salon owners in control of the whole client experience from the first booking to final payment.

➡ Salon Rising listeners get a 14 day free trial plus 50% off their first 3 months.

➡ And when you activate with Payments, you'll also get a free Touchscreen terminal, worth $349 + GST.

Use the code SALONRISING at checkout or click the link below to get started. Once you're set up, your Timely contact will take care of the rest. 👇

Timely

https://www.salonrising.com

Your team won't sell retail. You've tried paying them more and dangling incentives, and the shelves still aren't moving. It's one of the most common frustrations in Australian salons, and it's rarely the team's fault.

Tiana Baxter is back with her new company, SELLÁ, and this time she's talking about the thing she knows best. Sales. She has a hard truth for owners too. However you sell is exactly how your team will sell.

Sam and Jen talk with Tiana about why selling got such a dirty name and how to recommend product from conviction instead of pressure. It's practical and honest, and it will change the way you walk onto your salon floor.

What we cover

• Why sales became a dirty word, and why being called a salesgirl is a compliment
• Frameworks over tactics, and why tactics make selling feel manipulative
• Why owners need to live on the sales floor instead of visiting it when numbers dip
• The consult question that hands your client the whole problem
• Asking better questions so you know exactly what to recommend
• Product, people and payoff, plus the three Rs for every client
• A simple team training exercise to get retail moving this week
• The payoff of the payoff, and why you're selling confidence, not conditioner
• Why the sale starts after the client pays
• Your money thermostat and why earning more can feel unsafe
• The story behind the salesgirl name and building a business on faith

SELLÁ® — Home of the Salesgirl™ is a sales education company founded by Tiana Baxter, teaching women how make more money in business without becoming more ‘salesy’.

Through sales psychology, communication and self-mastery, SELLÁ teaches women how to get seriously good at selling without pushy tactics or awkward scripts.

It’s about learning to sell in a way that feels like you, while building a business that makes a lot more money.

Find Tiana and the world of SELLÁ on Instagram @tianarose.inc and @sella.inc

Why won't my salon team sell retail?

Most of the time, your team sells exactly the way you do. If you only step onto the sales floor when numbers dip, they learn that selling is something you visit rather than something you live.

What should hairdressers ask instead of "What are we doing today?"

Ask what your client is loving and not loving about her hair, and how she's finding it at home. Her answers show you what she wants and give you a real reason to recommend the right product later.

How do you recommend retail products without being salesy?

Use the three Rs, which are your recommendation, the reason why, and the result she'll get. Talk about the payoff instead of the ingredients, and only recommend products you genuinely use and believe in.

Mentioned in this episode:

https://www.salonrising.com

💛 A Limited Time Offer From Our Amazing Sponsor, Timely 💛

➡ Timely is the easy to use booking and payments system that puts salon owners in control of the whole client experience from the first booking to final payment.

➡ Salon Rising listeners get a 14 day free trial plus 50% off their first 3 months.

➡ And when you activate with Payments, you'll also get a free Touchscreen terminal, worth $349 + GST.

Use the code SALONRISING at checkout or click the link below to get started. Once you're set up, your Timely contact will take care of the rest. 👇

Timely

💖 Celebrating Our Podcast Partner – Christophe Robin, proudly distributed by McM Imports

We’ve partnered with Christophe Robin and MCM Imports to bring you something beautiful:

➡ Experience the Christophe Robin Discovery Box — curated by pro ambassador Monique McMahon.

➡ Inside, you’ll find her handpicked favourites — the hero products she swears by in the salon.

It’s your invitation to explore the range and discover why Christophe Robin has become a quiet obsession among stylists who know their craft.

Click the link below to request your FREE Christophe Robin Discovery Box, exclusively through McM Imports. 👇

MCM

Monday hits and you are already behind. The phone has messages on it from Saturday, the book looks fine until you actually look at it, and you have no real idea what last week made. So you open the salon, get in the chair, and tell yourself you will sort the rest of it later. Later never comes, and by Thursday the whole week feels like it is running you.

In this Mini Moment, Sam walks Jen through exactly what she does every Monday. Not a theory about admin days. The actual list. The appointments she moves, the confirmations she chases, the wages and bonuses, the accounts she gets down to the dollar, the inbox she empties, and the running to do list she keeps beside her the whole time. She does it in rounds through the day rather than one long block, and she has done it from a hospital bed.

Jen adds the other half of it. She runs a lot of the same work through AI and her software so the sorting is done before she sits down. Two salon owners in Australia, two different setups, the same rule underneath. If Monday is messy, the week is messy.

What we cover

• The Monday non negotiables Sam has never skipped, no matter what
• How to read your appointment book properly and find a full hour of wasted space
• Chasing confirmations and working the cancellation list before you post to socials
• Wages, super, bonuses and getting every account down to the dollar
• Paying credit cards off weekly instead of waiting for the month
• Clearing the inbox to zero and keeping a live to do list while you do it
• Why Sam refuses to touch any of it on a weekend
• Putting your projected numbers on the board on a Tuesday morning
• Using AI and your software to do the sorting before you start
• Going back over Instagram messages to make sure nothing got missed

Start with a real Monday and the other four days stop feeling like a fight.

FAQs

What admin should a salon owner do every Monday?

Check and rework the appointment book, confirm every unconfirmed booking, work the cancellation list, then do wages, bills and accounts. Finish by clearing the inbox and writing down anything left over so nothing is carried in your head.

How do I find more appointments without getting more clients?

Look at the gaps in your existing book. Fifteen minutes here and there across a day can be shuffled into a full extra appointment, which is why Sam moves clients up and down before she does anything else on a Monday.

Should salon owners do admin on the weekend?

Sam says no and treats it as a hard boundary. Jen replies when she genuinely has capacity, but flags anything that needs proper thought and leaves it until she is back in work mode.

Mentioned in this episode:

💛 A Limited Time Offer From Our Amazing Sponsor, Timely 💛

➡ Timely is the easy to use booking and payments system that puts salon owners in control of the whole client experience from the first booking to final payment.

➡ Salon Rising listeners get a 14 day free trial plus 50% off their first 3 months.

➡ And when you activate with Payments, you'll also get a free Touchscreen terminal, worth $349 + GST.

Use the code SALONRISING at checkout or click the link below to get started. Once you're set up, your Timely contact will take care of the rest. 👇

Timely

https://www.salonrising.com

💖 Celebrating Our Podcast Partner – Christophe Robin, proudly distributed by McM Imports

We’ve partnered with Christophe Robin and MCM Imports to bring you something beautiful:

➡ Experience the Christophe Robin Discovery Box — curated by pro ambassador Monique McMahon.

➡ Inside, you’ll find her handpicked favourites — the hero products she swears by in the salon.

It’s your invitation to explore the range and discover why Christophe Robin has become a quiet obsession among stylists who know their craft.

Click the link below to request your FREE Christophe Robin Discovery Box, exclusively through McM Imports. 👇

MCM