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Herb Hall even as busy as he always was had time to chat a bit if we both happened to be in the break room at the same time. Our conversations often involved sharing stories of activities we were involved in outside the salon. Herb shared his appreciation for how my career was evolving, commenting that my business was increasing more rapidly than he had ever seen before at The House of Edward. On one occasion he indicated that he
had spotted a vacant salon that was for rent, suggesting that we, the two of us, might consider doing a salon together. He gave me the address and suggested I take a look. I was not entirely convinced he was ready to leave The House of Edward Salon. The person that owned the building was interested in renting the space and was willing to sell the equipment at a very fair price. I decided to take another leap on my own. Within a couple of weeks I made the official announcement that I was opening my own salon. As I shared my plans with my clients they were excited and supportive. One client who was an interior designer volunteered to help to work with me on giving the place a face lift. It was not going to take a lot and she was willing to do the work in trade. She suggested a black and white theme, creating an interior that resembled an outdoor café. She designed awnings for the windows using a black and white striped outdoor awning fabric, and chose white outdoor furniture for the reception area with cushions that matched the awnings. Just to put this in perspective the space was only 750 square feet. There were two shampoo bowls and two work stations with three sit down hooded hair dryers in the middle of the room. It had a small room in the back that accommodated a dispensary and a bathroom. The facelift took only a couple of weeks. Bingo! Salon 1500 came alive.
Salon 1500 was located in The Berlingame Hotel, East Olive and Bellevue Avenue.
I had no business plan and no budget. Clients I had accumulated over the past year and a half were more than willing to follow me to the new location, which by the way was no House of Edward...however, it did have a modest charm and a great deal of enthusiasm. The responsibility of being a salon owner began to sink in. I leveraged myself by hiring a receptionist and worked for the next three months preparing for my upcoming trip to Europe. I was operating with sheer determination. Prior to leaving it was clear my timing was really great. I had made the acquaintance of the manager of the building, Mabel, the salt of the Earth; she also ran the switchboard for the residential hotel. On one of her visits to the salon I was sharing my plan to travel abroad to attend the Olympic Hairdressing Competition. She came up with the suggestion that I make the necessary arrangement to route all of my incoming calls through the hotel switchboard for the residential hotel while I was gone. This was in a time before answering machines. That turned out to be a godsend; I will explain when I return from Europe.
Off to Stuttgard, Zurich, Paris, and London….