Oh Lord, I'm in a pickle...

I work in a small city with an overload of salons with psycho owners and nasty stylists, and I've been an employee at nearly all of them. 11 jobs in 25 years -- ugh. Now I'm 44 years old with what I feel is nothing to show for all my hard work and advanced education, my body is tired, and my drive is gone. I got let go for the first time in my life 2 1/2 years ago from a job I loved because I "didn't fit in with the salon image." Being a tattooed motorcycle enthusiast went against the blonde, tooth whitened, tan giggly image, I suppose.

Anyhoo....

Now I work in a salon owned by a former "Merry Maid," for lack of a better term. Never been a stylist and knows absolutely zippo about modern salon business. She thinks because she owned her own cleaning business, she doesn't need to be taught how to run a salon. Let me tell you, it is only by the grace of God and the few decent stylists she's managed to keep that have kept her afloat.

So here I come...educated, talented, ambitious, still in love with doing hair...

I settled for less commission, no vacation pay, no benefits whatsoever. She won't even pay for a small portion of classes and is completely apathetic about bringing in FREE in-house education. What can I say? I needed a job, and I needed to be somewhere where I wasn't constantly pulling knives out of my back.

She claims she wants to be "upscale" and "cutting edge." She wants business to be booming. So I give suggestions -- well known marketing techniques, customer service tips, etc. I work my butt off -- selling retail, building clientele, doing all I can to help this lady with her business. So what do I get in return? Nothing but friggin' grief. Now she gets personally offended at nearly EVERYTHING I say. I'm telling you, if I didn't tell her we were out of toilet paper, clients would be ripping pages out of the magazines! She spends all day griping about having to be there or being broke, or she's on the computer doing her home party skin care business. If she put half the energy into her salon as she did that, we'd all be millionaires. She has been on the stylists about conserving color, so when I told her I had to dump out 2 bowls of color because someone had not cleaned red color out of them properly, she took it as though I was b*tching! How about telling people to clean up after themselves? But no! I get attitude! And that is just the tip of the iceberg...but I'll not burden you with more.

Friends and colleagues...this woman has made me hate hairdressing. I dread going to work. There are no more decent salons in my town where I could move to, and I think my clients would kill me if I moved again. What makes me so intensely sad is, I know this lady is a good lady. She serves in her church and community. She loves people. But she seems to hate me and I feel powerless to change her opinion.

A pickle, indeed.

Hey Tat2chick.

Dont let a person like that ruin what you love to do..  I let too much negativeness get to me when i was first starting out in 2005. I left the field after a year of it.. Now Im getting ready to get my license back. I just have to go take the practical exam. My school hours are locked in as well as my therory exam..  As soon as I graduated school I went straight to work at a Regis then Great clips. Big mistake.. this time im gonna enter the field right, Id lvoe to do apprenticship work and or booth rent... I have a full time job now so I can afford to pay to booth rent with litle cliental to begin with... Back to you..... Dont let someone rain on your parade!!!! I did and It cost me lost time...