BRIDGING THE GAP
How Summit Salons, manufacturers, and distributor relationships are reaching new heights. An interview with SalonCentric SSC R.C. Clements.
Summit Salon Business Center is passionate about equipping its salon owners with the comprehensive business knowledge needed to achieve the highest level of success. Retail sales are an essential part of this commitment to high business standards. Summit Salons routinely utilize the book and training program Over The Top: Best Guest Practices of Top 20 Stylists, which not only provides stylists with key talking points guaranteed to sell product, but also demonstrates how greatly retail sales can increase a stylist’s salary and complete the full guest experience. Summit Salons pair this stylist training with The Anatomy of a Great Front Desk video training series, which educates front desk support staff on the best techniques and practices for closing retail sales with clients at check out. These two resources work in tandem to create a consistent, comprehensive retail sales strategy that includes every step of the salon experience.
As a direct result of this training, Summit Salons are able to maintain retail-to-service percentages that are far above the industry standard.
R.C. Clements, a Salon Sales Consultant (SSC) who has been in the industry for thirty-one years, explains how Summit Salons have become his biggest clients and how the role of a distributor extends far beyond sales to include providing the absolute best in product knowledge.
How did you first get involved with Summit Salons?
It was Michael Cole who reached out and said I should make the trip to Minnesota to check out what he had been developing and working on. I made the trip with my District Manager at the time, and was completely blown away by my experience and what I learned about overcoming the top ten challenges salons had been facing for decades.
With blind faith and my strong belief in the power of this program and what it could mean to our clients in Florida, I was then compelled to come home and meet with the senior management at SalonCentric.
From a distributor’s perspective, what makes a Summit Salon different from a non-Summit Salon?
Everything. The Summit Salon Systems remove the emotion by teaching owners how to be true leaders who hold their stylists accountable. The systems provide the blueprint, breaking down goals on a daily, weekly, and monthly level.
For me, it’s observing the level of awareness and quality of conversations with my stylists one-on-one or in a salon meeting. I attribute this quality to the Summit Salon Level Chart, which removes the false ceiling of potential, and to the monthly coaching and support that is critical to staying focused.
Summit Salon Systems thrive on educating stylists and the front desk team on how to effectively talk to clients about retail—do you see a correlation between this emphasis on education and overall product sales?
No question, the missing link all along has been uniting the front desk to support the service providers. Through a variety of different methods (prescription pads, work ticket checkpoints, and many more) the service provider’s professional recommendation no longer gets lost in the shuffle, and the desk is able to assist with closing the sale.
What would you say to a distributor who is on the fence about getting involved with a Summit Salon?
They are ten years behind!! Summit Salon Business Center has saved thousands of salons around the country from losing their business, and beyond that, has even elevated these salons to be our top purchasing clients in every state of the country, despite times of recession.
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