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Welcome to beyond the mirror with your hosts, Adrienneenne Varga and Jodie Field. In this podcast, Adrienne and Jodie take you on an intriguing journey beyond the surface, deep diving into the world of business in the hair, skin, beauty and wellness industries. From business success tips and marketing hacks to industry insights and trends, it's all here. They leave no stone unturned. So get ready to unlock your full potential, evaluate your business, leave behind the limitations, and embrace the endless possibilities that lie beyond the mirror.
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Welcome, everyone. It's great to be back for episode 13. I'm Jody Fieldon. I'm joined by my work wife, Bestie, and business partner, Adriennebaga. During these podcasts, we share with you how you can leverage your passion into profit.
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Whether you're looking to launch to the next phase, take time away from the floor, or you're looking to sell your business and cash out your investment, you're in the right place because we've just about done it all. And we're here to share with you that you can, too, because it's time to believe your business can be everything you ever wanted. That's absolutely right. Hi, everyone, and welcome back. We spent the last couple of episodes talking about clients and knowing which clients are value and prosperity based and also which clients are discount and discount and poverty based.
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It's catching today.
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So we had a look at the bargain hunters and the cheap chases all the way up to the value for money. Peeps in the creme de la creme. So those are the ones that are loyal to the brand. I think it's time we were actually talking about this at the end of our last episode that we decided we'd jump in and make another episode about where we're talking about guilt. The guilt we feel about putting our prices up because we don't want to overcharge our clients.
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We feel bad about increasing our prices. And also impostor syndrome, which I mentioned I was saying that I felt about. Am I really as good as what I'm charging? Yeah, it's just a whole mindset and thing around it. So I think, Adriennea, it'll be really good if you can just start off with some of the clients that you've worked with that have felt really guilty and how you help them get a different perspective of overcoming that guilt and not hiding behind.
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Yes. Yes. I must say, most of the time when we start to work on pricing, this guilt starts to kick in. And then here and there, I meet with clients who actually don't have any problem to charging the right price, because they understand without charging the right price, their business is not going to survive. But that's a very small percentage.
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Most of the time when we start to work together, most of the business owners, they copied their prices from someone else's prices, so they don't even understand the strategy behind pricing and they don't even really know if they are profitable or not. Sometimes they do have a little bit of a savings, but they really work very hard to get that savings. But once we start to work on pricing, and once we go through all the structural and strategy element of pricing, this is when everything changes for a business owner. And this is when normally it can go two ways. One way someone is going to be extremely excited about it and they say, does it?
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I'm just going to change my prices? Because I understand now that without charging this, my business is not going to survive. Or then the other end is when they say, oh, my God, can I change my pricing? How am I going to change it? Are people going to pay for it?
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Like, how am I going to articulate my pricing? Are going to be this much from this time? Are people going to leave me? And that's a really big question, because if you belong to the second group, when you're questioning yourself and you don't know what you should do, you are not alone. Because this is the big air group.
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The small air group is when people get really excited about it and they say, that's it, I'm just going to do it because that's the only way to do it. This topic always reminds me of our friend that we worked with up in Queensland. I'm going to get you to tell this story, and it's one that we've done a few master classes on. And it's how Adrienneana was able to work with someone and take $3 and turn it into 50,000. In how many weeks was it?
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Twelve weeks, Adrienneana? I think it was, yeah, I think it was twelve weeks. So it took for us eight weeks to work the strategy out and just work the mindset true about pricing and not resisting pricing and all the assumptions what were around are changing pricing. But in twelve weeks, do you want to tell the story of the journey you took her on and how you got her there? Yeah, we always say this is a real life ghost story because this business owner came to us and she was asking for help.
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She knew she needed help, so she asked for help and we decided that she's going to come on coaching with us. And then our agreement was that we're going to reach out and we're going to organize an appointment for onboarding and we will start to work with this business owner. And then she disappeared. We couldn't reach her and obviously we sent sms, we tried to call and email and then we eventually just gave up because we realized probably she wasn't as ready as she thought she is. And then pandemic hit and this is when she came back and she asked for a help again.
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And this is when we asked, we are more than happy to help, but you need to tell us what happened last time because we agreed on we're going to work together on your business and you just disappeared. And this is when she said to us that she was worried that I will take over her business, which is an assumption because she didn't understand about coaching. She thought that when she signs up for coaching, what will happen? I will tell her what to do and there is no other way around it. And I told her this assumption cost for you six months of your life and that was a block towards your success because if you just would have asked the questions, I could have said to you or answered to you that coaching is all about mentoring and brainstorming together and helping you to find the best solution for yourself.
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So it's never about me telling you what to do and taking over your business. Firstly, I have enough businesses for myself to worry about. Secondly, I'm your mentor. I'm here to help you and help you to work towards to your goals and to your dreams. Not my dreams.
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So anyway, she came on board. We started to work on, she had a very busy barber shop, really busy. And she was in the lower part of the market triangle. Lots of, lots of clients, like literally people were lining up like 2025 people lining up, waiting for their appointments outside on the street. It was that busy.
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They were providing absolutely amazing service. They were priced quiet, low. And she was like, unfortunately, at the end of the months and quarters, many times she had to ask her husband to give some money or lend some money so she could pay her boss or superannuation. So she knew she was in deep trouble and she knew she couldn't find the way for herself. So this is when we started to work.
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And because she had a very busy barber shop, it was the numbers game. So we had a look the breakeven. We had a look the flow of the clients, number of the clients. We had a look all the KPIs for the business. And we came up with a strategy so I came up with a strategy for looking into the pricing and change the price, because that was the easiest way for us to pump some money into the business so she can stop asking her husband to taking money away from the family.
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So when I talked to her, I think the first strategy should be look into your pricing and change your pricing. She almost fainted because she said, like, I can't change my pricing. People are going to leave us. It's a barbecue. We can't charge more than this.
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And I told to her, just listen to me, just wait for a second. Just grab a calculator, and I will ask you to punch a couple of numbers in that calculator. And I thought to her, would you be comfortable if I would say, if you would put your prices up by $3, you will be out of trouble and you will become profitable. And she looked at me like I'm an alien from Mars. And she said, yes, I can put my prices up by $3 if I have to.
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And I told her, well, it's a numbers game, so grab the calculator. So $3 times 400 clients per week, what can you see and multiply that by 50 weeks? And this is when she almost fainted again because the number was over $50,000. I think it was around $56,000. And this is when her whole mindset has switched, changed, put the prices up.
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And then a week later, we've got an amazing email from her telling us that no one.
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And she doubled the price for kids haircut, and none of the parents resisted it. So she said it was experience for her life.
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I think that first week, I think from memory, it was a short week. So they only worked four days.
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Sorry, they only worked one day. No, one day shorter. No, it was a short four day. Yes. So one day less.
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And they made more money in that week with the shorter day than they had made in history in any week. It was their biggest week. So the difference that just a small amount can make is huge.
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And it's surprising about how many times we hear, I can't charge that because it's not industry standard. Like, this is how much I need to charge in the industry. Yes, the industry standard. It's a very interesting thing because, again, it's an assumption. And I almost feel like this is almost like an excuse why people are stuck where they are.
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Because if you say this is an industry standard, you are sort of covered why you are charging what you are charging. Many times I hear this from Pilates instructors that they cannot put their prices up because everyone else in the industry charges the same. And it is very dangerous when we have that belief that we cannot charge more or this is all what we can charge. And maybe the price is right. But you need to understand why you are charging what you are charging.
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It's extremely important for you to understand because if you know why you are charging what you are charging, then confidence will come. Just like for this barber shop owner, when she understood with the $3 where she going to end up, she had no problem. And the thing is, once you start it, then it's going to become addictive because then you will understand. And even her, she was changing her pricing. So what happened?
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We did the $3 and then the next step was like kids haircut. She understood the early break even and she said, well, where kids fit in here and nowhere. So she had to put the prices up. She doubled the price for kids. And then no one said a word.
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So then she understood. Well, people see a value in our service because I must say, her girls and the boys working with her, they did an absolutely amazing job. They did really fashionable hairdressing quality, like boutique hairdressing quality haircuts. And for the kids, they did all these funky haircuts with the line on the side and everything. And they charged like $15 or $20 for that.
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And once she understood the value, then she had no problem with charging what she was charging. And there's no guilt.
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You don't feel guilty once you know the reason behind what's going on. And I think that's the hardest hurdle to get over. And that's when it comes into the strategy about, okay, well, if I'm charging more, this is how much I need to charge to meet my break even and to have profit. What do I need to add to that? What added value do I need to bring into my business if I don't have, like, if I'm just doing a normal reformer class, okay, and I've got three people in it, I'm doing a reformer class.
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Everyone around me is charging $75 a class or whatever, and you've got three people. But my break even says that I need to be charging $95 an hour, okay, how can I justify that value? What can I do differently? And this is where the thinking outside of the box that we're going to be doing in the retreat and those offers of, okay, how to start thinking about what you can do differently to bring your value up to what you need to be making profit in your business. So that's going to be a big part of it as, yes, yes, absolutely.
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And it's absolutely true. And the other thing is what I wanted to talk about, and it comes, or it belongs to this subject, when in certain Facebook groups, people are asking, how much would I charge for this service? How much would I charge for that service? So people are absolutely confused about the basic element of running a business, which is in a way, it's very sad that we entering into business without knowing the most important part of business, which is how to calculate our pricing and how to create strong business foundations and fundamentals for ourselves. And when I see these questions, unfortunately, most of the answers are not the right answers or they are not helping those business owners with figuring out what would be the best answer for themselves.
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Because normally what people do, and they are very helpful, they want to help, but they don't understand. They actually cause more damage than not because they just say, I charge this much, I charge that much. But what you don't understand, and we didn't understand in the beginning that everyone's break even is very different. And one price would work for one salon and it would not work for other salon or studio. So it's very important.
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And if you really want to figure it out how much you should charge, you should not waste your time to go to Facebook groups and figure it out how much Jenny and Christopher is charging for the similar services. You much better off to actually educate yourself because it's all going to come back to education. And once you have the education, then you're going to have the confidence and then you will know how much you should charge. And it would not be any question for you if you are worth what you are charging because you will understand. If I don't charge this much, then I won't survive.
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Then I going to end up doing the crazy aid, working, and eventually feeling frustrated, overworked, overwhelmed, burnt out. And it is because the pricing is not right. Well, at the end of the day, if you don't have your pricing right, you've got to shut the doors and you may as well go work for someone else. Because we're here to make money. At the end of the day, as a business owner, we're here for three things.
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Because we love what we do. We want to be our own boss. And we're here to make money. Profit is not a dirty word. It is okay to be in it for profit.
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That's what we're here for. Yeah. And I think the profit is our reward for running a business because it's a huge responsibility. It's a huge investment. Investment of your money, investment of your time, investment of your knowledge.
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And then you're looking after clients, you're looking after your team. If you do business right, you can actually change those people's life who are working for you because you can create better life, better life circumstances for the people who are working for you, too. So I think we need to really understand that once you have a business, you do deserve your reward. Your profit is your reward because you risk everything. And you are the one who thinking like, you don't finish at five, you don't finish at six when your team is finished, actually, your brain is keep working on day in and day out.
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Your eye is always open, your ear is always open. You're always wondering, you always learn. High alert. You're always doing research. It's really a never ending story because you don't stop.
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Even when you're at the top, you still don't stop. It takes work to stay at the top. You don't just get there and go, okay, I'm here. That's when you come back down. It's actually harder work to stay at the top than it is to get to the top, I always think, because it can be hard up there.
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And I know even with us, like, Adrienneana will be, I'll get something through the middle of the night, or I'll have seen she's been answered an email at sank at 04:00 in the morning. Even though we very much advocate for work life harmony, as a business owner, you're still on. Like, you can choose not to be on. And that's the benefit of being in a position of a profitable business, is that you can choose not to be on. But like, for me, I said to Adrienneana the other morning, now, I was working in my dreams last night.
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Do I get paid?
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And my answer was, as long as you can show me the right look. I had results. I had results. You asked the clients I was working with last night.
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As business owners, we're always on when we've got a profitable, well oiled machine. As a business, we can choose whether we want to be on or is. We're going to have to cut today's podcast short. It's end of school holidays here in Australia. The kids have just broken up and my son has come home early.
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And I'm not sure if you can hear Brynn chatting away in the starting. Yeah, school holiday is starting and it's going to be a lot of challenge for lots of parents and lots of business owners. It's hard work. It is hard work. And even, like, poor Adrienneana has to suffer through my school holidays as much as I do because she needs to fit in around what I have to do with Harper and Brynn.
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And that's a whole nother beast is like, even though Adrienneana has her fur babies, she still has to deal with my school holidays. School holidays are nightmare for me, too, not just for where we live. It makes it so much better. But now Adrienneana's moved up here that she's anti the tourists and the holiday makers as well. Now she's turned into a real.
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So, yes, absolutely. It's going to be an interesting. Is this our last podcast going into summer, into Christmas? I think it is. We go on holidays next week, don't we?
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Yes, we are going on holidays, and we deserve these holidays. We don't have guilt around our holidays. No, there's no guilt. And in these three weeks, we are going to do very minimal monitoring our emails. But that's it.
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We worked really hard the last three weeks. We worked extra hours and really hard for us to be able to take these three weeks off. But as business owners, I guarantee that you and me, we're still going to think about strategies, what we can do, how we can make it better, what are going to be the topics for our next podcast and all those things. So we're recording this podcast, actually in advance, that for the next three weeks, when we are going to be on holidays, we are covered. Everything is done, and we can have a guilt free holiday for ourselves.
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We will take a guilt free holiday. I think I give you maybe three days before I get a little tap, tap, tap in the voxer with a thought. I think there's going to be about three days that she'll shut down. And that's okay. We're allowed to do that.
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But the only time we can really get her to shut down is when I send her away to an island somewhere with Sylvie to go and kick back. And there's no reception anywhere. No receptions. And there is a lot of destruction. Sylvie is my travel body, and she's a lot of destruction.
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So it's really Adrienneana's parents arrive from Hungary next week? Yes. You'll be distracted. I can't wait till Mama V comes and does her cooking. Fantastic.
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All right. Well, what? Don't forget our virtual retreat. Let me just put it back along the little doobie whacker down the bottom. There it is.
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You can see it's the pricing nexus@focusgdt.com. Retreats. You can watch the video that we were talking about earlier for.
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It's called a glimpse in the mirror. So it's guilt free and confident pricing to flow and flourish, which is a high level perception perspective of pricing and some of those nuances. And we do talk. Adrienneana goes more again into the value based clients. But Adrienne, you've got our handles.
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I always get our handles wrong, so you can do our handles. Our handles are at focus GDT, and our website is ww atfocusgdt.com. See? I'm glad she can say it. I can't.
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All right. It was great seeing everyone again, virtually. And we'll see you next year. Bye bye.
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Well, that was beyond the mirror. Thank you for being a part of this exhilarating adventure. Join Adriennea and Jody next week as they continue to help you unlock the true potential of your business so you can leave your limitations behind and embrace the endless possibilities that lie beyond the mirror. And if you have a burning question that you'd like to feature as a guest on this podcast, just leave us a message with the podcast page@focusgdt.com. So until next time, keep pushing boundaries, keep thriving, and always remember that your success is right here, right now, beyond the mirror.