Adina Nogospayeva, 23, from Karaganda
The salon’s mastermind, founder
HOW IT ALL BEGAN
I had no idea that I’d deal with business, although I did degree in International Business in Malaysia. Having completed BA, I entered MA in London under the “Bolashak” program and studied human resources management there.
Having returned to Kazakhstan, I had a great desire to start something new. I was going to get married and asked my parents not to waste the money on the wedding, but to invest my business.
My initial capital was $ 10,000
Initially, I wanted to start a public catering facility, but once, going home from the beauty salon, I and my husband calculated the profitability of the nail studio content. That was when the idea to open a manicure business occurred to us. We found a place, paid the rent forward for several months and made repairs.
I wanted our studio to be useful, so that it would be a nice place to come and do multiple procedures simultaneously. So, in May 2017 our first studio named “The Nail Kitchen London” was launched.
ON THE NAIL KITCHEN
I and my co-founders have opened three studios over the last six months. People think we work on a franchise, but we don’t. I really wanted to keep this business in the family, so my co-founders are my mother and my sister-in-law.
We’ve got common principles and traditions, as well as an approach to working with masters; but each studio has its own style and binding to one of the most popular cities in the world. “The Nail Kitchen London” is a studio offering service of express manicure and pedicure for an hour and a half. “Paris” studio’s co-founder is my husband's sister. The third studio is called “The Nail Kitchen Marrakesh”, which was founded by my Mom. Initially she was skeptical about this, but now she’s keen on the salon and knows a lot about the manicure. She’s engaged in price lists and the development of new services.
Our customers are always right. I work with masters and explain them the importance of communicating with clients. A woman who comes to the procedure wants to rest. So, we must provide the client with not a quality procedure only, but with a pleasant atmosphere, music, and communication as well.
Our main principle is 100% cleanness, as our tools go through a four-stage cleaning procedure
Besides, we consider our masters not as studio employees, but as partners. We often hold joint meetings, where we discuss goals and plans for the future, listen to the masters. We’re careful about our masters and demand responsibility, dedication and creative involvement from them.
Heading a nail studio, we provide not only a standard procedure of a manicure, pedicure and long-term gel-coating, but also an outgoing procedure for hands, feet, and nails’ health. We’re pioneers of a number of procedures in any Astana, e.g. Japanese manicure, Halal manicure with a breathable lacquer, collagen using rejuvenating manicure, manicure on Swiss Mavala products and SPA procedures.
Now we have additional services such as eyelash extensions, eyebrow shaping, sugaring, make-up and hairstyles, so that a woman can get several services in one place and save time.
ON ADVERTISING AND PROMOTION
We mainly advertise our salons in Instagram. News should be posted regularly and we must guess what clients would really like. We write the master’s name and prices under the pics of the works. We try to spread interesting, informative posts, and have got a special column named "Know our masters better".
Word-of-mouth marketing works the best. Also, I have a couple of friends with a large audience in social networks who really like our salon and ready to advertise it on their pages.
We always communicate with customers, arrange competitions and sales, raffle certificates for the salon. At the New Year’s Eve we had a lottery, which enabled our clients to have a discount or a free procedure.
Now we accept up to 400 people a week in all three salons, and more than 1000 people a month
We’re planning to increase the number up to 600-700 people a week.
ON DIFFICULTIES
The first difficulty was to recruit the staff. Initially, I thought that I would have a line of masters, but I was wrong. The thing is that one negative review can scare 10-20 people, and the positive one will attract only a couple of clients. In the beginning we often faced criticism, but were motivated to improve the service. We constantly try to introduce new types of procedures, to shorten the time of our service, to improve our masters’ qualifications.
To have a good manager is really important, since a good service starts from the moment the client comes in the studio. Meeting a client, offering tea, coffee, sweets are pleasant perks to have.
It’s not easy to choose products to be used. We’d tried a great many of them before finding the best ones, now we use Alexandra Lebedeva’s products manufactured in Germany, “Oniq” Dutch products, and “Diva” German products.
ON PLANS
We take into account customers’ wishes, and do understand that we need a studio on the left bank in Mangilik El district. Therefore, we’re actively engaged in the search for a spare place, investment and opening the fourth studio in the spring.
We’re suggested to open a franchise, but we aren’t developed enough, so don’t want to trust our project to anyone, yet planning to do that one day. Now we’re engaged in increasing a number of services and their improvement.
