Salons, hairdressers and holistic centres have been locked down for weeks, but little consideration has been given by the UK Government regarding what impact this is having on the professional hair, beauty and wellbeing industry. 50,000 UK salon businesses have had to close and 76,000 therapists have been left without work.
The Beauty Guild are the biggest UK trade body for the professional beauty industry, with over 16,000 members. They recently launched the Coronavirus Pandemic Survey Questionnaire* on beautyguild.com and invited all the beauty therapists, hairdressers, holistic practitioners, nail technicians, lecturers and students they represent to share their experiences of how COVID-19 is affecting their business.
The Beauty Guild will be using this data to better understand how the professional beauty industry has been affected by the pandemic. Key findings will be presented to UK Government.
Over 600 members of the professional hair, beauty and wellbeing industry completed the survey which revealed the following key findings:
Financial Impact
- 99% have done no treatments at all during the lockdown.
- 83% said that their salon is their only source of income.
- 30% of those employed by the professional hair, beauty and wellbeing industry are not eligible for any financial support from Government grants or schemes in relation to COVID-19.
Changes To Working Practices
82% of beauty business owners have worked with The Beauty Guild to produce a Coronavirus Infection Prevention & Control Policy for their salon, which will detail all the changes they will make to their working practices when they are allowed to re-open, to keep staff and clients safe and reduce the spread of COVID-19.
- 95% plan to wear a face mask when they re-open the salon and ask clients to wash their hands or use hand sanitiser when they arrive for their appointment.
- 85% will increase the time between appointments so clients can avoid contact with each other and so they can increase the frequency of salon cleaning.
- 84% have changed their booking terms and conditions to allow clients to cancel if they have symptoms of Coronavirus.
- 77% will only take card payments or bank transfers to avoid handling money.
- 76% will amend their consultation procedure to include questions about COVID-19.
- 30% will change their treatment menu to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
The majority of beauty business owners surveyed believe it will take up to one year for their salon to get back to the way it was before the Coronavirus pandemic (38%).
*The survey was completed by 629 Beauty Guild members and Guild Gazette Readers between 1st-14th May 2020.
