Dear Leah B.,

Tell me how the fuck u spend $315 for color/curl & give the assistant a cheap ass $5 tip after they done did all the fucking work?


Sincerely,

Cheap or Naw?

Dear Cheap or Naw?, 

So there are two ways to look at this:

1. The client isn’t cheap, if she’s paying $315.00 for a color/curl, by the time she’s getting to the assistant for a tip, she’s fucking broke! $315.00 is not your average price for color and curl. She may be hurting after that upper eschelon pricing…

I do commend her for giving up anything, there are some clients that feel like “I just paid $315.00, they got enough out of me today” and will leave without giving the assistant anything and dare her to look in their direction more than 3 times in a row…We’ll give her credit for having the decency to leave something, albeit small it was still a gesture of appreciation.

2. Some clients are completely clueless to the acceptable rate of tipping. When I was younger, I often went back and forth the entire visit with what to leave the assistant as a tip. I generally ended up giving at least 1/3 of my service fee. However, depending on the level of service, extras, conversation, etc. if I felt that they deserved more, I gave more.

Now that I’m a little older and wiser, the salon experience is about the atmosphere and the interactions that I engage in while there and my tips often reflect that. 

There’s a lot of variables that play into how a client tips the assistant, variables that may have nothing to do with your service. The beauty industry is one of those industries when the money is good, it’s good. but when the money is stupid, it’s stupid. Sounds like you had a stupid tip day but that’s ok, tomorrow your clients may make it rain on you like you’re in Magic City…

Leah B.