369 The Power of Showing Up: Lessons From 230 Salons with Denis McFadden

Hello, and welcome to the Grow My Salon Business podcast. I'm your host, Anthony Whittaker. And whether you're a first-time listener or a regular listener, either way, it's great to have you join us here. Now, today I'm gonna be talking to a returning guest, Denis McFadden, who was previously on episode 24 way back in January 2020. Now, most listeners are probably not familiar with the name Denis McFadden, and I dare say that that's exactly the way that he likes it. But today, the Just Cuts Salon franchise is seeing over 110,000 clients a week spread over 230 salons, 3,500 staff, and operate in four different countries, Australia, New Zealand, the UK, and Canada. Now, I've had the opportunity to speak at the Just Cuts annual conference on a couple of occasions. And at one of those conferences, I said to Dennis that he should write a book about his life story and the story of Just Cuts, and that book has just been released. It's titled "Just Cuts: The Power of Showing Up." It's not just a business book, it's a very personal book of his life and career. So without further ado, welcome back to my friend, Denis McFadden.

G'day, Anthony, and good to see you again after so many years.

Yeah, exactly. Well, last time we spoke, 'cause, uh, as I said in the intro, uh, you are a returning guest, but that was episode 24.

Wow.

And interestingly, it was released in January 2020, so right at the beginning of the COVID thing. And obviously at the time, you and I had no idea of what impact that was gonna have on, on businesses or, or on the world, you know, on the future of hairdressing and so many different things. It's had a huge impact. So as someone who has a, you know, a significant business, I, I figure that that might be a good point to just sort of do a quick, uh, recap on because, you know, a business the size of yours, um, you know, the sort of impact that that has is quite different to someone with one salon and half a dozen staff or, uh, or whatever the number is. So, so, so what sort of impact did that have on you without dwelling on the COVID thing for too long?

Well, as you say, COVID affected every business. Um, but certainly in the hairdressing, um, w- the problem for us was we were in leased premises, and we had landlords, uh, wanting their rent, but there were nobody in the shopping centers.

Hmm.

And this was the challenge for us. We were also concerned for the stylists coming into contact with COVID, uh, because as you say, Anthony, we didn't know what was going to happen, how long it was going to last.

Hmm.

And we did in fact close quite a few salons that we subsequently did not reopen.

Right.

We did not reopen. But we kept all the teams-

Yeah

... uh, employed. And in some, uh, for instance, in Australia, uh, there was help from the government on the payroll. I'm not sure if that's the case in, uh, uh, in America or anywhere else, but there was some support from the governments. But the governments did shut us down eventually.

Yeah.

And then we could go to the landlords and say, "Well, it wasn't our decision to close. It was a government decision, uh, and they've legislated to close." And, and that helped us a great deal.

Yeah. Now, I know you've got