23. How AI Is Changing the Salon Business with Zenoti CEO Sudhir Kunuru

Hey, everybody. Welcome to The Connector, InterQuafeer's weekly podcast connecting salon owners and professionals with the leaders, artists, and innovators shaping the future of the professional salon industry. I'm your host, Gordon Miller, General Manager of InterQuafeer America Canada, the industry's only not-for-profit association representing employment-based salons across the U.S. and Canada.

Before we get started, a

reminder that the Interquartier Fall Atelier Tapestry of Beauty is happening in New York City, October 3rd through the 5th. That is not far away. A really quick update. Most excited to announce that Tabitha Coffee, will be on the Atelier main stage thanks to Aura 300. And Jason Everett, founder of the High Performance Salon Academy, will be making his very first appearance at the Intercoiffure Atelier, courtesy of Bumble and Bumble. Importantly, Midtown Hilton Hotel Block deadline is September 4th. You can book after that date, but if you want to be 100% sure to get the very best prices, please go online and book by the 4th of September. You can go to intercoffier.com for the hotel link, for the Atelier registration link, and for all the information, including full agenda, it's all there. online right now at intercoiffure.com. All right, on to today's guest, Sudhir Kanero, CEO and founder of Zenody, one of the industry's leading tech company and a valued brand partner of Intercoiffure. Sudhir is an absolute innovator. He and his team are doing some brilliant and fascinating work in the AI space for our industry, as well as, and this is important, they are collecting, analyzing, and sharing critical data relative to what's going on across our industry. We'll get into that in just a moment. Welcome to the Connector Podcast, Sudhir.

Yeah, happy to be here. Thank you for inviting me. I'm thrilled. It's my second time

getting to record a podcast with you, Sadir. And we first met actually at an Intercoiffure event. At that point, I was a speaker, not someone directly connected. I'm now the general manager of Intercoiffure American Canada. So yeah, like a special little connection to you. So it's great to spend some time with you.

Yeah, great. I look forward to it. Thanks.

So when I first heard you on the stage at Intercoffure, I was really taken by your thoughts on AI to the audience. And it's such a big conversation in the world today. It's moving super, super fast. But a year ago, you were talking about this shift at Zanotti and how you were going to present the brand, how you were thinking about the brand. And you really kind of dug into the idea of agents, which a year ago, the conversation wasn't as deep as it is today. I would say you were ahead of your time. And talking really about Not using AI just to get information and move information around, but thinking of AI as a series of agents who could do work on behalf of the salon, on behalf of various roles in the salon. Did I say that right? Is that kind of where you were a year ago?

Yeah, absolutely. I agree. And it's obviously evolving pretty fast. Yeah. Wow. You know, we've been building on whatever we started in

those days. Yes. Yeah. So if you were to explain Zanotti today