u/alternative_summit

Hi all,

Currently Im on commission at a salon I got hired at in January when I was renting my chair before at another spot. My new boss / the owner was not willing to hire a renter so I folded and accepted commission because I really needed to move.

The more time goes on, the more I realize I need to be back to rental. I have my business license, business cc and bank account, certain investments, habit managing my menu and money, etc. She has other renters, she just doesn't want new ones. However she is micromanaging reasonable time off, the way she manages services and menus doesn't align entirely with me and she's sketchy on pay. I have to double check my pay all the time to make sure nothing is missing.

I do not want to change salons, I just want to rent, and given that I used to be a renter and that she has renters, I feel like I could try to talk to her about it.

Does anyone have advice about how to go about this? I absolutely know she does not want to lose me so I would love to leverage something.

So to be clear, I started this job about six months ago and I don't get paid time off. I work on commission making a percentage of the services I sell to my clients. Whenever I request time off, it is unpaid. A few months ago I requested 4 days off at the end of this month for travel. It was approved but my boss asked if I could work more before I left or when I got back to make up for it which I thought was odd considering it will be unpaid and that's not really the point of "vacation" either. I declined politely saying I was getting back from my trip right before getting back to work and would not be able to add more days to my schedule.

This trip is now coming up shortly. Two weeks ago I was really sick and there was a death in my family so I unexpectedly had to take a few days off to process all that and rest up. My boss again asked if I could make up for that time off given that I'm taking time off at the end of the month.

It's just annoying and making me feel bad for asking for time off, as though I shouldn't feel comfortable doing so. I haven't asked for time off since starting to work there and am normally a very reasonable person when it comes to these requests. I'm tired of "politely declining" each time and feel like this is going to become a thing.

Any advice? I feel like I should just keep politely declining until my boss either brings it up or never does. I feel like if I address it, it could be seen as confrontational. I already struggle with not feeling bad about taking time off and now this is making me feel so guilty and anxious and paranoid about it!

Hi everyone!

Read TL;DR at bottom if you don't want to read the background context!

I've (29F) been in the industry about 5-6 years now since finishing school. I work in a well rated and known salon in my city as a commission employee. I used to be self-employed but gathered that my lack of experience and clientele brought me more stress than anything else so I switched back to commission until I can sustain myself with a full clientele.

I do like what I do but I wish there wasn't so much talking involved. There are other points that irritate me but that's just how jobs work lol. I find most of the time I enjoy my days at work. Lately I have begun to let go a little mentally because the level of "passion" and commitment I was putting into it was exhausting me and what I received in return (compensation, recognition, quality clients, etc.) didn't make up for it. I almost burnt out and gave up completely, that's when I switched to commission. Now I just have my schedule booked by whoever the salon throws at me and I don't fuss over it much more than that.

The thing is, I find myself just going through the days. I don't feel like watching training online to learn more or looking for classes. All I think about is my free time and the outdoors, nature and getting out of the city. (I've fallen in love with nature and being outdoors via various sports and hobbies). I'm guessing this is normal but I'm starting to think about my future.

I don't like the idea that if I took time off to travel, I could potentially lose clients. I don't like that my job depends entirely on my capacity to be present and functional physically. (I like physical work but hairdressing is impossible with a broken arm let's say). We get NO benefits. No retirement, no insurance, no future plan. No "break". No backup in case we need a break. I'm not sure how I feel about this long-term. I often think about if I should maybe go study something that could be more "secure" or adaptable to aging. On the other hand, I like the idea of working 4 days a week, having mostly flexible time off or being able to be self-employed and call the shots.

I'd love to hear from long-time stylists that maybe went through this kind of phase with the career and stuck it out, or chose to do something else. How is your body feeling? How do you feel about the future? I'm wondering if I've maybe changed too much as a person and this may no longer align with me, but changing careers is not the easiest thing to do.

TL;DR: long-time stylists that stuck it out, how are you feeling body-wise, retirement-wise, life-wise having continued on with hairdressing? do you wish you had done something else? did any of you move on to something else and how did that go for you?

Edit: I wanted to add that I've started to notice my feet hurt every day. I'm so brain dead after work from being around so many different people yapping at me. It's tiresome explaining to people that what they want will cost several hundreds of dollars and fragilize their hair only for them to put box dye over it a couple of months later and then hope I can fix it. I'm around chemicals constantly and I'm starting to wonder how healthy that is. I get no breaks at all and am finding the end of the day far. I still mostly enjoy my days but these points are becoming more and more apparent and I'm only 30. I just don't know what I'm picturing for the future in this field anymore.