Here's my origin story: I'm an old school department store and retail worker. During the 1990s I worked for Jacobson’s, Hudson’s, Home Depot, and Victoria’s Secret. I did such a good job as a holiday assistant at Jacobson’s. They decided to create a permanent position for me there. Jacobson’s on-the-job training was top-notch. In every aspect, the customer experience was the company’s main priority. Since they valued their customers they made it simple for us to perform our jobs to the highest standard.
Given my background in retail I was not accustomed to the ghetto fabulousness of the salon industry. In retail the most I ever worried about was co-worker stealing a sale. But a business owner stealing from her customer?! Jesus knows I stayed clutching my pearls once I became an esthetician. Some of these owners treated their customers like they hated them. Let me not forget how salon owners go to great lengths to sabotage their competitors.
One owner I worked for sold a $700 day spa package to a guy for his fiancée. The owner told me that she’d spent the money and didn’t want to do the services because it would take too much time. I was instructed to tell the fiancée that the owner was booked until after their wedding, convenient. After the owner left for the day, I called the fiancée from my cell phone. I told her to have her fiancé do a chargeback on his card. Less than a week later I came into work and heard the owner screaming in Spanish “Dios mío, quitaron $700 dólares de mi cuenta. ¿Qué voy a hacer ahora?”. Bandit behavior on 10.
The owners of another place I worked put a lot of money into the interior design budget and zero dollars into their marketing one. They had us chasing folks down in the parking lot to hand out brochures. I hated doing that! One morning I caught a business segment on GMA. Mavericks At Work's author left a lasting impression. After reading the book, I excitedly gave the owner my notes on cost-effective marketing strategies, since I didn’t want to chase people around a parking lot.
Apparently she gave the notes to her husband because during a staff meeting he showed up and put me on blast in front of everyone! He told me that I didn't sell enough to warrant suggesting anything. Interesting, sir. Tell me more. I was hired to provide esthetic services, but because they the owners of this "up-scale salon" were too cheap to spend money marketing their own establishment, I ended up walking laps in a parking lot and handing out an ugly brochure.
After marketing their way for a year. My sales came to about $8900. $4450 was paid to me in commissions. There's nothing that burns my bush more than a smug man running a ghetto ass company. He genuinely believed he was exuding BIG DICK energy in that meeting. In actuality, their business strategy was giving sharecropper. They expected us to operate with limited resources, invest into marketing their company, and provide services for clients in exchange for a half share payment. Jacobson’s would never!
Yes, the business is closed. Yes, I implemented the suggestions on the paper. Yes, I made a conscientious decision to provide a space where customers can come out of these ghetto beauty salon streets. You can get serviced by someone that knows what she’s doing, is properly licensed, and I won’t sell you snake oil. While many moons have come and gone. My desire to provide customers a bandit free experience has not.
To begin let me say this out loud. I'm so protective of anyone seeking beauty services. I seriously worry about the potential clients that are online trying to find a solution to their problems. I don't want for you to make a beauty decisions without first talking to me. I know that it's not logical to think that is a possibility, but a girl can wish. I've been the hyper protective "big sister" my entire life.
If you're old enough to remember the discount department store SYMS. Then you can appreciate that their business model definitely left a lasting impression me. I believe that there company slogan was "An educated consumer is our best customer"or something like that. I remember
Is my feeling that way crazy, possibly and it is certainly not realistic because I believe in a person's right to make their own decision. I really want the best for you.
Here's why: I have personal knowledge of how dangerous and predatory this industry can be. It doesn't matter who makes the products or offers the services. They want your freaking money. It is your responsibility as a customer to possess enough knowledge to determine whether to do business with them or go elsewhere. I consider myself to be a superhero in the beauty industry, and yes, I do have a few arch enemies (they came with the territory). There’s a subculture of uncivilized individuals operating beauty businesses in affluent zip codes throughout the state of Michigan.
Beauty Is My Ministry™
This is my all-time favorite bandit beauty salon owner tale. I’d admired the owner of this salon from afar for about 3 years before I worked there. I’d actually had a newspaper clipping of her on my vision board. She was one of the women that inspired me to be at the top of my game in this industry. She had mastered her craft. When I think of industry greats. I think of Vidal Sasson, Paul Mitchell, Robert Cromeans, and her. In my eyes she was the one woman that could shatter that glass ceiling. She was just that talented.
I love powerful, creative, business minded women. I really thought that we'd work well together, because what she’d built was amazing and I respect that. The more I got to know her the more I realized how hateful she was. It was really sad af to witness that. Everyone around her was complicit in her bullshit. I was like wtf is going on?
After a new client had just walked out. The owner and another stylist started laughing about how unstylish her clothes were. I responded "well she just spent $200+ on her hair and products. Who cares what she’s wearing?” After I said that the owner and I stood there and glared at one another. She was Ed Hardy Tee and “thin beauty” obsessed. I watched this grown woman eat one PLAIN potato chip, wipe the corners of her mouth, grab her stomach, and then announce that she was stuffed. Get the entire FOH!
Again, how it looks matters most in beauty. I’ve found that to be the stupidest philosophy in any business. What matters most is the reality. Will this product or service solve my problem, or nah? I worked there for about 3 months and was fired for insubordination and negativity (imagine that). I wasn’t insubordinate or negative, I just was vocal about her talking crap about clients and bouncing our paychecks multiple times.
The straw that broke the camel’s back was when I stopped depositing her rubber checks into my personal bank account. I did not want to end up on Chexsystems so I started going to the bank that my paycheck was drawn on and cashing it there. She angrily confronted me about overdrawing her account and expected me to pay the overdraft fee. This bandit’s business strategy was something “my people” were emancipated from on Dec. 6, 1865. I don’t work for free. Since I refused to reimburse her for the overdraft fees. I was technically fired for cashing my paycheck. To save face she told everyone that I was “insubordinate and a cancer to her salon”. I hated working there so I took that “L”.
Even after that she got the “W” she was still trying to screw me over. The receptionist called the clients that were scheduled for the month and told them to be on the lookout for one of my emails. She then sent me a series of texts with names of everyone that was booked so that I could reach out to them. I found a new place in downtown Rochester (Rochester Esthetics) within a few days and set up shop immediately.
She fired me. So essentially she won that battle. Insubordinate, negative Tiffany was gone from her salon. Please tell me why she and her kids were prank calling my house phone? Now, I’ve always been particular about who has access to me and how. So I only gave my home phone number out for emergency contact, when applying for credit, and places that I submitted job applications to.
One snowy December night in 2007 my home phone rings around 2 am. I woke up in a panic thinking something had happened to my husband. He worked the night shift as a delivery driver. My first thought was OMG something happened to Jimmy. I answered the phone in a panic. “Hello, Jimmy!” There’s a male voice on the other end that I don’t recognize. Me again, "Hello, Jimmy are you okay?” This guy starts laughing like a maniac in a horror movie. He takes a deep breath and then asks if he can come over to my house to get his junk waxed.
It’s 2am and I’m home alone with our toddler daughter. Now I am hypervigilant! I immediately hung up the phone, ran into my toddler’s room to check to see if she’s safe. I ran around our apartment checking the windows and doors making sure they were all locked. Then I called the Rochester Police department and asked that they send a car to canvas the area. Thank God we lived downtown at the time. I saw the patrol car come by my bedroom window within two minutes of me hanging up.
I called my husband and told him what happened. He told me that it was probably someone pranking me. He suggested that I should try to get some rest because I had my new job that I was starting later that morning. I told Jimmy that I loved him, I hung up the phone and I layed back down. The phone rings again. Now it’s a female voice. She’s speaking in a fake broken English accent asking me about coming to my house to get a bikini wax at 2 something in the morning.
At this point I am fed up and I just started swearing at the person on the other end of the phone. Then I hear a sweet little voice say. “Mommy, she's saying bad words to me.” I then heard the owner that had just fired me say “Hang up the phone (child’s name).” The call was immediately disconnected. I was gobsmacked! I sat on my bed with the phone receiver in my hand for what felt like an eternity. The off the hook beep is what signaled me it was time to hang up the phone. I could not believe that she would behave like that.
I was relieved that we were safe, but deeply sad for her daughters. A grown woman was teaching her elementary aged daughters how to bully. I’m an adult and I can handle bullies. I can not imagine what that child would be capable of doing to someone her own age. Later that morning I called the other ally that I had at that salon. I told her everything that had transpired with my firing and now these 2am prank calls. She promised me that I would never have to worry about the owner bothering me again.
About 10 years later I was at the AMC 30 with my daughter and her two friends. The One Potato Chip Victor and I ran into one another in the lobby. We both quietly stood there for a moment and then went our separate ways. Yes, her salon is closed. Yes, I avoided being on Chexsystems. One thing I have learned is that this particular industry is not for the faint hearted.
My mission
The market for influencer and DIY beauty services is huge because customers have been duped far too often. MBR’s mission is to radically change the way the salon industry operates. Rather than being overly gimmicky and profit-driven. I put my client’s needs first, I am highly trained, licensed, and provide the best possible solutions for your beauty woes. Even if it means referring you to someone else or refunding your money because you were unhappy with the service. That's MBR's pinky promise guarantee.
My vision
To live in a society where service providers and salon owners behave in the best interests of their customers. Every service provider should, in my opinion, hold the appropriate license and operate within the parameters of their qualifications. Assuming this ideal world exists, salon owners would assume complete accountability for branding and marketing their businesses, freeing up employees to concentrate on serving customers. Kinda like Jacobson's, but specifically for the salon industry.
Meet The Team
Uniqueness is what powers ME Beauty Republic. MBR, which Tiffany Renée Piggée founded, aims to hire top talent in a variety of sectors, including esthetics, customer service, and janitorial. Serving you is the goal. All jokes aside, I will fill every position and work alone on this until I find a tribe of people who share my values for a safer, customer-focused salon industry.
Tiffany Taylor
Founder / Lead Esthetician
Renée Piggée
Creative Director
Piggée Renée
Client Coordinator
Taylor Tiffany
Events & Janitorial