Seems like I'm not the only one who has had a bad experience here. Let me see, where to start...this may sound like a broken record, but I had an appointment scheduled for 9a, and guess what?
My stylist was almost 15 minutes late. When I arrived, the receptionist, whose customer service skill I can only liken to drinking poison, did not ask me what my name was, who I was here to see---seems she was expecting the stylist to be late, and I just had to "deal with it." When the stylist did arrive, she was nice and came up to me to say hello and introduce herself--rather than the receptionist doing this, so the stylist gets ONE STAR for being respectful.
However, I can tell you that this is the LONGEST I have spent in a hair salon to receive a service that should take no more than 2-3 hours. I was there to get extensions taken out and a light relaxer put in, shampoo/blow dry/style. The only lengthy part, the extension removal, should have taken about an 1 to 1.5 hours...HOWEVER, the stylist told me that she "works slow to do good work" and proceeded to unbraid my hair and clip out my extensions at the pace of a drunk turtle!
Every flick of the wrist, every turn of the hand, every finger motion seems like they were keeping pace with someone lost at sea--drifting along with no sense of time or reason...She yammers on about zodiac signs (though I told her I don't believe in astrology), and when she asks what my birthday month is, she says, "A-HA, you're a Cancer...my husband is a Cancer, you guys are a special kind of crazy...not the bad crazy, but the good crazy." I told her I'm not lumped in that category and hope her Aquarius moon and good crazy husband are blessed...after I said that, she sensed I "went to church" and backed off that wacky space crap...she obviously exists on another mental plane that I don't aspire to get to...EVER...I just wanted my damn hair done!
When she is FINALLY done with taking everything down and unbraiding my hair, I show her the type of relaxer I want her to use---which the application is pretty universal, but she spends several minutes reading about the product. One of her colleagues, who had done about 2 people between 9a-11a, knew about the product I had, and that should have been enough...but oh no! Not for Susie "Aquarius" Turtle!
Anywhoo, sometime between 12p-1p, she has slowly, slowly, slowly, applied a relaxer to my hair...slowly, slowly, slowly, took me to the shampoo/condition....slowly, slowly, slowly, led me upstairs to sit under the dryer....and then slowly, slowly, slowly--all the while cooing her version of customer conversation---the moon, signs, finding a good church, dog breeds, Obama, and parking meters------SLOWLY, my hair is blow dried out, and the best part for me was to see the long, healthy hair I'd grown over the past 3 months...that was the BEST PART of my visit!
I had wanted to get new extensions put in...yet when she was up to the blow dry, it was already 1p. I asked her how much longer it would take to get my hair rebraided and some extensions put in--she told me it would take about 5 hours..."I work slow but do good work" is what she told me...I looked at her like she was high! Ain't no dang way I'm going to sit here all day like I'm at work, frustrated, and letting you do the two step in my hair for another 5 hours....NO!
After she flat irons my hair...slowly, slowly, slowly...I get this Claire Huxtable in the 9th grade hairdo that I ask her to make a bit more....oh let me see---contemporary, current, something at the top...she tried, but, I just said, "oh hmmm, thanks so much." I was DONE at 230p.
Don't get me wrong, she was a nice person, but slow and wacky as all heck! How do you tell a customer they are "good crazy like my husband" and expect a tip? When I went to the front counter to pay, she wanted to book a followup appointment for the following Saturday for the extensions between 9a-3p...I told her that shouldn't take her that long to do, and what did she say in return---wait for it---
"I work slow but do good work..." LOL
The receptionist gave me a "are you sure you want her" look, and then tried to cover by saying, "Oh, we set time aside for lunch." What the heck am I signing up for, a shift on an assembly line? Ri-DAMN-diculous!
Big shocker--I never came back!
A few weeks after this appointment---THANKFULLY, I found a new stylist and new shop I love, who arrives on time, who works fast, and the entire shop is customer friendly. Woo-Hoo!
ONE STAR--because the stylist knew my name and introduced herself, but whose work and the overall atmosphere at the salon was like "I don't care, give me a Zanax, I don't want to be here." Great place to spend a Saturday, I tell ya---NOT! read more