Las Vegas International Beauty Show

Here are some pictures from the show. Karen Showen sharpened for us and had people bring back additional shears after they tried out their shears. Nikita Smith cut my hair in class. She kept a room of 200+ enthralled for the full 90 minutes of class. Our best selling shears were the short curve, the Fishbone, our new T25 and T14. We are pretty tired and look forward to the flight home tomorrow. We miss our grandbabies. I will post the diagrams to Nikita's haircut on the website as soon as I get home. They are part of the slideshow here.

I sold a Twister Sister at the show to a gentleman from South Africa. Imagine his surprise when I told him we had a Bonika warranty center right there in his country and someone there who could sharpen them correctly. Unfortunately we couldn't say that to the lady from Guatemala. Maybe next year we will have a sharpener there. We plan to add a Spanish speaking country as a warranty center in October.

This was one of the loudest shows we have been in. The volume level was overwhelming. I think it affected our sales by 30%. We still did well enough we will be back next year.

Coming Events

I haven't posted but will try to be more diligent. We stay so busy but there are so many things happening with our company this year that I need to annouce and chronicle them.

1. Baby is due. Probably next Wednesday the 23 which is when the doctor will induce if baby Brooke is not born. Not my baby. For those who don't know me, my daughter Mystie is my office manager and her husband is my sharpening manager. It's her second baby that is due. Being a family business it disrupts things, but we are excited about the new bundle of joy.
2. IBS New York. We will leave on Friday (2 days after the birth) and have two booths and two classes there. If you are coming to the show stop by our booths. Also catch the classes. Sheila Tate is teaching classes. She has a great DVD coming out that will be available for wholesale by the middle of May. Its Barbering for the Cosmetologist. She taught this class at the Miami International Hair Show last week end and will teach it again in Orlando for the Premiere Show. I think her DVD will sell very well.
3. Phasing in new shears and phasing out old ones. We are switching manufactuers for some shears, discontinuing the slower selling ones and replacing with new designs and completely revamping some of our other shears. We are excited about the new items. Any left over old models we will sell at a discounted wholesale price at the Sharpener's Jam in July. We are working now on some great bargain boxes for the shapeners who attend.
4. Back in stock, if you were waiting for them T14. Also take a look at the new EDT Shear and tell me what you think. We will be distributing this shear.
5. Last item today is the Kuda Workshop We were asked to speak on how to sell shears. I will be taking the seminar and using Lenny's machine. I thought it was impolite to bring and market ours. I'm intrigued to use it. We will also be certifying sharpeners for our Bonika Shears. We will probably bring some discounted Jazzys for sharpeners to certify on and possilby some texturizers and a Fishbone. for directions on sharpening a Fishbone click here.