← Thriving Stylist Podcast
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Being behind the chair is what you love. Worrying about money, that's exhausting. Imagine if 2026 was the year everything changed. It's not just some stylists in our coaching program that grow their income. Every single one does over half, even cut their hours while earning more. And all of them, they finally feel in control. No guesswork, no risk, just real results in 90 days or less. For our 17,000 members who are just like you, visit www.thrivingstylist.com and take the first step towards the business and the life you actually want.
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Do you feel like you were meant to have a kick ass career as a hairstylist? Like you got into this industry to make big things happen. Maybe you're struggling to build a solid
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base and want some stability.
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Maybe you know social media is important, but it feels like a waste of time because you aren't seeing any results. Maybe you've already had some amazing success but are craving more. Maybe you're ready to truly enjoy the freedom and flexibility industry has to offer. Cutting and coloring skills will only get you so far, but to build a lifelong career as a wealthy stylist, it takes business skills and a serious marketing strategy. When you're ready to quit just working in your business and start working on it, join us here where we share real success stories from real stylists. I'm Britt Siva, social media and marketing strategist just for hairstylists and this is
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the Thriving Stylist podcast. What is up? And welcome back to the Thriving Stylist Podcast. I'm your host Brit Siva and this is going to be another one of those like investigative reporter style episodes. I do research for every single episode I record, but every once in a while I do one that is extremely data based and this is one of those. I got a DM this week from a stylist who was asking me to basically give a statement on something that's about to potentially have a pretty big impact on our industry. And I responded, I gave my opinion and when I looked at her response to my feedback, it made me realize that I think there is a lot of confusion, misconception, misunderstanding around how private beauty schools operate and why defunding loans and federal support is actually happening. The backstory on the DM that was sent to me is a private beauty school. Actually a collection of private beauty schools made a social media post asking for the industry to go to a government sponsored website to give feedback and basically push for the government not to pull back government funding to cosmetology school. Programs on its face totally makes sense. Like I am all for growing our industry. The trades are booming right now. I want as many people to join the industry as possible. I was a student who attended cosmetology school on financial aid like so trust me, I have been able to take advantage of programs like that. I fully get it. However, what I think that this person who DM me learned is that that post, at face value is fighting for something maybe a little bit more complex than what it looks like on the surface. So I'm going to share with you what that post was. I'm not going to share who made the post originally. I'll give some context. I'm certain you could find it if you wanted to. The reason why I'm not sharing who the post was made by is because I don't necessarily think it's relevant. The post was made by a collection of private beauty schools, which I'll explain what that means in a moment. I totally understand why they did it. The reason I'm not sharing the source is I don't want that collection of private beauty schools to be like targeted. This is not about them. It has nothing to do with that. They just happen to be, you know, the handful of businesses who made this post that's going semi viral so it happens to be attributed to them. But I don't want it to seem like this podcast is like coming at them because it's not. That's not my point of view at all. So let me read you the post. So the DM I got said I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on this and where we're headed as an industry. I've been licensed almost 30 years and I've experienced lots of shifts over the years for many different reasons. I see several sides to this, but would love to hear your thoughts. Thanks. Then I opened the post she sent. It's a shared post made by six different privately owned beauty schools and I'm going to read with you what the post says. It's a carousel and it says Save the beauty industry. There is a bill being passed that would cut loan funding for beauty school students, which would put 92% of beauty schools in the United States at risk of closing because of a federal regulation that is completely ignoring how this industry actually works. This has been an issue for a long time, but our voice is needed now so we can be categorized and prioritized correctly. It does not count tips, part time schedules, the gender wage gap, how many of us are entrepreneurs? How many women work in this field are mothers and don't work full time, the large portion of our industry that is minorities and systemic differences, the years it takes to build a clientele and much more. It just decides that this path is not worth protecting or providing resources for. The Department of Education is taking public comments until May 20th. This is the only official chance to speak up before the rule is final. We need your voices. Submit a comment and then it shares a link. I've not been to this website so full disclosure, I've not checked it out but the link they share is regulations.gov and this post asks you to make a comment addressing basically the Department of Education and then it closes with Save the Beauty industry. We're so deeply appreciate your help in protecting this amazing industry and all the future professionals to come. Great. So I responded and I said I've watched the $25,000 plus student loans that are negotiated out of privately owned beauty school franchises completely wreck aspiring beauty students financially with challenging repayment terms and high interest. While local community college programs are able to offer low and no cost admissions, these student loan programs can be incredibly dangerous. When salons don't have strong plans in place to fill books and increase revenue quickly, reduced rate programs would be much more powerful than student loans. And the person who initially sent the DM said I hear you. Thanks for responding. I want to give context to my point of view, which is fairly different than that post that was made by beauty schools. And in order to give the full context, I want to help you understand how private beauty schools are set up and why that is my take. Fun Fact About Me I did have the tremendous benefit of getting a wide breadth of knowledge when I was in the salon. I was a director of a multi seven figure salon. My position was unique. The owner of our salon had left, was not on site. I was leading the team in his absence. He was on site in the salon an hour to 90 minutes a week. On the weeks he came in, I would say he was in the salon like four hours a month on average. That's probably about right. And then the rest of the time he was running this secondary business that he had opened up right when I was hired onto the team. So this was a private for profit beauty school and he was running that as director of that school full time. I watched him run that school, hire for that school, go through the process of being approved for financial aid. I watched him ultimately sell that school and close it. And so I've gotten to see kind of firsthand how private beauty schools do things and I want to share that context in case you don't know how that sector of the industry operates. So I did a little research. There are approximately 100 Paul Mitchell Beauty Schools in the US today. About 25T Spa, which is the Academy for Salon Professionals or the Salon Professional Academy. There is an estimated 58 to 60 Aveda schools. Empire Beauty Schools has over 80 locations is in my research. There's Summit Salon Academies, they're Tony and Guy Academies. And there's way more. Hundreds and hundreds, hundreds of privately owned and operated for profit beauty schools. These can all be owned and operated differently. So some are franchises, some are licensed brand and education system. So that's different than a franchise. There's some crossover similarities, but it's not the same thing. Then some are completely owned independently. Like somebody decides to open one and operate it on their own however they want to. All of that is fine too. So there's hundreds of these out there in the US and then there's also cosmetology schools that are run through like local community colleges or local trade programs. And oftentimes, well, something through a community college would not be independently owned and operated. And a lot of cosmetology programs are part of a college institution. And colleges are publicly owned. So it's not a for profit business. It's a totally different model altogether. We're talking about for profit businesses for just a second. So when you look at beauty school tuition at these private for profit locations, tuition runs anywhere from 15,000 to $25,000 plus sometimes you have to buy a kit on top of that. Right. It's expensive. When you look at the data, some of these beauty schools have over 50% of their student body. They're on student loans, sometimes on Pell grants too, which are different. So let's talk about the difference between the two. So a Pell Grant is completely forgivable. It's a grant. So there's no repayment term that is expected. If you get that grant money, it just goes towards your tuition and the student is never expected to pay it back versus a student loan. It's, you know, like getting a loan for a car or anything else. The up front, it pays for the school and then there are repayment terms. We're going to talk about that too. Now what happens is any privately owned and operated beauty school has to apply for naca, which is the National Accrediting Commission of Career Arts and Sciences. It is an independent accrediting commission that decides basically who is running a legitimate beauty school. The finances have to look good. You have to be following an approved curriculum. There's all of these things. And getting Naka's approval is a huge deal. I can remember the owner of my salon who opened and owned this private independent beauty school. It was like really stressful for him. It was so important that he get it. Because you cannot get federally funded financial aid through these programs unless you are accredited. So if you're not accredited, basically the business is going to flop. It's really, really, really critical that you have that because these beauty schools know that a good chunk, if not the majority of students attending will be on some kind of federal financial aid. That's how they're able to afford that high rate of tuition. So let's zoom out for a second and talk about for profit beauty schools. I thought this was interesting. The Paul Mitchell schools network is estimated around $460 million in annual revenue across 100 locations. Now, in the data that I found, most of those locations are independently owned. So whether it be through franchise or license model, I don't know. But it's not like Paul Mitchell themselves is getting 460mil in most of these setup. It's going to be somebody, some person or a partnership or whatever group it could be who's decided to open up and operate this privately operated beauty school. And they're using, you know, brand name, a brand model, perhaps a teaching methodology that they've either licensed or franchised through. But they're running the business. They're just using the model that they have selected. Okay, so when you look at that, the average location could be running anywhere from, you know, two to five million dollars per school on average. Now, that's not profit, that's total revenue. So the data looks like the profit margin on a beauty school like that runs around 8 to 19%, depending. It looks like some locations are higher than that. I'm seeing data up to 25%. But I would say let's, let's be a fair estimate and say around 15 profit margin, or hey, let's even go with 8%. I'm fine with that too. But there's some kind of profit that's being generated out of this beauty school, and that's why these independent owners own and operate them. 8% of $3 million is $240,000 in profit a year. Like that'll work for most people, and that's what the schools are doing it for. So in order to get enough students to pay all of that tuition, these schools have to lean on the federal funding options available. Now let's look at data on student loans as a whole. Now what I'm about to share with you is not just cosmetology school student loans. This is student loans as they stand in the United States today. You ready? It's a 1.6 trillion dollar debt portfolio. So there's a hundred 1.6 trillion dollars in student loan debt in the US today. 180 billion of that is in default, meaning it's not being paid back. We don't know what's going to go on with that 180 billion. Like they don't got the money and it's not coming in. There are 43 million borrowers in the system today, millions of people, trillions of dollars in debt, billions of dollars in default. That is a problem and there has to be some kind of solution. So then when you look at that Instagram post or you know, any of the buzz around the beauty industry, it's like, yeah, but don't target us like we're a trade. And often people who enter the trade are people who maybe couldn't go to a traditional four year school for whatever reason. Some people just do it because they love it and that's beautiful too. But a lot of people go into the trade because it's their lifeline. It's the only thing they have completely understand. I want to tell you a story and it is about a Paul Mitchell school out of Knoxville, Tennessee. This was a for profit beauty school and In August of 2024 it was told it would be stripped of its accreditation. So it was going to lose that knock US rating I was talking about before. And without that accreditation you cannot get the funding. So in 2021 that beauty school out of Knoxville received $1.7 million in school loan funding. More than 25% of Paul Mitchell Knoxville students were formally in non paying forbearance status on their loans two years after graduating. Another 25% are not making any progress repaying them. Another 25% ish are in default and 17% were actually making progress on the loan. So we're looking at millions of dollars even just focusing on one location. And 17% of the loans given are being repaid. Something is not working here. So the reason that that school ended up losing its NACA's accreditation is that one of the requirements is that the school sustained what they call sound finances. And they were not able to on their books show that they basically were financially stable. They weren't able to demonstrate that for whatever reason. In 2022 it was reported that almost 75% of revenue that was brought into that school in Knoxville came from Title 5 funding, so some kind of financial aid program. And because they weren't able to create stability, the school lost its accreditation, therefore had to foreclose and close their doors because without the funding, there was no school. The school relies on that student debt to be able to essentially sell 15,000 to $25,000 tuition rates. You have to look at it as a sales pitch. And by the way, some of these, I'm not saying that privately owned beauty schools are bad. In fact, some of them are fantastic. Some of them really equip beauty school students to be successful right out the gate. I just interviewed somebody who graduated from a Paul Mitchell school, happened to be in Southern California, and she was like, honestly, I graduated with such a strong skill set. I was successful pretty much from the jump. And I have watched her story. She was so it's not to say that all schools don't prepare students. A lot of them do. However, if these loans aren't being repaid at scale, the system starts to fall apart. If you want to do more research on what happened at Paul Mitchell Knoxville, you can just Google it. All of the data is out there and it's, it's really public and you can kind of see what happened and what fell apart. So I share that story because it was so well document documented. But I looked it up. There are two beauty schools just here in the San Francisco Bay Area, privately owned and operated, that have closed in the last five years. Like it's happening. And that's just in my backyard. Like, I'm, I'm sure if you were to look nationwide, there's plenty more. It's a fragile business to run. It relies on the accreditation and it really relies on being able to acquire student debt. To be totally honest, it's the only way that $20,000 plus tuition is going to get paid at a scale that can keep the beauty school open and operating. So let's talk about what that point was getting at. Like, why is it saying save the industry? 90 something percent of schools are at risk of closure. Why is it saying, saying that? Because that sounds really scary. So part of what was included in the plan for the big beautiful bill that was passed July 4, 2025, was essentially the dismantling of the Education Department, the U.S. education Department. And the plan was to have a lot of the oversight of debt and loans and a lot of other things in the adult education sector was going to shift to the Treasury Department, which Treasury means Money. Treasury Department wants their money, right? Versus Education Department stands to just get people taught and educated. Treasury Department says we want that too, but we also need the money to run the country with. And so they're fighting for something totally different. The Treasury Department is not taking over the Education Department in full if all of this goes into swing. Also, the Department of Labor is part of the equation. And so the thought was, if the Department of Labor is aligned with the Department of Treasury, then these student loans will be less in default and less working professionals will be crippled by student debt. Because the Department of Labor is essentially in charge of making sure everybody can make a livable wage, right? And right now, that is part of the failure in industry. And here's the rub. We all know this. Some people who go to beauty school, it's just not for them. And you could say that about any school. Like, I'm sure some people go to medical school and it's not for them. If, you know, talk to a lot of veterinarians, a lot of them are people who went to med school, decided it wasn't for them, or for whatever reason it wasn't for them, and they became a vet. It wasn't choice number one. People go to cosmetology school, and it's not for them for whatever reason. Maybe they graduate, but never enter the work workforce. Who knows what job they take next, but they can't repay that loan. Some people do enter the workforce but have to assist for 3 years and struggle to pay that loan, don't do the things that they need to do to build and grow rapidly. It shouldn't take 5, 6, 7, 8 years to build a clientele. But not everybody knows how to do it fast. And so it can take a decade to start making real money. Well, by the way, that loan had to have been repaid years ago, and now we're in default. The system wasn't working. So here's where it hits us. Under the proposed rule, if the typical graduate of an undergraduate program does not earn as much as a high school graduate, the program will no longer be eligible for student loans. Graduate programs must similarly lead to earnings above those in an average bachelor's degree program. Programs that routinely fail to provide students with a reliable return on investment would lose access to federal student loans and in certain cases, Pell Grants. Losing the Pell Grants is upsetting to me because that is an opportunity for somebody to go to cosmetology school where they don't accrue debt is a real opportunity for those who are most Deserving Pell Grants are given to those who are at a very low income level and wouldn't be able to otherwise get a loan or afford college in any other way. They're just gifted the opportunity. I'm here for that. The high interest student loans that people are unable to repay, it's a bit harder for me to want to fight for. So with this plan, out of the nearly 20 million post secondary students, 95% are enrolled in a program that's likely to pass the earnings test. Cosmetology happens to land in the 5% that is likely to not to. So this article I read was quoting somebody named Preston Cooper, who is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. And that institute tracks higher education reform. So this is their full time obligation. And what he said is I think that there are some great four year college programs and there are some great trade school programs. There are also some bad 4 year college programs and there are some bad trade school programs. I kind of think he hit the nail on the head. The schools that are going to be hit the hardest by this are those whose students are graduating and are not going on to make amazing things happen. Now, I understand it's the industry at large. It's not based on individual school, but we are entering a window of opportunity. So if this moves forward, which signs are indicating that it will? There's a chance that it won't, but it's looking like it will come through in the summer of 2026. That basically enters a period of review and adjustments wouldn't be made at scale until 2028 and 2029. That's when the opportunity for those federal student loans would cease to exist in the industries and at the schools where it's deemed to be unlikely to produce a profitable result when the student graduates the program. Now what would take place immediately is what they're calling flagged programs, which private for profit beauty schools are one of the flag programs. They'd be required to notify current and prospective students of their low earning outcome status, meaning as a private beauty school is sitting there talking to this very excited prospective students, arguably their family who's there, and they're so excited and they're deciding they want to jump into this career and this industry. They have to sit there, I'm going to assume have them sign something. I don't know for sure, but I assume have them sign something that says the odds are against you. You graduating from this program is going to give you a low earning outcome. Now if mom or dad is co Signing on this loan, I think it is going to raise some concerns. It's a much tougher sell. And so for these private, for profit beauty schools, this is scary. It's already hard to get people to want to take out those loans or to have the money to pay to go and cutting off this line, there is no doubt hundreds of schools would close. I don't doubt that to be true. I'm just not certain that the answer is continuing to have students go into $25,000 in debt when the data is showing the majority are in default and cannot get their head above water on it. So what is the solution? I mean, I personally know lots hundreds of salons where somebody graduates from beauty school and within the first three years they're taking home 60, 70, $80,000. So that would be a person who could repay on their loan, no problem. So are these beauty schools partnering with salons that do have a growth plan? They're able to build and grow a team at scale and do it fast and fill a chair and understand marketing so that when somebody graduates from their school, there is no chance of default. They're not going to be making less than somebody who graduated high school and went on to no sort of post graduation education. They know that that stylist is going to graduate, go into some kind of advanced training program, kind of like a master's degree for stylists and be making, you know, $35,000 the first year, 45, $50,000 the second year, 60, 65, $70,000 the third year. Okay. And that's happening at scale. Everybody, not all salons are struggling. Thousands, tens of thousands are doing really, really, really well. So is the answer that these schools need to connect with these salons that are just killing it and filling it and getting these students opportunities at those places? I think that could be a viable answer. And I understand that we say things like, you know, the government doesn't take into account that a lot of people who join our industry are working moms. I was. Are people who want to work part time. Don't count tips. We talk about they don't count tips. They don't count tips because you're not claiming them on your taxes. They can't factor in ghost money. Like if they, if you're not claiming your tips on your taxes. Yeah, of course that's not going to count towards the potential of our industry. They can't count fake money. It's either documented or it's not. And we say things like the ability to work part time. I'VE said it once, I'll say it a hundred times. I know so many stylists who are working three days a week. I interviewed one. You will hear her story. Stylists who are working three to four days a week doing over $200,000 a year in services. So, yes, this industry is one that works part time, and this industry is one that is very female dominant, very female based. And I got a quote from Galen Burrows, who's the vice president of the National Women's Law center, who says gutting the Education Department will hinder the government's ability to enforce civil rights laws, especially if for girls, students with disabilities, LGBTQ students, and students of color. There are bigger, deeper concerns that happen when this funding pulls. I totally get it. I also think that there are things that could be shifted in the education side of our industry, and we all know it. And I think if we were to tackle those deeper issues, we could have everything that we're fighting for all at once. So I hope that listening to this episode just helped to give a little bit of clarity and context around how private beauty schools that are built for profit operate, why student loan funding is so critical and important to them, why loans, student loans and potentially Pell grants, which would truly be unfortunate, could be pulled back from our industry. Specifically the risks associated with these student loans, the volume of students who have been struggling with them for arguably decades, and the fragility of beauty schools who are relying essentially in full on students accruing debt to keep the doors open. It's a very fragile model. I fully agree. It has to change. We have a couple years to figure it out. I think as an industry, we can come together and do it. And cheers to another hope for change. So much love, Happy business building and I'll see you on the next one.