Working as a beauty consultant is a good grounding for becoming a retail manager in the beauty industry. Many make-up consultants would like to progress in the same career yet do not wish to become freelance make-up artists. Retail management in beauty offers the chance to earn more money and to build a lucrative long-term career in an exciting industry.
Climbing the beauty retail management ladder is hard work. This is not an easy career to just walk in to and gain instant as well as long-term success. It requires excellent communication skills and suits someone who can understand arithmetic.
However, there are many levels of responsibility in beauty retail and because the industry is so good at training its staff, beauty retail management can represent a way for someone without the resources, or desire, for university education to earn good money in a fulfilling job.
Supervisors and Assistant Managers
The first rung of beauty retail management is a place for learning. In addition to regular duties, there will be training in how to do basic figures, reconciling tills and staff management.
- Assistant management positions are great for self-motivated people who want to learn more while still being based on the shop floor.
- These roles are also essential for those who want to progress as managers in the longer term.
Beauty Counter Managers in Department Stores
Managing a whole beauty counter, or account, is a great job for anyone with a proven sales record. This is still a sales role, but with the added responsibility of running a profitable business within the safety net of a department store. The main responsibilities of such a role include:
- team building and motivation, which culminates in driving sales
- business administration
- stock control
Counter managers are judged by the overall financial success of the account, so this job can involve pressure. However, successful managers will be invited to many company events outside of the department store and will start to learn much more about the industry. As an account manager, you can turn this job in to whatever you want it to be. It could be a comfortable long-term role that involves working in the same store for any years. Or it could be a real career platform to gain management roles off the shop floor.
Beauty Boutique Manager – Stand-Alone Stores
Being a manager of a small beauty boutique is a step outside the comfortable world of the department store. For independent and confident quick-thinkers, this can be an excellent role. In addition to the roles that a department store account manager undertakes, a small store manager is also responsible for the building.
- This will include being ultimately responsible for implementing all fire and safety regulation as well as undertaking regular risk assessment.
- Staff security is another important part of working in a store that does not have a team of security guards.
- Motivating a team without department store floor managers to monitor staff behavior requires more authority and much more experience.
Additionally, there is no passive flow of customers as in a department store. To make a business success of a small boutique, the store atmosphere has to be just right. Customer service and clienteling is the only way to build up regular business.
Due to the extra responsibility involved, this is where beauty retail management salaries start to get more competitive. Managers in the busiest and largest stores, with the big teams, earn the most money. This is also a fabulous springboard to higher management careers as succeeding in this role takes a strong personality and good understanding of the business.
Beauty and Spa Management
Someone with a beauty therapy qualification and who has run a stand-alone store could progress to spa management. This can involve most of the issues that a stand-alone store manager would have to deal with but with the added responsibility for enforcing industry standard hygiene, maintaining professional equipment and upholding treatment standards. Beauty spas have stringent legal requirements to meet at all times.
Ideally a beauty manager would have a good grounding in the practical application of treatments as this role is still extremely hands-on and will involve trade testing new staff as well as still having some contact with clients.
This job is not too dissimilar, in terms of the level of responsibility, from running a small hotel and good spa managers command excellent salaries. As a customer, having a bad spa treatment is as distressing as getting sick after eating in a restaurant so running a spa is in many ways a much more prestigious job than other higher management positions in retail.
Anyone who has progressed to one or more of the above roles, may wish to make the move permanently off the shop floor into a well paid management job in a beauty company head office.
Shefali Choudhury - Writer and visual artist, Suite Beauty topic editor, Shefali spent 10 years in professional makeup artistry from beauty to blood ...
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