A hairdressing business that doesn’t require technical skills from its franchisees, Just Cuts has made its mark with a simple, clear service and no-appointments structure.

General manager Amber Turnbull shares some insights into how this 34 year old business is building success.

How many franchisees are in your network?

The average Just Cuts franchise owner goes on to own multiple salons. In fact, just over half are multi-site owners (53%). Out of 198 Just Cuts across Australia and New Zealand, 95 franchisees make up the community.

What’s the average tenure of a franchisee?

Many Just Cuts franchisees spend less than 30 hours each week working on their business so many of them stick around for the long term! The most compelling example of this is our first ever franchisee,  Leigh-Anne Brosens who opened the Engadine outlet in 1990. Leigh-Anne still owns this location and is the biggest advocate of how following the system works.

Statistically most of our franchisees have been in the business for at least five years with many celebrating 10 plus years.  

What are your expansion plans for 2017-18?

We will reach 200 Just Cuts locations by the end of June 2017.

And thanks to 40 percent year on year sales growth since 2013 for our exclusive range of professional haircare and styling products, Justice Professional, this May we celebrated the grand opening of our custom built, $3 million warehouse and international distribution centre. We strive to continually add value to franchisees’ investment and this has increased their buying power.

We have a continual commitment to innovation and technology. We always want to change and improve. We have a number technology projects in the works including a network wide POS re launch, taking our loyalty program to the cloud and improving internal communication within the group so the right content is getting to the right stakeholders.

We are also currently reviewing opportunities in the UK to establish a Just Cuts community in that market.

How long your business has been franchising?

The first Just Cuts Franchise opened in 1990 in the southern Sydney suburb of Engadine, NSW.

Why does the system work?

The core focus for our system is that it is easy. You don’t need to be a hairdresser to own and run the business. The system is centred around empowering your stylists to think like an owner so they take the initiative to run all aspects of the business. And, most importantly our fixed fee structure is simple and relevant to the brand. Owners commit to a weekly investment of 12 haircuts a week. Regardless of the number of haircuts a salon completes each week, the fee remains the same. The marketing investment is based on the same structure at five haircuts per week.

How do you measure growth?

We base location feasibility around a series of equations that consider aspects such as salon square meterage, centre foot traffic and centre type. As a fixed fee franchise, we don’t push a goal sales growth percentage onto our franchise owners. We focus on core metrics around the ideal mix of services and products that make up a successful salon such as new clients versus existing, percentage of retail sales against services, average service price and so on.