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I'm a 56 year-old hairstylist with an established business in San Francisco. My partner and I are ready for a simpler less stressful life and love the Asheville area. My concern is that when I leave my clients here I have to start completely over. No horizontal move. I will have to get all new clients. How realistic is this to pull off? I know that prices are lower in general in Asheville for services but I can't live on minimum wage.
No idea of prices for styling in SF but would guess cost of living here less. My hair stylist came from New Orleans charges $55 for wash, cut, blow dry and is the best I've ever had anywhere. He works out of his shop at home so keeps price down.
I'm not a stylist, but I speak with mine about her business. She's an amazing stylist, but struggled after moving to this saturated market. She had to use Groupon, and it still took her two years to establish a client base who would pay the prices she was asking as a very experienced stylist.
That is kind of what I am anticipating, if I do move there. I expect to lower my prices because the overhead is not gonna be as high as San Francisco but I think it would be hard to charge half as much after having 30 years of experience. I currently charge $68 for a woman's haircut, which is pretty average in the city here. Certainly not high end.
I'm a 56 year-old hairstylist with an established business in San Francisco. My partner and I are ready for a simpler less stressful life and love the Asheville area. My concern is that when I leave my clients here I have to start completely over. No horizontal move. I will have to get all new clients. How realistic is this to pull off? I know that prices are lower in general in Asheville for services but I can't live on minimum wage.
I think you'd have a tough time. The woman who cuts my hair is super-talented, has a chair at a good salon (so far as I can tell!) in trendy West Asheville, was born and raised in the area, and has a side business, and is still struggling to find an affordable apartment within the city. As others have said, while the absolute cost of living here is lower than it is in NYC or SF or most big cities, the gap between cost of living and pay is way out of whack. For better or for worse Asheville is overexposed, and so many people want to be here right now. I think it'd be stressful for you here, at least in the beginning. If you could save up enough to live on for a year you might be able to make it work, or maybe consider some of the other pretty small towns in WNC like Waynesville or Weaverville. They'd probably pay even less than you could make in Asheville but the cost of living could be considerably lower.
I'm not sure where she started, but she's in South Asheville now.
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