One thing in particular that concerned me was that one of the state orders originally stated that hairdressers had to wear a medical-grade face mask at minimum in order to see a client. Reading that, I felt conflicted. I have family members that are in the medical field that are having a difficult time having the proper amount of PPE to go and work with patients, and they're sometimes having to use one for the entire day because they're so limited. It was morally conflicting for me to think that I was going to have to now go seek out and get medical-grade masks, when other people who need them much more essentially than me can't even get their hands on them.
Then again, things are changing every minute. Right when we wrote up all of our mitigation plans and we were almost done with it, the state updated the mandate. Still, we're telling all the stylists, "This is are what our guidelines are. They could change, but until we tell you that anything on here is verified that it's changed, this is law. You have to follow this."
There are a lot of ways an appointment will look different at the Loft, and much of it is from the state mandate. We are taking appointments only — no walk-ins — because they don't want to have a lot of people coming in and out unknowing. You'll get a pre-screening. No mask equals no entry. We will not have a waiting area available; your vehicle is the new lobby. When your stylist is ready, they will call you when it's time to enter. A huge one that I've been telling every client that's called and booked is to please bring your own mask that loops behind your ears. You have to make sure it's the one that goes around the backside of your ears as opposed to tying behind your head, because we have to be able to get to your hair. The mask will be worn the duration of the service, unless directed.
We're doing 15 minutes sanitization procedures in between every client and 30 minute ones every four hours. We have a limit of people that are going to be working, so our schedules have changed significantly. I want to keep clients just as informed as I am, in the best that I can without making it really overwhelming. And for the most part, they've been pretty supportive of that, so I feel like it's been good.
The Very Real Dilemma of Snagging a Coveted Appointment
Right as Alaska officials announced that hair salons were going to be in phase one, I wanted to know who is going to be coming to see us, because I have a lot of my clients on my personal Facebook. I simply posted on there and said, "This isn't for comments, this isn't for your opinion. I just want you guys to put a thumb emoji or put a heart emoji. Thumb emoji means you're going to go out and you're going to see these businesses that are opening in phase one. Heart emoji means you're going to stay home a little bit longer."