It’s always reassuring to discover that something you long suspected turns out to be true. And it’s especially satisfying to be able to prove to others that your theories are, in fact, fact.

We at NAILS Magazine have long asserted that nail technicians should continue their educations. We’ve suggested that a technician’s earning power increases with the number of continuing education classes she takes.

Well, some recent research done by NAILS, in conjunction with the Nail Manufacturers Council, bears out this simple lack Nail technicians, who continue their educations actually earn more money on services than technicians who do not take classes.

Technicians take an average of three classes a year. That’s not a bad figure for an average. But we found that those who take more than three classes a year have higher service prices overall.

Look at the figures from our 1991 survey: Technicians who took four classes earned an average of 6% more than the national average on services; people who took 10 classes earned an average of 7% more. The consequences of not continuing your education hit you in your pocketbook: People who did not take any classes earned 4% less than the national averages.

If you ever had any doubt about continuing your education, this information should send you straight back to school.

There’s more interesting news about service prices that came out of this survey. We found that there has been virtually no change in service prices in the last two years. For some salon professionals, this is obviously not good news because service prices need to go up to keep pace with inflation. However, considering that we had a war and a recession in the last year, the mere fact that prices didn’t go down is cause for elation among many salon owners.

Finally, we noticed some disturbing trends in pricing across the country. Several states popped up repeatedly with the lowest average service prices; nationwide. Unfortunately, my home state of California was the worst offender. We have the lowest average prices on sculptured nails ($35.21), on fills ($18.33), and on gels ($32.50). Our East Coast counterpart Now York came in with the lowest prices on manicures ($8.56) and pedicures ($18.71). I’d sure like to see those prices get closer to those in such high-priced stales as Maryland, where the average price for sculptured acrylics is $54.29 and the average fill runs $33.08.

I’ll have more information gathered from this reader survey in upcoming issues. I’d like to thank all of you who participated in the survey: Your responses helped us gather some very valuable information that will help NAILS and the Nail Manufacturers Council understand your needs and serve you better.

 


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