Ask anyone who has met nail technician and competitor Tim Farquhar what he is like and invariably the answer will come back, “Tim — he’s such a nice guy.” Farquhar is the sort of person who is always positive, helpful, cheerful, affectionate, and funny. Yet he seems unaware of his host of admirable traits.

“Doing the cover nails was the best experience I’ve ever had in this business,” says Farquhar. “Everyone was nice; it was tremendous!” Because he came all the way from Ohio, Farquhar took the opportunity while he was in the Los Angeles area to visit the Long Beach Hairdressers’ Beauty and Trade Show.

“The show was overwhelming,” Farquhar says. “We never have big shows like that where I come from. I felt like Alice in Wonderland. People kept coming up and offering thigh creams and all kinds of things for me to try. I ended up spending only $5 — for a drill-bit holder! At shows, I like to look at products, but I step back and think about them and order them later if I decide to, even if it means paying more. My supply houses back home treat me right, so I like to stay loyal to them.”

Farquhar “fell into” doing nails five years ago after having spent the previous five years cutting hair. He was offered a job with a hair care company that didn’t materialize, so, having lost many of his hair clients, he joined a nail salon to try to build up a clientele.

“None of my friends would have believed then that five years later I would travel to Los Angeles, visit with a photographer in Hollywood, and see the Hollywood sign, all to do nails for a magazine cover,” Farquhar says.

For one of the hands on the cover, Farquhar did tips with fiberglass overlays. He competed twice in the fiberglass division at nail shows (placing seventh in his very first show, second in his second) in his home state of Ohio. “I went to a show just to see what it was all about, and I liked it. I’m going to this year’s Allied Beauty Show and will compete in the acrylic division.”

Farquhar loves doing acrylics. An independent contractor at The Nail House in Dayton, he does mostly tips with acrylics, but he also does fiberglass, gels, and regular manicures. He is very popular and is booked three weeks in advance, probably due to the way he makes his clients feel. “None of my clients are movie stars, but they are all famous — for the hour they’re in my chair,” says Farquhar.

Farquhar enjoys his work and thinks that you can make as much money doing nails as you can cutting hair. “It all depends on you. I start my day at 10 a.m. and will work until 11:00 at night if I’m booked,” he says.

His hobbies include learning other languages, including sign language, and needlepoint. “On my days off, I pretty much loaf around. But my hands always have to be kept busy,” he says. “I’ve been studying sign language for about a year. I have friends who are deaf that I can practice sign language with.”

Farquhar s ultimate goal is to own his own salon, and he has his entire dream salon mapped out in his mind. But that plan is on the back burner for now, since things are going great at The Nail House.

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