Reporter Gets the Dirt on Salon Sanitation

Consumer concern about salon safety continues to dog our industry. So when Good Housekeeping’s Leslie Vreeland posed the question. “How safe is your manicure?’ in an October 1995 article, The NAILS File took notice. To get a firsthand look at how licensing and sanitation standards are enforced, Vreeland accompanied two state inspectors — code-named “Rose” and “Betty” — on a tour of a New Jersey nail salon. The inspection began with Rose and Betty quickly trying to match license names and photos to faces in the salon “before unlicensed workers could slip out the back door,” they explained in the article. Next, the team did a walk-through of the salon, checking for neat and sanitary workstations, good ventilation, and proper disinfection procedures, at the same time on the lookout for strong odors and smoking violations. Finally, the inspectors checked the salons .storage and waste disposal facilities for code violations. While the article did employ a few scare tactics, on balance, it did much more to cairn fears about potential disease transmission and to educate die public about the stringent standards technicians and salon owners must adhere to.