Seasonal scents are something we have used often to shake things up a little and provide a little treat for the guests in our nail department. We have used three main scents in our salon: pumpkin spice, cranberry, and chocolate. As Jill mentioned, fall is the time to harvest apples and pumpkins. Many scents are available to you like apple cider or pumpkin spice for fall-themed pedicures. There are others like candy cane, cranberry, or gingerbread for winter-themed services. If you search you can find just about any scent you would like. In our salon the hands-down favorite has always been chocolate. We have used this scent around Valentines Day to great success.

Be mindful, however. As Jill says, research not only the scent, but the product price, cost per service, and how you will advertise for it. Will you make a seasonal insert for your salon menu? Or will you just make a flyer detailing the special scent? In our salon we make a laminated card on festive paper with the seasonal scent and change the description just a tiny bit to reflect the season. This way we don’t need to make more than a half dozen cards per season. We do not go to the added expense of printing menu inserts. We offer each scent for the holidays for about two months. This gives clients time to try the scent but not enough time to get tired of it. This help us to keep a things fresh and new.

Also, our basic service and upgrades are exactly the same. We just use the scented products in place of our regular products. This makes it simple for me to incorporate the new scent into each service provider’s training for the season so there is no confusion and wasted product when we start offering the themed services. As far as ordering the scented products, when I plan my holiday ordering I usually order in bulk the mask, scrub, and massage cream, so I usually don’t have much to order for those products. Or if I do need one of those things I cut down by half what I would normally order of the regular products and order enough of the themed scent to be able to give the scented upgrade to everyone who wants it. This allows me to stay within my inventory budget and still provide something exciting for the season to our guests.

Seasonal scents are one of my favorite ways to do something different for my guests for the holidays. We are getting ready to launch our fall scent beginning in October, and our guests are looking forward to it.

— Sandy