Twenty years in. Every seat at the table.

I have been a working artist, an employee, and a salon owner. I have built a team from the ground up, made payroll when it was hard, and made the calls that protected the bigger picture when it would have been easier to stay comfortable. That full-spectrum experience is not a talking point. It is the reason I understand this industry at a level most people in corporate positions simply do not.

In 2017, I acquired what was then Allure Salon and Spa. In 2020, I rebranded it entirely. New name, new vision, new location, new way of doing business. Allure Beauty Bar was not a refresh. It was a reinvention. We built an environment our guests genuinely wanted to be part of, and the industry took notice. Five-time Salon Today Top 200. A NAHA nomination. A seat on the PBA Salon and Spa Advisory Council. Those recognitions were not the goal. They were the result of building something real.

We became the number one extension salon in the region, and that did not happen by accident. It happened because we were obsessive about getting it right. We studied brands extensively, ran trials, and held ourselves to a standard most salons never reach before we ever introduced a service to a guest. That process led us to Drop Dead Hair Extensions, and the results spoke for themselves. We built deep expertise, trained our team to a level that set us apart, and created a reputation that traveled well beyond our market. We also built a wedding hair and makeup team that grew faster than we anticipated, and a traveling show and events team that took us to national productions at Premier Beauty Shows in California and Florida and Americas Beauty Show in Chicago, where we worked backstage in model rooms, on stage, and on set at photoshoots.

Over time, Allure became a trusted resource for our broader industry partners. Color brands, tech companies, and product developers sought us out for beta testing, new product launches, and honest feedback from a team that was actually behind the chair. I consulted directly with many of them on product development. That relationship between the salon floor and the brand side is not something you can manufacture. We earned it, and it shaped the way I think about this industry at every level.

When I closed Allure, it was not a defeat. It was a decision. I had a calling that ownership, as proud as I was of what we built, could not fully contain. I wanted to reach more people. I wanted to operate on a larger stage. I let go of what I thought I needed and stepped into what I actually want.

Our industry is operating on old philosophies. The professionals doing this work every day deserve flexibility, autonomy, and the kind of support that meets them where they actually are. I believe beauty should be leading the charge on innovation, not trailing behind it. That belief is what led me to found Arise, an AI color formulation app built for professional colorists. I had been using AI tools with my own team and realized I was building something that simply did not exist yet for the average stylist. Hair color is a universal language. The technology to support it should be too.

I am a stage educator, a contributing writer for the professional beauty industry, and a strategist who brings two decades of lived experience to every room I walk into. I am not here to explain the salon world to brands. I am here because I lived it, and I know exactly what it takes to build something that lasts inside it.