Strawberry Hill Hair & Beauty Salon evolved from a small home based business 21 years ago to a thriving retail location in the heart of Surrey, B.C that is booked solid daily.
From it’s inception, Baljit Takhtar offered laser hair removal with the Dermalase IPL as well as hair styling and other beauty services. Through word of mouth, exceptional customer service and fairly priced treatments, her business began to out grow her home location.
In 2014 she purchased an existing salon in their current plaza location - and the business still continued to grow – Strawberry Hill Hair & Beauty Salon now has two floors, the lower 1000 sq. ft. floor has 10 hairdressing stations devoted to hair and the second floor has 3 rooms for customers privacy, a laser room, facial room and a waxing room.
However, with such tremendous growth it was becoming too much work managing every aspect of the business alone and Baljit was considering selling. At that time her son, Paul, was against the idea and instead pivoted from his IT career to partner with his mother, sharing the daily responsibilities of co-ownership.
Paul retrained at the B.C. Medical Academy of Aesthetics, specializing in both laser Hair Removal and Skin Rejuvenation treatments and he also attended the Hair Art Academy earning his hairdressing diploma. Now with Baljit, Paul and two other laser technicians, they are filling their appointment books from 10am to 7pm seven days a week.
With so many laser clients, Strawberry Hill Hair & Beauty Salone purchased their second Dermalase IPL device in 2020 – just as the COVID-19 pandemic was beginning. After a couple of months closed by provincial government mandate, when they reopened they discovered there was a huge pent-up demand for personal services and laser treatments – so much so, that Paul says “even though not many of our regular clients visited us due to the pandemic, we still doubled our new laser clientele database within just a few months into the pandemic”, he enthuses, “in fact, we’ve purchased our third Hair Removal handle in just one years time”.
What made Paul and Baljit choose another Dermalase IPL? “Imagine I was going to invest in a Mercedes, I would want to know that the company behind my investment will be around a long time and have the backbone to support me,” replied Paul, ”and Nubody has that long history and capability to support us in the long run”.
Even with other salons around the same plaza as Strawberry Hill Hair & Beauty, Paul and Baljit have continued to grow and we asked Paul what the secret to their success was. “I’ve always been very customer orientated and I ensure that I always customize treatments to their needs and never try to add unnecessary treatments or hidden charges and because they trust us they always come back – and they bring their friends as well”, said Paul, “and as well I firmly believe it takes money to make money and I’m not afraid to invest in advertising – I want to make sure everyone knows our name - and that investment will always pay off”.