Trademarks and Your Salon Brand Name

May 24, 2024Nina KovnerGROW

It’s all in a name

From Module 2 of Creating Your Awesome Brand, A Complete Course for Beauty Professionals

Your salon brand name helps communicate your salon brand story and helps connect you to the clients, teams, and tenants you wish to serve. And part of naming your salon brand is knowing if it is available to use and hasn’t been trademarked by another salon.

A trademark is part of your salon brand’s intellectual property, which holds immense value and is worthy of protection.

Trademarks protect the investment you made in creating your salon brand name, including your signage, website address, social and digital page names, printed materials, etc. 

Last week I had three conversations with salon owners on trademarks, and it has been a highly misunderstood part of brand development in the salon industry, so I want to bring attention to trademarks and your salon brand name. This is what we share with our clients in One On Ones, in A School and also in Creating Your Awesome Brand, a complete course for beauty professionals.

In one conversation, the salon was told by ‘experts’ that they did not need to trademark their salon brand name. It took me less than one minute doing a search on the USPTO website (the US patent and trademark database) to learn someone already has the name trademarked in Class 44, the trademark class for salons. UGH.

While I am not a trademark attorney and am not, and will never give you legal advice, I have three decades of trademark experience, being responsible for some of the most valuable trademarks in the professional salon product space, including receiving a gazillion cease and desist letters from conglomerates with way more attorneys on staff than I had, along with helping our clients the last twelve years at Passion Squared.

Things To Consider When Creating Your Salon Brand Name

  1. Is the name aligned with your salon brand story?
  2. Is the name already trademarked in the Class you want to use it for? (Hair salons are Class 44)
  3. Is the name available as a web address and site?
  4. Is the name available to use as your brand email address?
  5. Is the name available on social pages?
  6. Is the name available on digital pages?

Trademark Investment

  • USPTO Directly $250 + (I don’t usually recommend this as it can be overwhelming for some)
  • Legal Zoom $649 +
  • Attorney $2000 + est It takes anywhere from six months to one year to secure a registered trademark, depending on the USPTO and the complexity of the mark.

Cost of Creating A New Salon Brand Name If Your Current Name Is Trademarked by Another Salon

  • New website address
  • New email addresses
  • New social page names
  • New digital page names
  • New signage
  • New printed materials
  • TIME ENERGY MONEY ++++++++

This is just one of many tools and strategies inside the Creating Your Awesome Brand, a complete course for beauty professionals. Because when you have clarity around your salon brand, you have a strong foundation to make more aligned decisions, save a ton of time, money, and energy, and feel more confidence, courage, and joy. Click here to learn more.

Much love, in service to you-

Nina

Five Questions To Help Create Your Salon Brand Promise

May 23, 2024Nina KovnerGROW

Trust is built on promises kept

From Module 1 of Creating Your Awesome Brand, A Complete Course for Beauty Professionals

What is a brand promise?
• How you solve the problems of the clients you serve
• The experience you deliver
• The expectations you set
• How you want your clients to feel

Different Audiences, Different Promises

When crafting your salon brand story, you likely have more than one audience unless you are a solo independent.

• Employment-based salons
Clients and team members

• Lease based salons
Clients and tenants

Example Brand promise for clients
Your clients may value relaxing experiences because previous salons they’ve been at feel chaotic.

Brand promise for teams
Your team may value working in an environment that is grounded and relaxing because their previous salon was toxic and chaotic.

Same. But different.

Five Questions To Help Create Your Salon Brand Promise
1. What does your salon brand experience look and feel like?
2. How does your salon brand solve the problems of your people?
3. What is the expectation you are setting for the experience of your salon brand?
4. How do you want your people to feel?
5. What do you want your people to say about your salon experience?

Having clarity of your salon brand story, which includes your salon brand promise, helps you simplify your decision-making process, make more aligned decisions for your salon business, set clear expectations, and connect with the people you wish to serve, whether it be salon clients, salon teams or salon tenants.

With that clarity, you will save a ton of time you waste not making decisions, or making ones that are not aligned with your visions and goals, have more confidence, and courage, and feel so much more joy. 



This is just one of many tools and strategies inside the Creating Your Awesome Brand, a complete course for beauty professionals. Because when you have clarity around your salon brand, you have a strong foundation to make more aligned decisions, save a ton of time, money, and energy, and feel more confidence, courage, and joy. Click here to learn more.

Much love, in service to you-

Nina

Elevated Salon Prices Require Elevated Salon Experiences

May 15, 2024Nina KovnerPodcast

In this episode, Nina dives deeper into a recent Reel they shared on the connection between your salon brand, your salon experiences, and your salon prices. When your prices are aligned with the experience you deliver, and you’re attracting salon clients who see value in the experience for the price, you are good. When your salon prices are out of alignment with the experience you deliver, that’s where you may struggle. We also talk about the importance of context when absorbing content on the socials about your salon pricing. The Reel mentioned in this episode can be found here. You can learn more about the Creating Your Awesome Brand course here, find us on the socials here and here. Thank you so much for listening! 

Apple Podcasts
Spotify
YouTube Podcasts

Your experience matters. We would be so grateful if you shared your experience with our podcast by leaving a review wherever you enjoy your podcasts so others can discover it. It matters to us, and so do you. Thank you- Nina

The Trouble with Comparing Your Salon Brand To The One Down The Street

April 10, 2024Nina KovnerPodcast

In this episode, Nina dives into the trouble with comparing your salon brand to the one down the street, revisiting a Passion Squared blog post from 2014 on the importance of having clarity around your own salon brand story, and marketing strategy which includes your salon pricing, your business objectives, desired outcomes, overhead, and all the things. This episode also includes a little reminder about your rhythm, knowing that some days you’ll be in your flow, some days you’ll be on fire, and some days, like for Nina today, you will be in your slow era. All the days and eras matter. And so do you. You can find us on the socials here and here. Thank you for listening. 

Links mentioned in this episode:
Creating Your Awesome Brand Course 
The Pricing Playbook Class

Apple Podcasts
Spotify
YouTube Podcasts

Your experience matters. We would be so grateful if you shared your experience with our podcast by leaving a review wherever you enjoy your podcasts so others can discover it. It matters to us, and so do you. Thank you- Nina

How Salon Clients Find You Online and The Missing Context of Charging Your Worth

April 3, 2024Nina KovnerPodcast

In this episode, Nina dives into a few key actions that can have an immediate impact on your salon business and brand. New salon clients find you via search, whether it be through search engines, voice, AI, referral platforms or the socials. Every word matters, which means your captions are more important than ever. In this episode I share an exercise I did that proved how social media posts can significantly contribute to how your salon comes up in search engines. We also talk about the missing context of the ‘charging your worth’ messaging in the salon industry, and give you some fundamental tools to help you refocus your energy on your own salon brand and get out of comparison. Thank you so much for listening!

Links mentioned in this episode:
Creating Your Awesome Brand Course 
A School for Salon Owners

Apple Podcasts
Spotify
YouTube Podcasts

Your experience matters. We would be so grateful if you shared your experience with our podcast by leaving a review wherever you enjoy your podcasts so others can discover it. It matters to us, and so do you. Thank you- Nina