An interview with Richard Calcasola, owner, Maximus Salons

Congratulations!

The international association of hairdressers, Intercoiffure Mondial, has named Richard Calcasola — owner and creative director of Maximus Spas and Salons and chairman of the Fashion Committee of Intercoiffure America/Canada — Personality of the Year. The award, which was presented to Calcasola in September 2005 in Paris, is given in recognition of his services in his home country, the U.S., his commitment to fostering young talent for the salon industry and his efforts to earn Intercoiffure media recognition as a spokesman for the salon industry. Earlier this year, Calcasola was named creative director of Intercoiffure Mondial. In this role, he is part of a international creative team charged with forecasting hair trends. Calcasola will present a photo shoot of hair fashions at the association's annual Atelier, to be held in New York Oct. 8-10, 2005.

I recently caught up with Richard to talk about his decision to move from FT Access to Virtual Spa and Salon. Maximus has been a Software Creations client since 1996.

Joanne: Can you remember why you originally chose Software Creations in 1996?

Richard: We outgrew our existing software that no longer met our needs and when we evaluated software, we were impressed by Finger Tip Access more than any other. SCI had more detailed reports that fit our new business model as we were moving from a salon to a company. We needed more sophisticated software.

Joanne: How do you view the past 9 years with SCI?

Richard: It has been very favorable because their support was always available to us and they were continuously upgrading their software programs. And there was a lot of thought involved. There was the quality of the Finger Tip Access thinking - they were thinking about our industry. In fact, the quality of their thinking was useful to our industry and actually made us aware of new criteria for measuring our progress.

Editor's note: In early 2005, Richard and Joyce Calcasola decided it was time to move to the next level of their business and their IT. They formed a technology committee to make sure they weren't missing any great innovations in software or hardware. For 5 months they reviewed the top several software companies out of 30 plus on the market. Software Creations and others were brought in to meet with their committee and after a series of meetings and demonstrations, they again chose Software Creations.

Richard: Most recently, we did our research to see what software was available to us that would once again meet our new demands. We seriously evaluated 5 and 3 were viewed as contenders and then down to 2 over a five month period.

"Every company has there pros and cons, but SCI had more of the answers than anyone else did."

Of course having a history with Software Creations, we wanted to preserve the relationship. The reason was not simply status quo. We found SCI to be trustworthy, honorable, caring and leaders in new technology. While personally not a "techie," I felt very comfortable when our technical people gave SCI their endorsement.

Joanne: What rose to the top of your Pareto analysis to make your decision?

Richard: We had a long list, but eventually saw a few items repeated on the list - just described differently. These would be our top 5

1. Networked - connectivity was important - POS, accounting, etc.
2. Tie our marketing initiatives and strategies to the software
3. No loss of history and no conversion was a huge advantage. It saved us significant time and money.
4. Web based is important because I travel so much. I am able to tap into information and reports wherever I am at home or abroad.
5. Very helpful to have Software Creations to work hand in hand with our hardware installers. It was important for us in every step of the process to select and install and run our systems.

Richard: Being networked. When I think of all of the individual reports I see, for my three salons, I can now combine those reports and views to see my business consolidated and broken apart. Speed. Not a day goes by that we don't think of a question from a conversation and wonder, "How can we see that, how can we know that?"

Joanne: How do you see this software changing your customer contact and revenues?

Richard: Using the Recommend program, it answers the question from our stylists and technicians about how to encourage retail - which is an industry issue. How do we sell more retail? It has been proven that if a product is recommended at the right time and in the right way, sales will grow without any clumsiness. We are very focused on retail and in-salon treatments. We are probably double the national average for in-salon treatments. Missing the extra treatments is like going to a restaurant and skipping dessert. If you can afford it, why not say yes!

Our industry has the experts - it is so obvious, so easy. Who better than the technician or stylist to recommend the right shampoo, conditioner and styling products? Your client is sitting right there. Manufacturers are frustrated. Owners are frustrated. Stylists look at the extra amount of money and it just doesn't mean enough to them. Recommend lets us quantifiably see how much and often they recommend. What gets measured, gets done. We can learn who the best front desk influencers are. You learn who you want to acknowledge and even learn from them to teach new staff best practices. It comes back to the reports. I'll be using Just Ask myself. Every day we wish we knew how many of this or that we sold - with Just Ask we have the answers.

Finally, I'd say Central Booking will impact our revenue and customers. We hope it provides more consistency, easier monitoring efficiency, less confusion at the front desk, and with multiple salons, easier communications between salons and less payroll. We may still need close to the same amount of front desk staff to keep enough of the personal touch. We are just starting, so we don't know what we don't know. Clients need to be greeted and handled better than ever so the relationship is felt. We spoke with many industry experts in telesales to find tips to avoid making central booking impersonal. It should be seen as a trusted source to handle complex booking and recommendations when people call. We need them to meet our clients needs and encourage new services, let our clients know what promotions we are running, and when we can add open manicure slots to their booking. We are learning how to get goal focused and meet the gift certificate season with gusto. We will also augment Central Booking by Virtual Booking to let our clients book on line as a strategy to maximize the book and free up telephone lines.

Moving to the next level, in our industry, means smart automation with a partner who has the answers. SCI does.