REVOLUTION9 Salon — Local services in Saint Petersburg

After living 25 years in a north shore suburb of Chicago, I moved to St. Petersburg. Finding the right stylist and colorist Is often a challenge. Being a redhead, a color that is not the easiest color to define or achieve, I was apprehensive to change salons. The choice was not mine as a flight to Chicago every six weeks was not going to happen! Up until this month, I'd been going to another very reputable salon and have had a year of working toward just the right tone of red. My stylist/colorist was capable and so very conscientious and determined to make me happy. On a whim, I stepped outside my comfort zone and tried another salon as my stylist was unavailable. DISASTER!!! I needed a quick fix and my stylist/colorist was out of town. I popped into Salon Number 9 without an appointment and was warmly greeted by two receptionists. Alexandra (Alex) was recommended by the receptionists and Alex spent nearly An hour consult with me! I felt confident that she would do her utmost to make me happy with my hair. I scheduled an appointment and when I arrived Alex made a point of telling me that she'd been thinking long and hard about my hair since the day we met! She concurred with another "master designer" regarding how to best achieve the color I had prior to moving to Florida. As well, she discussed what she felt my cut needed in order for it to fall just the way I wanted. Rush, she did not. It was as though I was her SOLE client! In the end, I had one of my best cuts and I AM now a redhead! Alex is talented and patient and truly understands the importance of listening! It's apparent that she cares and aims to please. This is vital in a customer service industry. I encourage you to make an appointment with...

If I could, I wouldn't even give this salon the one star. I made an appointment with Amanda because I had wanted to slowly dye my hair lighter and go through the process of making my hair blonde. That is not what she did at all. My hair is now orange thanks to Amanda and her assistant Josh. My first session was a success though, she managed to get rid of the banding and add lowlights and highlights to lighten my hair. This was an outrageous cost of $320 for a whole head of highlights that shouldn't have cost anything over $250. A month later I come in to the salon for a second session and that's when everything went wrong. Instead of doing highlights and lowlights like I was told, she grabbed huge chunks of my hair and put it in bleach. After what seemed like forever, she removes the foils to reveal orange that the bottom half of my hair is orange. "Don't worry, orange blonde looks great with a neutral dark brown root" is what she said when she saw my face. Josh then proceeded to dry and style my hair and Amanda was forced to chop it off to shoulder length because of the damage she caused. That was only $160 this time. I don't think she even used olaplex or anything to try and save my hair. At first I thought this was fine. But I keep going through her instagram feed and I see clients with hair worse than what mine was, and they have beautiful and healthy hair with the thanks to olaplex!!! Of course her clients are years older than I am, I'm only 18. I feel like she took advantage of my age and messed up my hair which she still left with banding. So thank you Amanda and Josh for the wonderful service and orange hair!! I'm sure I'll fit in greatly with the pumpkins...

It has taken me a few months to decide that sharing my experience is worthwhile, this is constructive criticism for customer retention. I came to this salon and requested a simple trim but the stylist thinned my hair and used a curl carving technique without my consent. Unfortunately I have been babying my hair for two years attempting to recover from a previous experience with unwanted use of thinning shears. For my fine, naturally curly hair, that is typically styled curl free these techniques created an abundance of frizz, flyaways and an unbalanced shaped. The stylist and staff were friendly, my negative experience was due to the stylist not communicating and my resulting new hair style. Communication is such an important part of the stylist customer relationship. In the beginning I felt guilt for letting this happen; I should have laid out a long list of what not to do my hair, how did I not notice what the stylist was doing sooner... but that is a nonsensical reaction and should not be the burden of a client. As a professional, always consult with your client first. What you do has the ability to help someone feel amazing about how they look or quite the opposite. I hope this can help prevent negative experiences...