I am standing in my bathroom trying to juggle my phone and a pair of tweezers at the same time. Welcome to eyebrow treatments in lockdown – another face-to-face experience now transferred to the world of video calls.
On the screen of my phone is Sherrille Riley, the founder and CEO of Nails & Brows, a popular salon in London’s Mayfair. Riley has been conducting consultations with clients since she closed the salon. “We have been inundated with inquires,” she says. “Our regular clients will see us every four or six weeks and we always tell them not to touch their brows.” With Riley on their phone, they will learn how to tidy up brows with tweezers, apply pencil or powder, and brush brows up to open up the face. “I’m not going to get you to shape them,” she laughs. “I’m not giving you my job.”
Eyebrows have been big business for over a decade now – judged to be worth £20m a year in 2016. Established brow icons range from Cara Delevingne to Jodie Comer in Killing Eve and Solange Knowles. With our current working-from-home culture, and the new world of video conferencing, there is a boom on this boom. Looking groomed from the shoulders up on a screen has become the way to make an impression, over any outfit. Earlier this month, research by the NPD Group in the UK revealed that sales of eyebrow products were up 78%.
This is no surprise to Riley. “Brows now are as important as the hair on our head,” she says, “and with Zoom calls they have become top priority.” Jared Bailey, global brow expert for Benefit, agrees, adding that with more people wearing masks, “filling in your brows is the quickest and easiest way to instantly make you look more polished and put together. Brow products are now replacing lipsticks in that way.”
Bailey, who is based in San Francisco, has also been conducting virtual consultations and has been pleasantly surprised by the uptake: “A full day of consultations can be filled in under an hour of opening them up, which is wild to me,” he says. In addition to this, Benefit launched its Brow Try-On service online in 2018, in which a programme will select the products to get your perfect brow using a photograph. (Mine clearly need work – I am prescribed an eyebrow wax, a cream gel and something called an “eyebrow enhancer.) April saw the highest ever traffic on the page in the UK – up 12,000% compared with March.
Before lockdown, of course, eyebrow experts everywhere would have been much more hands-on. Like many women, I had a monthly appointment for an eyebrow tint. With the therapist touching my face a necessity, this is now on pause in the world of social distancing. Could the fact that no one can perform an eyebrow treatment two metres apart mean the eyebrow trend is on its way out? “We’re a contact industry so we can’t do any treatment at the moment – whether it’s eyebrows, eyelashes, electrolysis,” admits Lesley Blair, chairwoman of the British Association of Beauty Therapy & Cosmetology (Babtac).
But there are plans to make it safe. While the government has yet to issue guidelines around hairdressing or beauty therapy, Babtac issued an eight-page document of guidelines earlier this month – detailing everything from washing uniforms at 60C after each wear to greeting clients warmly, but without contact. This is in anticipation of 4 July – the date pencilled in for salons to reopen.
Riley says she will operate at around 30% of normal capacity: “Where we used to have three clients in the same space for eyebrows, we will only have one at a time.” Masks, protective shields and handwashing rules will be put in place to protect both therapists and customers, with no walk-in appointments permitted. At Benefit, they have opened brow bars for waxing appointments in Asia-Pacific, with similar hygiene measures in place. “Our typical two-seat service stations will be limited to one customer and placed six feet apart from each other,” says Bailey. “To ensure all brow waxing stations are properly sanitised and disinfected in between services, our appointments will be spread out.”
Blair says her members are on board with whatever the measures will be: “One positive is that, predominantly, we are already a very hygienic industry and take great care to protect our therapists and customers, so we will more easily adjust to new government rules.” She adds that a study commissioned last year found that hair and beauty treatments were worth around £6.6bn to the UK economy in a year, meaning there is motivation to find new ways of making this work. “I think the antibody tests will be a bit of a game-changer for us,” she says. “They will reassure clients who want to go for a treatment. I would be worried myself. I would really like to do my eyelashes – they aren’t looking their best – but I have my health and that’s much more important.”
In the meantime, the virtual appointments continue – and may become part of a new normal in the world of eyebrows, even when salon appointments are reintroduced. “We think that this touch-free way for our customers to explore and play with our products has set a new standard and will be a welcomed experience in a post-Covid 19 era,” says Bailey. Riley agrees, pointing out that appointments online work for an international customer, even without the pandemic factor. “I was speaking to a client from Sydney last night,” she says. “Video will never replace the salon experience but the virtual world and the physical world will start merging.” Better start practising the art of holding tweezers and a smart phone at the same time, then.
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