Kristen Wood
AGE: 35 COMPANY: The Ten Spot WHAT THEY DO: A chain of beauty bars BEEN AROUND SINCE: 2006 NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES: 225
HOW IT STARTED
I was fired from my job. I had always wanted my own business. I was out for a slice of pie on Queen Street. It was 10 years ago, so there wasn’t really a lot going on, but there were pockets of stuff happening, so I was like ‘I want a store on Queen.’ I lived above a nail bar in New York when I was there for a year, and it was so busy, but it was so sketchy. I was like ‘why doesn’t somebody do something where it’s still that convenient and prices are reasonable?’ I rode my bike home, and I wrote a business plan. I submitted it to the bank the next day — a Monday. By Friday I found out I had the money, thank God, because I had signed a five-year lease.
WHY DID YOU DECIDE TO START YOUR OWN BUSINESS?
My dad was like, ‘kids I don’t care what you do in life, find whatever you love, and then make a business of it because you’re all going to be entrepreneurs.’
WHAT ARE YOUR COMPANY VALUES?
Our mission is to make everyone feel like a 10.
WHEN WAS THE MOMENT YOU REALIZED YOU HAD MADE IT?
I haven’t had that moment. I felt overwhelmed with gratitude and pride on our 10-year birthday. Every location — 18 of them at the time — did free services all day starting at 11 a.m., and at 9 o’clock we had lineups around the block. We had people lineup for four hours at a time in 40-degree (summer) weather.
WHAT HAS SURPRISED YOU MOST?
Our services. When I started they were more luxury, you treated yourself. Now they’re necessities for the modern busy lady.
WHAT CHALLENGES HAVE YOU OVERCOME?
Probably franchising. I thought ‘we’ve got a bunch of locations, we’ve got managers, so let’s have franchise partners.’ I realized it’s a totally different business.
WHAT ARE SOME OF THE MOST IMPORTANT LESSONS YOU LEARNED?
I take more time now with things.
WHAT ADVICE DO YOU HAVE FOR OTHER BUSINESS OWNERS?
My dad taught me that the answer is always ‘no’ unless you ask.
WHAT NEEDS TO BE CHANGED TO HELP LOCAL BUSINESS OWNERS?
When I was starting out I never worried: will people come? I’m like, ‘there is no business. The thing I need to do right now is write a business plan, and then I need to submit it to the bank and see if I can get some money.’ At any point it could fall apart.
WHAT WOULD YOU CHANGE IF YOU WERE TO DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN?
For the first couple of years, I was not paying as much attention as I could have been. It took me a little while to read some business books, get more serious about it, and bring in people that were smarter than me.