The business of hair Colour Queens
Colourful wigs and bundles have become another avenue of self expression. Joburg-based Colour Queens founders Yolanda Vilakazi and Bathabise Vokwana are leading the way.
Colour Queens Hair specialises in the retail of top-quality human and mixed-texture hair bundles and wigs. Launched in 2017, Yolanda and Bathabise talk about customising, the colour craze and how to turn your childhood dream into a business.
Find a good par tner
In order for a business partnership to succeed, it needs constant dedication, communication and a shared vision by all partners. As friends, we share the same entrepreneurial spirit, so it only made sense for us to go into business together. We both felt strongly about finding good-quality hair at a ordable prices, which sparked our business plan. The name comes from our view that our wigs are crowns and our customers are queens.
Know your target market
Although our brand is still in it’s budding phase with a lot of room for growth, we attribute our success to the uniqueness of our product. We’re current, and continuously switch up our prices and wigs to suit the trends and the demand of our customers, who vary in age, location and careers. From the working woman who wants to splurge with a wig that costs R4 000 to a young student on a budget who wants a daily wig for R700 – we’ve got it.
Keep up t o date
We’re constantly researching ways to improve our services to our customers. Our hair is always pre-coloured and conditioned, which ensures that hair bundles and wigs are in good condition. Stylists often forget that human and mixed-texture hair bundles and wigs are essentially dead hair. They require plenty of conditioning and care to maintain. Colouring bundles and wigs requires bleaching down of the hair from its natural colour, which will then be able to take to any other colour you desire. This process damages the hair so much that deep conditioning is a must.
Educate y our client
We remind our clients that aftercare treatment for their wigs and bundles is vital. The hair requires frequent hydration (through conditioners and moisturising serums), and must be stored in a clean and dust-free area. Brushing it regularly also helps.
Passion gives you an adv antage
Our passion has influenced our business positively because we aren’t just chasing profits – we genuinely want to do better. Our competitive edge lies in the fact that we specialise in funky hair colours that aren’t readily found on the market, such as ombré, one-tone, two-tone and even threetone hair. We don’t release anything to our customer that we wouldn’t be proud to wear ourselves. To stay up to date, we introduce new trends and colours weekly, and our next big thing is unicorn-coloured hair.