Blow Away the Competition: How Two Sisters Are Styling Columbus’s Hair Scene

Step into the world of The Blowout Bar, where two sisters turned a New York City inspiration into Columbus’s first blow-dry-only salon empire. Kristin and her sister Kailen’s journey from a chance encounter during a girls’ trip to running three successful locations offers a fascinating glimpse into the power of niche entrepreneurship and unwavering focus on customer experience.

By: Brody Howell

Entrepreneurs of Columbus Editorial Staff

 

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So Kristin, tell me a bit about Blowout Bar. 

The high level is, it is a concept that is blowouts only. The biggest thing is that we are not a traditional salon in the sense that we don’t do any cutting and we don’t do any coloring. So it’s very niche. We stick to the concept of just doing blowouts and styling. We were the first blowout bar and concept to come to Columbus. We now have three locations; Our first one was in Grandview 11 years ago, and then Dublin and Easton. 

So how did you and your sister get the idea for this?

We got the idea from travel. We went to New York City with our mom. It was just the three of us for a girls’ trip about 15 years ago. We stumbled across an independent blowout bar there. 

We loved our experience so much while we were traveling. It was one of those things where we had to have it back into Columbus. So it really was just out of need and inspiration from being in another city and knowing that Columbus didn’t have it. We wanted it, so we decided to start it. 

What do you think sets you apart from other similar experiences? Why would someone want to choose you over the other options they might have? 

Well, I think the first thing is we just focus on the blowout and we’re the best at that. So for the past 11 years, a lot of other salons or blow dry bars have decided to, you know, venture into other services or add on to their menu of services. We really have decided to just stay true. So because we only do blowouts and styling, we’re the best at it.

Like I said, we’re not a traditional salon. We don’t mess with the cut and color. It lets us be the best at what we do because that’s all we do. We’re also very convenient. The fact that our salons are open seven days a week is a big plus. Most salons are closed on either Sundays or Mondays or both of those days. That’s a huge thing that sets us apart is we’re open seven days a week and our hours are really flexible, opening at 8AM and closing at 7PM.

For those reading who may be less familiar, could you describe what a blowout would be?

All of our blowouts start with a hair wash. So you come in with your hair as dirty as can be. You come in, you get your hair washed at the wash bowl, and then you get it blown out with a high-power blow dryer from wet to dry. We don’t do any pre-drying at our salon. What that would mean to someone that might not know is we don’t do any sort of rough drying or pre-drying to the hair. A lot of other salons will go ahead and maybe pre-dry or rough dry 80% of the hair with their fingers, and then go ahead and use a round brush and style it towards the end. For us, we start with that round brush and high tension right from the get-go at 0%.

All the way until the hair is dry is the blowout, and then included in the blowout is hot-tool styling. So if they want curls or waves in their hair at the end after it’s blown out, that’s also included in the blowout.

What were some of the big turning points for you? When did you realize that this is something that was really successful? 

I think we realized that straight away. We started kind of tweeting about it when we first started opening. We were worried that it would just be the two of us who even would benefit from it or knew what it was, and the minute that the word got out that we were opening, the excitement from other women just caught on, like, immediately. We knew right away that there were other women just like us in Columbus that needed it and were excited about it, and that had been traveling and getting it in other cities and just wanted it here. So it really was immediate where we knew that it was going to be something that would catch on very quickly. I’d say obviously that was a big turning point where we didn’t have to do as much educating as we thought at the beginning.

So are you from Columbus originally?

No. We’re both from Warren, Ohio.

What would you say Columbus means to your business? Why would you want to stay in Columbus instead of maybe going to a New York or an LA?

Well, I think a couple things. I think that being women and locally owned is a huge thing that also sets us apart because we both live in Columbus. Our three locations that are in Columbus, we are visiting them daily. We manage day to day operations, but we’re also regular guests at our own business. We are heavily, heavily involved in the business still. That obviously is a reason why we wanted to stay here and why it’s so special is because we work there every single day. We know our stylists. We know everything about them. We know the guests.

I do think that Columbus is a great test market for new concepts to new businesses. I don’t feel that we need to be in a big city with a lot of competition like, you know, Chicago or New York. It’s needed here just as much as there, and has proven to be quite popular here, so there would be no reason for us to kind of head anywhere else. We have the women here that want us in Columbus and we’re here. It just makes it more special. 

Do you feel like the city of Columbus has supported you? 

I think Columbus and just Ohio in general love seeing when things are local, when businesses are local, especially when they’re female owned as well. I think it’s always a pleasant surprise when someone asks who owns it. I think a lot of the time people will think that it’s a franchise from a bigger city. So I think it’s always a nice pleasant surprise when someone asks who owns it and they can say, “two sisters that live here in Columbus and they’re actually right here. They’re in the back of the office.”

You’ve talked a lot about the importance of supporting local businesses. Are there any other local business owners you look up to? 

Yes. We look up to Cameron Mitchell a lot in his restaurants. We just feel that they’re very consistent and we always get very good service when we go to those. We’ve always kind of looked up to the “people” portion of their business, as well as the folks over at North Star and those family of restaurants. We also feel that they are very consistent in what they’re putting out as far as the quality of their food and the staff that’s working there. We kind of hope to always put out that type of consistent quality when it comes to our blowouts, the same as kind of what those two restaurateurs do. I feel like it’s important and that’s definitely something that we notice a lot when we go to those restaurants. 

Say someone’s visiting Columbus for the first time, are there any places that you would take them before they leave the city? 

Well, of course, getting their hair done at the Blowout Bar. Easton is great. We’re a tenant there and it’s grown so much. We love Easton. We love the area. So that’s definitely a place where we say that you have to visit. We both live downtown for quite a while for years. We love the North Market. So that was always a place that we would tell people to visit. We love the restaurant Third & Hollywood. As you can tell, obviously we are huge foodies. We go out to eat a lot, so a lot of my answers here revolve around food, which is no surprise. 

You mentioned earlier that when you were first starting, you were seeing a lot of success marketing on Twitter, now X. How do you feel social media affects the way that you market? 

We started our Twitter account the day we got our business license and came up with our name. We were very personal about it. We ran it ourselves. For the first, I think maybe seven years, I was doing our own social, which I think just added such a personal touch. I think people felt very connected to the brand and to my sister and I because we were the ones behind the phone and behind the screen. I think that that has helped us just connect so much with the guests and other women and men of Columbus. Even since then when our marketing manager took over our social accounts, we still meet with her weekly about it. Both my sister and I are on our socials all the time. It’s just nothing that we’ve ever taken like a break from or thought that it wasn’t important. 

We’re always constantly connecting, answering every single question, DM, comment. So I think it just has a little bit more of that personal feel rather than just a big brand that someone is managing from California. You could definitely tell it’s a locally owned business that gets back to you within seconds if you have a question in the comment or a DM or anything like that.

Note: If you need help with marketing your own business, check out our list of the Top 10 Marketing Agencies in Columbus!

How long have you been in business now? 

It’ll be 12 years in October.

What were some of the biggest difficulties for you getting started 12 years ago? 

I think one of the biggest difficulties is I think we grew so quickly. It was so popular so fast that we felt the need to grow very rapidly. So from our Grandview location we were only open a year before we opened our second location in Dublin. We were doing everything ourselves. Immediately we were split from two people being at one location and manning the front and managing the salon to now suddenly having two spaces to manage.

I think how to keep up with that demand when it was so popular at the beginning was really hard to do and manage. I think we grew too quickly in opening Dublin before we could kind of get all of our ducks in a row. We were doing everything ourselves. We weren’t at that point where we were able to afford or even knew how to delegate out tasks at that time. It was really hard when we did bring on a ton of key people to have to train them because we’d been doing something for so long that we weren’t writing anything down or keeping track of any of the processes. It was really hard for us to train them into what we had already been doing for a couple years on our own.

If you felt the second store opened too quickly, what made you have more confidence in the opening of the third location? 

I think by then we had just somewhat figured it out. Being a part of Easton Town Center was just a no-brainer for us. We were hesitant to go to Easton because of the parking and, you know, getting lost with all the other tenants. The location that we have there is right on the corner. It’s a perfect location. It’s on the corner by Trader Joe’s there right across the street from a parking garage. The parking is really accessible. We were able to paint our building to be white so it stands out and it’s really pretty. It was just a location that we couldn’t pass up. I feel like we also had enough figured out at that point where we were able to open the third. 

What would you say is your number one piece of advice for someone wanting to start their own business? 

I think my number one piece of advice would be to never stop asking questions or seeking help. I think that that’s our biggest thing. I think we’ve only recently really figured that part out. Even though we own our own business and we’ve been through it all, we still have so much to learn. There’ve been so many people that we’ve surrounded ourselves with that have been better than us or smarter than us that have helped us get to the next level. I think that the more that you can expand your resources, expand your mentors and join business groups and things like that will only help get you further. I just wish we would have done that right from the beginning rather than wait so long to learn all of the things, read all of the books and ask all the questions that maybe we thought were silly at the time or that we thought we knew. 

What would you say is the most challenging part of running your business in the day to day? 

I would say the biggest thing is that we’re a people business. We rely very heavily on our team. I think the biggest challenge would be to stay connected to them as much as we want to on a daily basis. That way they feel connected to the brand and connected to my sister and I. I think that if there was a way that we could be there at all three locations 24-7 to connect with them would be the best thing that we would try to do. And we try our very best but I think that that would be the biggest challenge is as we grow and open more locations, our time spent with the team and connecting with them on a daily basis just gets smaller and smaller for us.

How do you feel about online reviews? Are they ever something that you take personally?

That is such a good question. I will say the first maybe a couple of years, we took all of our reviews so personally. That would be the best way to describe it. You took the words right out of my mouth. Whenever there was anything negative, we would take it personal. We would feel defensive of our team and of our brand. 

We would be worried and upset. All of those feelings would definitely take over those first couple of years. We felt the need to respond to every single one with our side of the story or our stylist’s side of the story.

I don’t know what changed it. I’m at a point now where I absolutely love online reviews, good or bad. We don’t take them personally whatsoever. We actually take each one as a learning experience. I actually love getting the negative ones more than the positive ones now because I have wrapped my head around it and have come to peace knowing that people are going to say negative things about your business or their experience. If they didn’t, there is really no true way of us knowing because negative word of mouth we feel is almost more harmful. If someone were to have a bad experience and go out with their girlfriends and talk to nine of them about how awful their experience was, there would be no way of us knowing that. At least with the online experience, if it is negative, I tend to it right away. I still take care of it personally. We take care of it personally. We care about them but I don’t take it personally. We definitely don’t ignore them. We read each and every one. We respond personally to the guest by a phone call and then we go ahead and provide that feedback to the team as well. Nothing has changed in regards to what we do with the information, but we are dealing with it better and turning it into a positive rather than just wallowing in it all day. 

I do think it is fair to say every business owner has some kind of a flaw. What would you say is your biggest flaw as a business owner? 

I would say that I am a control freak. It is my biggest flaw. 

How do you feel that affects the business? 

I think that certain things probably take longer than they should to roll out because I want to control every aspect of that roll out. I feel that it probably takes us a long time to make decisions because of that controlling issue. I also think it might prohibit some of our leaders and teams to feel that they have that authority to make those decisions without having to come to me with everything or run it by me. I feel like definitely being less controlling and delegating more would help us for sure. 

I think that makes sense given the history of the business where you said you were doing so much of it on your own at first.

Yes, exactly.

What does it mean to you to be an entrepreneur? 

I think a lot of people love the freedom that it gives us as far as schedules and all of that stuff, and not having to work for someone else. That actually isn’t it for me. I worked with a lot of people before starting my business. I actually love working for other people and taking that type of direction and feedback myself. I love being able to learn the lessons. Honestly for me as an entrepreneur it’s just a way for me to grow. I think it has just provided me with just so much grit and so many stories and things that I can hopefully pass down to my sons and to our team. I just feel like it’s just given me a lot of knowledge and practice. 

What do you think makes most businesses fail and what sets you apart? 

I think that… Good question. What makes businesses fail? 

I read a while back that something like 20% of small businesses fail in the first year, after 5 years it’s 50%, and then after 10 years it’s 70%. 

The first thing which is good and bad for us is that our concept is not trendy. That’s the first thing. When you asked me how to explain a blowout, if you think back to our grandmothers and our great grandmothers they were going to the salon once a week and getting their hair set. 

It might have not been a blowout but they were going weekly to get their hair done for the whole week. Fast forward 60 or 70 years, that’s what we’re doing today. I think that our business itself is sustainable where it’s nothing that AI or a robot or anything like that is going to be able to take over and do it. I think that definitely saves us for sure. 

I don’t see it going anywhere because women are always going to have hair and they’re always going to have to get it done and a lot of them hate doing it at home. We’ll always be there for them for that. I think that our business model itself is here to stay.

There have definitely been times where we were close to joining that percentage of businesses that close down as well. We have thought about, “are we able to do this? Would it be easier if we closed one of the locations?” We’ve come to those milestones for sure and we’ve just overcome them by hard work. I don’t think there’s any secret. 

Let’s talk about those moments you were worried it might not work out. Do you feel like the two of you made any mistakes that led to that? 

Yeah, tons of mistakes. I think that entrepreneurs can easily get distracted by new ideas and new side businesses when really the focus should just remain on the biggest thing, which is why you started. Most of our mistakes have been made when we’ve taken our eye off the ball. I think that’s the biggest thing. Another mistake would just be doing the things that we did for too long without bringing other people in. 

Is there anything that you’ve done where you felt like it was a huge investment for the business, but it ended up being super worth it?

Yep. A huge investment has been our EOS model that we run by. 

Could you explain that a bit? 

It’s the Entrepreneurial Operating System. It is a way in which you operate your business. You hire a business coach to walk you and your leadership teams through quarterly meetings and you run your business by this approach, by this system. That definitely is an investment for sure, but once we made that investment, we’ve never looked back from that. That’s also another one where if we were able to afford that investment towards the beginning or middle, we would also be a ton ahead. That’s been our biggest game changer is running our business through EOS. 

Where do you see the business in 10 years? 

Good question. We see it with more locations, so we think that we can definitely squeeze out one or two in Columbus still, which would be great. Then we see ourselves expanding throughout Ohio, going to other cities.

Hopefully a long ways away, but do you have an end goal for the business? 

No, we haven’t really thought of an end goal for the business. Obviously, we’re both local. We would love to continue ownership of our stores and continue to grow those in Columbus and Cincinnati and Cleveland and visit those and grow those. No real end goal as of now other than just to continue owning them independently, keeping them within the family and continuing to grow. 

Is there anything you’re working on right now that you’re excited about that you can share?

I think the biggest thing would be definitely narrowing down our fourth location in Columbus. We don’t have it nailed down yet, but we’re close. We finally feel that the COVID hangover is over for us. That was also a very, very tough time for us, as you can imagine. I feel now, 2024 has been our catch up year and our comeback year from that. I feel that now going into 2025 is when we can start looking to expand again. 

I’m sure every business owner has feelings of doubt or worry. How do you overcome that? 

Someone said to me that business leaders have to be excited or their team is not excited. I think every single day knowing that if I go in feeling motivated, talking motivated, that the team will hopefully follow. 

To me, there’s actually not really an option. When I feel that way, I really do push it to the side and continue on with what I have to do during the day and compartmentalize that and show up for myself and for my team in the best way possible because those thoughts can definitely take over and can ruin a day and ruin the motivation. I think that when you have a team looking to you, it really actually doesn’t become an option to let those feelings take over.  I lead by example and push through. 

As The Blowout Bar approaches its 12th anniversary, Kristin and Kailen have proven that a focused vision and adaptability are key ingredients for entrepreneurial success. Their journey from a single Grandview location to three thriving salons across Columbus showcases the power of identifying and fulfilling a niche market need. With plans for expansion both within Columbus and throughout Ohio, the sisters continue to demonstrate that locally-owned businesses can flourish with the right blend of passion, perseverance, and community connection. The Blowout Bar story serves as an inspiring testament to the enduring appeal of personalized services and the potential for homegrown businesses to reshape their local landscapes.