Читать книгу Non-Compete Agreements: An Employee Perspective - Ron Hummer - Страница 9

As you can see, this book really isn’t about me. Of course, I don’t know too much about hairdressers so in this case, I can talk to you about my hairdresser named Janet. This also gives me a chance to let you know what she thinks about that discussion that Amy Robach had with Sam Champion on GMA.

First, let me give you a little background on Janet. She used to own her own hair salon. I had already explained to you how someone that worked for her stole names out of her appointment book in order to steal clients from her. That woman was fired.

After a few years, Janet decided that she didn’t want to own her own business anymore. She wasn’t making any money - big surprise in the hairdressing industry - and she wanted to spend more time with her husband and children. To her, it was much easier for her to work at a hair salon since they have two incomes coming in between her and her husband. If she was lucky, she could pull in $40,000 a year.

In any case, she managed to find a buyer for the salon. He made an offer and she accepted. Somehow, the offer was changed at the last minute because he wanted to lowball her. I mean, it wasn’t like she had 100 people at the door waiting to buy her salon. So after a lot of haggling and a tremendous amount of aggravation which kept her and her husband up at night wishing that they could sell the business, they finally had an agreement and Janet would go to work for this man.

Of course, this man had other plans once this started. His first order of business was to steal Janet’s clients so he could fire her. Now, in case you think that she might be making this up, I can assure you that that isn’t the case. You know why? Because I was one of those clients that this man approached. Bet you didn’t see that coming. As Jim Nabors said in the TV show Gomer Pyle surprise surprise surprise. This went on for a few months and he kept pressuring me to have him cut my hair instead of Janet. By then, Janet had had enough of this and decided that the best thing to do was to leave.

Yes, I followed her and I’m very proud of making that decision. Why on earth would I want to stay at that salon and let that greedy rotten bastard cut my hair? You think I would want to associate with someone like that. No way. Yes, it wasn’t enough that this man lowballed Janet to try to get her place for a discount but on top of it, he would steal her clients from her so he could fire her. Why, because they showed up at his salon? Yes, this is the type of owner that I should feel sorry for when he cries that he doesn’t like ObamaCare. Maybe Fox News can put him on their network and the Republicans can have another one of their cult meetings and listen to this creep and give him a box of tissues when the broadcast is over.

It wasn’t like things were much better for Janet. She managed to find a job at another salon. After a few months, the owner said that he would not allow her to have her commissions anymore. In case you’re wondering what that is, it’s money that she would earn being a colorist. For example, since she was working in a low end salon that had a lot of elderly people, she would color their hair as part of their haircut and the salon would charge $120. I think in other places, something like that would cost $150, if not more, and the hairdresser would get a bigger cut than $30. Janet would get an additional $30 from the owner in this case after she completed her haircut. Now she is losing that $30 because the owner of the salon can’t afford to pay her what she’s worth. Again, let’s get another box of tissues out for the owner of places like this because people should just be grateful that they have a job. The bigger problem is ObamaCare since they can’t afford that either. Let’s have another cult meeting at Fox News.

Oh, and let’s not forget that Janet is on a non-compete agreement now that states that she can be fired at any time for any reason and she can’t work within a 50 mile radius of this new and wonderful place. I know, if you’re a non-compete lawyer, you say go to court and of course that costs you $10,000. Now I know that people who are reading this will say hey, that doesn’t sound right. I mean, Janet is lucky if she is making $40,000 a year. How can she be expected to pay over $10,000 in legal fees? No way. That isn’t right Ron.

My answer would be yes, that is correct. If you don’t believe me, you can look at some of the stories that Scott Kirsner did for the Boston Globe. You would find that some of these hairdressers would have to represent themselves in court because they can’t afford the the legal fees. And don’t expect judges to feel sorry for them because they usually lose those cases. Plenty of stories on this by doing a google news search. Wonder if the producers of GMA did any searches after having that story on a celebrity hairdresser.

Nice to know that people like me and Janet have non-compete agreements that don’t expire like they do for celebrity journalists like Amy Robach and Sam Champion. Doesn’t matter if you work for a place for over 10 years like Rene Garcia did. That non-compete agreement is always over your head year after year. No reason to regulate this though.

Of course, if you’re a Republican or a newscaster on Fox News, you would hear them say if they don’t like it, then let them find another job, even if it’s 50 miles away or maybe she shouldn’t have signed the agreement in the first place even though most hair salons have non-compete agreements now. Plenty of signs up at hair salons that say help wanted. Sure, just go 50 miles away and start all over again with no customers and lose even more money. How far is 50 miles? An hour from your home. You have a job so you pay for more gas for your car or take public transportation such as a bus. Won’t take that much longer to get to work or home at the end of the day. In the meantime, Janet has to see if her new employer will pay her commissions as well.

Once again, let’s get another box of tissues out for the small business person who complains that they don’t like ObamaCare and they can’t afford health insurance. Let’s have another cult meeting at Fox News with Republicans and see if we can get an owner from a hair salon to come on and complain about this.

Okay, now that you know Janet’s background, I can tell you about her reaction to that wonderful conversation that Sam Champion had with Amy Robach. Once again, you’ll see that this book is going to be unbiased.

First, she shook her head. Then she said, “yes, I really want to steal clients, especially when I get a $5 tip from them. And as far as my other customers are concerned, many of them disappear after a few haircuts. Sometimes they want to try someone else, especially if they can have their hair cut for a lower price. People in other salons say that they can do a better job than I do if they have a chance to see a customer that I had. I’ve had situations where people in my own salon go behind my back and tell my customers that they can do a better job than I can.

If anything, many of the customers that I have are people who are walking in the door. As long as you have a good location, then more people will come to that location and that’s where the real business is. So much for the idea that everyone has their own personal hairdresser and they never leave the salon.

Why don’t we end this chapter with a wonderful story about the relationship between the owner of a hair salon, the employee, and the customer.

One day, Janet was getting ready to go home when one of her clients came in without making an appointment. This was a $5 tipper. She wanted her hair cut and colored as well. This would be $120 which is on the low end of this hair salon. Janet said “it’s the end of the day and I’m going home. Someone else can help you. It’s 6:00 and I would like to get home in time to cook dinner for my husband and three children.”

Of course, the customer would not hear any of this. Other people in the salon didn’t want to work with this woman knowing that they would get $5 for working with this woman for over an hour without commission.

The owner would settle this. He told Janet this is your client so you can stay and serve this customer. Or else.

After more than one hour, she was done. And of course, her reward for her work was a nice crumpled $5 bill. Fortunately, she told her husband she would be late so he brought in pizza for dinner. She could just throw her slice in the microwave when she got home.

How about another box of tissues for owners of hair salons who do this and say they don’t like ObamaCare. Maybe one day we’ll see them on Fox News.

And not to sound biased, let’s give a big hand to GMA producers for having two sides of a story on hairdressers and non-compete agreements since this isn’t a subject that you would talk about. How about doing a google search by going non-compete agreements and hairdressers. You can see a lot of wonderful stories such an owner of a salon taking out an injunction against three of his hairdressers because they didn’t work far enough from his place. Maybe it would be hard for you to get a story like this but it wouldn’t be hard for you to have Scott Kirsner on your show so he can tell you about hairdressers who represent themselves in court cases because they don’t have the money to hire a lawyer because it’s over $10,000.