In the third installment of our Innergize Leadership Huddle series, we catch up with Tony Tjan, the co-founder, chairman and CEO of MiniLuxe and the CEO and managing partner of Cue Ball Capital. With 23 nail studios and counting, MiniLuxe delivers the highest quality of nail and waxing services and products. In our discussion, Tjan shares how MiniLuxe keeps clients coming back, how it is leveraging AI to elevate the experience, the brand’s plans for franchising and why he's looking forward to Zenoti's Innergize 2024. 

SALON TODAY:Tell us what sets MiniLuxe apart?

Tony Tjan: “MiniLuxe is part of our larger holding company Cue Ball Capital, which was a group that started with the intention to use capital and entrepreneurism as a force for good. The starting point for MiniLuxe as a transformative brand in the nail-care space is its intentionality, its purpose. Our purpose is to empower and enrich the communities around us, including our team members and our clients, through the power of self care and self expression. 

“It’s really anchored around this purpose of empowerment and enrichment from an actual client experience standpoint. One of the first key differentiators we took on was to have a surgical-grade clean lab in every single one of our nail studios. Second, is in the treatment of our team members. We call them nail designers—not technicians—and we give them fair, competitive wages and real career advancement and skill building. Thirdly, we have the aspiration of a Mani Manifesto that details the perfect manicure and pedicure—we've obsessed about what it takes to do that perfect service from a quality standpoint and deliver it in a value-driven way.” 

SALON TODAY: You have a reputation for delighting your customers. What strategies are you using to keep them returning?

Tjan: “To delight customers, they have to have trust in the brand, and you have to understand, first and foremost, you are not necessarily in a salon, selfcare or nail-care business. We’re really in the business of hospitality and client service. I don’t think people come necessarily for that nail or hair service, but really to experience a feeling. 

“So, if you understand that people are coming to you for that feeling, that experience, that’s your starting framework, and it’s really important. What we try to do around that is offer folks, the best quality mani, the most trusted at a value price point. They can come in for 20 something dollars and get what we believe is the best-in-the-industry class of manicure or pedicure. Then we have various upgrades around that, but we also build in the trust factor with elements such as a no-chip guarantee. We also have developed our own proprietary products, so that they are better for the customers, cruelty-free, safe and non-toxic so it makes things simple, beautiful and easy. And, we are one of the few salon businesses that have invested millions to develop a proprietary system on how customers book, and we work very closely with our booking platform provider Zenoti and others to build a system that allows that experience to be as seamless and easy as possible from end to end.”

SALON TODAY:So rumor has it—you’re using AI to help deliver an elevated customer experience. Can you offer insights into that? And, where do you see AI driving your growth?

Tjan: “I actually started my career at age 15, selling skin care, door to door. But I spent almost a decade+ working in data, media and building tech businesses, and I continue to have significant investments in the tech side, including businesses that are very AI driven—and I’ve done that for 25+ years. 

“After my business partner and I had been part of the leadership in transforming one of the largest media, information and data businesses in the world, we ‘logically’ opened up a nail salon. The reasoning was that we wanted to see where, if you apply professional standards, better management practice, ethical practices, but also data information and technology, what can happen to those types of businesses. 

“AI obviously is the tech buzzword that’s en vogue today. Its biggest impact is either generative or predictive. So, generative is all the content that you hear about with ChatGPT, but predictive is about using data to be more informed about everyday operational decisions that you’re making. 

“It is about matching your supply and demand. In our case that means matching our nail designers and wax specialists to the demand patterns of our clients. From day one, we have what I used to call formats (before AI) to look at data to be predictive. What’s the weather like? Is there an event? What’s the season? For example, are we currently in an open-toe climate or the dreaded winter in Boston? All of those are inputs toward predictive outputs.

“So, if you have a warmer, sunny spring day during the Boston Marathon, maybe people will come in for more pedicures with callus treatments. We all have peaks and troughs in our business, and we know that Fridays and Saturdays are always going to be busy for us, but how do you optimize the experience during other windows of time? That has evolved a lot, and we are able to automate that a lot more with AI in the modern age. We can look at when a client likes to come in and be more predictive about what she wants—a little better than we did before, because of better data and better ways to analyze it.”

SALON TODAY: I imagine with all your background in technology, you’re a pretty tough customer when it came to deciding on your software solution. What drove you toward the decision to go with Zenoti?

Tjan: “To be clear, we have used different platforms. Zenoti’s CEO Sudheer Koneru has a background that isn’t dissimilar from mine. He worked at Microsoft for years, then ended up running a very large spa service business when he saw an opportunity and thought technology could help solve it. We’ve been fortunate from the earliest days to work with them in partnership on product development for us, and by extension, I think, for others in the industry. 

“There are just unique elements that one needs to have in a booking system, and it also has to be able to plug into other technology and data components that are important to business. We’ve enjoyed, first and foremost, our relationship with Zenoti and the ongoing connectivity we have—and not just with Sudheer but the overall team—so that we have a constant feedback loop. That’s what we seek in any partner—common values and common standards.”

SALON TODAY:There’s another rumor that you’re going into franchising! That’s a bold step. Can you tell me more about your plans? 

Tjan: “Our plans have always been to think big, start small, then scale appropriately fast. You have to nail it before you scale it. I think we are at that point where we are feeling we have so many elements of the model coming today. Obviously, Covid was something that knocked us off our feet. We had gone from hundreds of people down to six in five weeks. And, from eight figures to zero in six weeks. So, the silver lining from that has been seeing if our concept is resilient, and how we came through it all. We feel confident we have a very resilient brand.

“I think that we have one of the leading brands in the self-care space, and I think the systems, protocols and processes will allow franchise partners to have freedom within a framework. We’ve come to a simple decision that we want to partner with people who want to be in business for themselves, but not by themselves, and that’s where we’re going to work side by side. We’ve got the tools, the brand and the systems to create a win-win partnership that will help us expand our vision and purpose. 

“One of my business partners and board member led much of McDonald’s leadership for business development. He owned well over a hundred McDonald’s franchises and he has really helped me understand how to think about franchising—not just as an expansion strategy, but as a new learning strategy, meaning that we can pull from the wisdom of the crowds from all these folks. Taking it back to McDonald’s, he remarked that almost every menu innovation came from that franchisee network. For us, I don’t know what it will be, but I know the answers are out there with a lot of unsung heroes and hidden talent who will not just take our system and methods, but make them better and bring new ideas.”

SALON TODAY: I understand that you and your team will be joining Zenoti’s Innergize conference coming up October 13-15, and that you‘re going to be sharing more of your experiences about adopting AI. What are you most excited about regarding Innergize?

Tjan: “Well, it’s my first time going to a Zenoti gathering, and I’m really honored and privileged to share the stage with their CEO Sudheer and have a chance to be on a panel with other entrepreneurs to share our growth stories—to explore that entrepreneurial narrative—the highs, lows and challenges. It’s always great to hear and embrace lessons from kindred spirits. So that’s going to be a great session, and I look forward to meeting others who have forged unique paths. I think entrepreneurship is the relentless pursuit of an opportunity without regard to resource. Whether that is Sudheer or an individual salon owner or an immigrant who is a nail designer, all of us are living the entrepreneurship of like, relentlessly pursuing an opportunity without regard to the resources at hand.”

To learn more about this year’s event, go to www.Innergize.me.

For more information on Zenoti, visit www.zenoti.com.