From the humble beginnings of a spare bedroom and a portable massage table; Pamper Me, an award winning Beauty Salon, was created by beauty therapist Jodie Finnigan.
Time Line
19th November 2009- Where it all began….
Jodie Finnigan decided to take the plunge and began Pamper Me in her spare bedroom. With a budget of £20 and a basic website, Jodie took the leap from being an employed Beauty Therapist to the owner of her own business.
‘I decided to create Pamper Me to give me the independence to live the life I wanted, and not have to rely on anyone else.
For as long as I can remember I’d always dreamt of running my own salon. Having no savings in the bank had always held me back from making my dream a reality, but one day I woke up and made the decision to go for it any way!’ explains Jodie.
‘I craved challenges, and wanted to wake up every morning and feel excited about going to work. Starting my own business gave me the excitement I was missing in my life’.
Having studied Business and Marketing at university Jodie believed that she had the skills and knowledge to create a beauty business that could compete with already established beauty salons within the Stockport area.
Jodie reveals she decided to focus on offering massage to begin with, mainly because she couldn’t afford to offer anything else, and also because she knew she was a phenomenal massage therapist.
Delivering one massage at a time, Pamper Me’s client base began to grow steadily, giving Jodie the capital to add more treatments to her menu.
‘I began to market my massage services to my friends and family, and I would ask them to recommend me to their friends. Over time my client base began to grow, as well as my independence and self worth’
9th November 2010 – Moving on up to Massie Street!
As Pamper Me was expanding Jodie Finnigan decided that the next logical step would be to find new premises.
‘Within a year of creating Pamper Me I found that my confidence and self-worth increased, and for the first time I had started to truly believe in myself.
When I began my business I was in a relationship, but as my business grew I came to realise that the relationship was destructive and didn’t make me happy anymore’ shared Jodie, ‘Moving out of our home took me out of my comfort zone, I no longer had my spare bedroom. But needing to be happy was more important to me, so I decided to move my business and began renting a room above a hairdressers’
Moving to Lowry’s Hair Salon on Massie Street in Cheadle village was a turning point for Pamper Me, because as the business began to expand so did the team.
Within a few short months, (March 2011 to be exact) Jodie opened a second room above the hairdressers and employed another beauty therapist to help her with the growing demand for her beauty treatments.
1st August 2011 – What goes up…..
Pamper Me was going through a rapid expansion, and Jodie felt she needed her own premises to be able to do keep up with the surge in growth.
‘I came across a premises in Cheadle Hulme, on Station Road, which needed a lot of work, but I thought it had the potential to become a beautiful salon, my only issue was that I didn’t have the budget to do everything that I wanted to do straight away’ explains Jodie
‘My friends and family helped me decorate and source second hand furniture to make the salon a lovely welcoming space, I had to make do with things that I wasn’t happy with, but for the first time I got to open the doors to my very own salon!’
Over the next two years the Pamper Me team expanded, the treatment menu expanded, and so did Jodie’s waist!
Nope she didn’t get chubby, she fell pregnant with a Pamper Me Baby!
1st August 2013 – Must come down….
Becoming a mother was not only life altering but Jodie found it difficult to come to terms with her new found responsibilities as well as running Pamper Me.
‘I lost all of my confidence in my abilities to run a successful business, becoming a mother was a fabulous experience but for the first time ever I couldn’t focus all of my time and energy on Pamper Me anymore.
I was getting so depressed because I felt like I was failing at everything, Pamper Me was suffering, and I had to decrease the size of the team as I couldn’t manage everyone.
I got to point that I wanted to give everything up and go find a job on a make-up counter, but then I saw a sign in the window of a hairdressers offering rooms to rent.’ says Jodie.
On the 1st August 2013 Pamper Me downsized and moved to Leigh Healy’s Hairdressers in Stockport.
Jodie decided to go back to basics and rebuild her confidence as well as her business, whilst learning how to become the best mummy she could be.
‘It was a relief to move to a smaller premises with much smaller bills! I was able to slowly rebuild my confidence again and get to grips with juggling all of my responsibilities.’
8th March 2016 – Build on a solid foundation!
The time we spent at Leigh Healy was a brilliant way for Jodie to regroup and make some positive changes to Pamper Me.
Pamper Me’s reputation began to increase, and it didn’t take long before they had out grown the rooms they rented.
On the 8th March 2016 Pamper Me moved, again, to Dry Hairdressers, and rented some larger rooms.
‘In hindsight I think I was scared to make the next step to open my own salon again, it felt like a safer option to rent rooms above a hairdresser than to have the responsibilities of leasing my own premises’ shared Jodie.
‘I wouldn’t say moving to Dry was a mistake, I think I needed to learn this lesson.’
During the time at Dry, Pamper Me continued to grow, and Jodie started to put a plan of action together to open the doors of her very own Beauty Salon.
1st July 2017 – Our wonderful NEW salon
If you have followed our journey so far we are sure you will agree that there have been some ups and downs, twists and turns!
Pamper Me has evolved over the years and as of the 1st July 2017 we have opened the doors to our very own beautiful salon.
We have an incredible team who have helped shape Pamper Me to become the Award Winning Beauty Salon it is today.
Having faced challenges in her childhood and adolescence independence was really important to Jodie, ‘I created my business to give me independence to live the life I want, and not have to rely on anyone else. Pamper Me has given me the opportunity to challenge myself in ways that I could never of imagined, and I am a better woman because of it.
Even though I have slipped up over the years I have always managed to pick myself back up again, and I couldn’t of done that without self belief and self confidence.
My journey, so far, has been supported by Pamper Me’s clients, who have become my friends. Without their support, and the support of my team Pamper Me would not be the success it is now.
I would love to eventually be in a position to give back and help other young women start their own journeys to create successful and exciting new businesses.
Moving forward we have such a bright future, and I’m excited to see what happens next!’
