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Growth in sales for a professional hair care company depends upon
maintaining a forward edge in fashion and trends.3
There are three categories of liquid hair products: "Hair
care" (shampoos, conditioners, and rinses); "styling products"
(hair sprays, fixatives, mousses, sculpture lotions, etc.); and
"chemical reactive products" (hair color, perms, and bleaches).
Professional-only hair care products are marketed on an
implied promise to the hair stylists that such products will not be
mass marketed or sold through drugstores, supermarkets, or discount
stores. Professional hair stylists will not sell or use mass-
marketed products in their salons. Mass marketing a product closes
the salon or professional market to that product.4
Education is an important aspect of marketing hair care
products to hair stylists. This education includes hair shows,
product knowledge classes, and styling classes (featuring new ways
to cut hair and new products to achieve the latest looks). During
hair shows, platform artists demonstrate new styles and techniques,
3 For instance, Redken was a professional hair care
company that dominated the salon-only market through the 1970's.
In the early 1980's, Mr. Mitchell began to convince hair stylists
that the new trend in styling was the "sculpted look". Redken's
sales growth flattened when it did not keep abreast of this
trend.
4 During the 1960's and 1970's, companies such as Wella
Balsam, Aqua Net, Vidal Sassoon, and Jhirmack broke the implied
promise and changed their distribution from salon-only to the
mass market. The products of each of these companies were closed
out of the professional market shortly after being mass marketed.
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Last modified: May 25, 2011