 I'm just having a good time, having a bad day. What's up, guys? Welcome to episode number one of the Bad Hair Day podcast. My name is Matt Beck, those of you guys that haven't been following me or don't know about freesalon education, it's an online education resource. Over 1,000 free hair tutorials. I've been doing YouTube content for over 10 years or about 10 years now, which I can't even believe. And over that 10 years, I've created tutorials, I've created podcasts, all kinds of different stuff grown social following on all the different platforms. And this podcast is going to be a little bit different than ones I've done in the past because I don't want to go into this. I want to go into it with a few thoughts and really just talk freely and talk about things that are going on, whether they're going on and things I've dealt with throughout the week or things that have happened in our business or on social media or in celebrity hair or whatever it is. I don't even know what celebrity hair is anymore, but anyways, and those are things I want to talk about. I want to really just give my thoughts on things that are happening in the industry, hopefully create a really fun community through this. Where you guys ask questions, if you're on a platform like YouTube or you're seeing this on Facebook or in video form and you can comment, make sure you're commenting any questions that you have or things that you want answered on a future show. Let me know because that's what it's all about. I like the communication back and forth that we can do and it'll give me ideas for future shows and different things like that. I also want to be able to have this platform to update you guys on things that are happening in Freestyle on Education. I just put out a couple of videos last week. So if you guys haven't seen those, there were really fun videos. I did the octopus layered haircut. I didn't come up with that haircut. It was something that I read about and decided to create an education video on my take on how I would do that style of haircut or how I would cut that style. And then I did a shag haircut that was really 70s inspired which I really liked doing. And I got into the styling portion of it a little bit more. I think that's something that this year I really want to focus on. I try to, and I don't know if you guys are the same way but I try to like look at things that maybe I struggle with a little bit and then try to research and find people that are doing it in a way that fits me, right? So I get messages a lot from people that are talking about they've tried to learn haircutting or from teachers or whatever it is and I'm the person that they connected with the most. And I think that I'm always searching for that person in my life as well. So I had that through learning haircutting and all of that but then I had it in photography. Frono's Photo was a YouTube channel that I watched a lot just to learn about camera equipment and different things but he taught it in a way that I connected to. Then there was Casey Neistat who was a popular vlogger at the time 2016 timeframe where I was also making YouTube content almost daily at that point and I took inspiration from what he was doing and tried to transfer into my world of what I was creating. So I think it's important to always be looking for that inspiration. So with that being said, the Shag hairstyle that I was doing, there's this guy on Instagram I forget his handle, I'll try to put it up on the video so you guys can see. But Ben Brown was one of the guys that kind of showed him to me and I really love this way, this style about how he puts the clips in the hair and kind of holds it in place. And I still don't fully understand it but I play around with it a little bit and that's the fun part of the industry. That's the part that drives me that makes me wanna do better. It is when I learn something new and it's kind of what's driven my career to be honest. I was in hair school, not really, and this was 2004, long time ago. But I was in hair school and I loved hair cutting and that was kind of what I fell in love with first in the first few months. And maybe because it came a little bit easier to me and everything else was a little more foreign to me and then one of my teachers gave me an entire giant box of VHS tapes that were just collections of old hair cutters, like classic collections like Tony and Guy and there was some Paul Mitchell videos in there. Michael O'Rourke was in there. There was a ton of guys and just classic, cool hair cutting. Some of it was dry hair cutting and texturizing. So that box of videos I watched a ton and I learned so much from it and that's kind of what it's all about. It's really where my thought process and just my drive and everything came from that box of videos. So that's when I look at the internet, YouTube is that, but it's bigger, right? So you have the opportunity to research and find and it's just so funny to me when people talk about like, they're always asking such simple questions and to me, it's never even been a question if I like something or I love something, I just figure it out. And I think a lot of people need, like they just want permission I guess to say it's okay to go figure it out. And that kind of leads me into, the industry and one of the first things I kind of really wanted to catch to touch on is, I had a client come in the other day and they were asking about the latest trend. And I just thought it was kind of like funny in a way and let me know your guys' thoughts on this subject because it's one, I have two things with clients that I just think are kind of funny. And I do believe that you should, you come to a hairdresser, they're a professional and your goal is to give them ideas. But at the same time, we're in a world now where you have all the ideas at your fingertips. It's kind of our job now to take that idea and make it happen or to let's say you're like, I really want a ton of layers and I want this fringe and like you have really fine thin hair and so now as a professional I gotta guide you in different ways or adapt that style to you, but you should be able to come in with something that you like, right? And but at the same time, I get it cause you know, and this is me working out things in my head, but for me is I do want to give advice on a style or a trend, but when you just say what are the latest trends, I don't even think that exists anymore. Like, do you guys, there are trends, but there's so many that there's not just, it's not just the Jennifer Aniston Rachel haircut, you know, like that doesn't, that's not a thing anymore. Now it's like, you can kind of be whoever you want to be. There's so many styles and trends that go along with what you like and what you want. So, you know, I always think it's funny when a customer now is or a client is saying, you know, what is the latest trend? Well, for me, it's whatever looks great on you and fits your style. So, what do you like? Like, who are your favorite people that you like look up to style-wise or, you know, things like that. So, I always, I just thought that was funny because I don't really think in my mind there are trends anymore. Like, a trend, it's not like the trend. It's what do you love? And what fits you and that's where we're gonna go. So, my goal now when I have a client in the chair is to really just talk about the different things that they like and start fitting it in. What is their lifestyle like? What is their job, you know, and things like that. And that's another funny thing. And this was like an article that I read the other day and I'll actually can pull it up. Like, what is their job, right? Well, that shouldn't matter anymore. Like, we're in 2022, it should not matter, but it does, unfortunately. And I just saw this, like, if Chick-fil-A, so Chick-fil-A, first off, this was the headline, read this if you have dyed hair and want to work at Chick-fil-A. So, apparently, Chick-fil-A has an issue, of course, with no blue hair, blue nails or blue lipstick. You're not allowed to look different or express yourself. One redditor commented. So, somebody from Reddit commented that. Employees are required to have to be clean-shaven, well-groomed, and sporting a natural look. The handbook includes phrases such as neat and professional appearance, unnatural hair colors, and eccentric styles are not permitted, and makeup must be subdued and worn in good taste and not to be distracted. So, I just don't understand why Chick-fil-A, so there's so, like, so many people say good things about the food, and then also the politeness of, I don't know if that's a word, but, the team or the staff there, and, but it's just so crazy to me that, like, these places, like, what does that have to do with, do people really care, like, do we really care when we go to get a chicken sandwich if somebody has blue hair and blue nails? Do we? Let me know. If you think that that's a big deal, like, for me, I just feel like we're at a time, like, why does it matter how somebody's expressing themselves? It's not, I'm first off gonna look at that person and I'm gonna have my thoughts, but it doesn't make me then think something of Chick-fil-A. And I have plenty of thoughts about Chick-fil-A, so, you know, if we're going down that, like, it has nothing to do with blue hair. So, you know, what do you guys think? Do you think, do you still think that there should be guidelines to somebody's appearance and where do you think that guideline sits? Because that's where I'm just a little confused on who is the person that gets to make that judgment. Yes, I guess the owner of a company, you know, but I just feel like, you know, to say, I just love that they have blue lipstick in there. So that's that, but let me know what you think. I think it's crazy. This was an article from Mashed. If you wanna read more about it, I'll link it below. You guys can get the full, you know, story, but it just seems a little crazy. This was another article that I found that I thought was just mind-blowing to me because I've gotten into this kind of mode with clients when they're asking about their hair and, you know, damaging it and should they blow dry? Should they not blow dry? What products to use, all that stuff? And kind of my go-to would be, try not to blow dry as often if you can. Obviously, in my mind, I always thought air drying it made the most sense. If you can, if you can't, blow drying, it's fine. And I know a lot of people that will blow dry. Some people will only do a blow dryer, no hot tools. Some people will do a blow dryer and hot tools. Some people will just air dry or just diffuse or whatever. And some people use heat-protectant products. Some people don't. So my professional opinion, what I've always told any client sitting in my chair is that air drying would probably be with products. So put products in your hair, air dry it, conditioning products, things like that. And that is probably gonna be the safest bet. And then if you need to dry it, then obviously try not to do hot tools every day and definitely use thermal-protectant products on your wet hair and your dry hair as you're going through it. So this article was from InStyle Magazine says, hold on, is air drying your hair more damaging than using heat? And I thought that this was a really interesting article. They did a study. It was performed by a group of doctors who wanted to test the impacts of hair drying in different settings. There were five groups that each blow dried their hair at various distances for differing lengths of time. So one of those groups didn't get any heat and was air dried at room temperature. The results showed that although using a hair dryer causes more surface damage than natural drying, using a hair dryer at a distance of 15 centimeters or six inches with continuous motion caused less damage than drying your hair naturally. So this was, and I read more into the article and basically what they're saying is that the interior of the hair, I'll make this real simple. And then again, you guys can read the article if you want, link it below. But basically the interior part of the hair swells when you don't blow dry it. So what that can do is cause breakage because it's swelling and the elasticity of the hair is only so much, there's only so much elasticity. So over time, if you just let your hair air dry and it keeps swelling up, it can cause breakage that way. And then if you blow dry your hair, it doesn't allow the hair to expand like that but you can create surface damage. So this is literally life, right? So like everything, it's like you're damned if you do, you're damned if you don't. Like you don't have, no matter what, you're gonna have damage in your hair. It's just which damage do you want? Damage from the inside or outside? So, but I just thought it was fascinating. And so for me, it still takes me to the fact that maybe just not using hot tools, the best bet would be to share with my clients that to make sure that you keep your hair as healthy as possible, use the blow dryer further distance away from your head, use thermal protecting products and maybe a brush, soft bristles if you can and just don't overload it with heat and you should be pretty good. I love that as I'm talking, I'm using blow dry, like I'm blow drying the hair as I go through. Oh well. But yeah, so that's gonna be my moving forward. I'm gonna make sure that that's what I'm talking to my clients about and maybe not telling them to air dry their hair as much and try to use that technique. And then machine gun Kelly dies his hair pink. He cannot work at Chick-fil-A, so that's official. I think his hair is cool. I actually just wanted to go over it. I'm still not sure if I figured this guy out yet, but his music brings me back to when I was in high school. So I think that part's cool. But the, you know, he, I like, I dig the pink, but beyond that, I'm looking at the cut because that's just kind of where my brain goes. And to describe it to you guys, he's really definitely, it's kind of a diffused, he's got pretty thin hair, it looks like. He diffuses it a little bit or just scrunches it. It has kind of a gel, crunchy look to it. And then it's, I can't see the back, but it's definitely kind of a slight undercut taken tighter at the temples. And all worn, worn, worn pretty forward, which seems to be, if we had to say a trend right now, that would be definitely one of the trends. And it's worn in so many different ways. I know my son, who's 13, he's wearing his hair kind of messy into the front and scrunched up. He's got super straight hair, wants it to be wavy, which is I think a lot of the kids are trying to do that. And this is kind of a version. The bad hair day is kind of a trend right now. It would be my thought process. And because it doesn't look like he's having a good hair day, it just looks like he woke up, scrunched some stuff in his hair and went. And those tend to be the trends as we, the last however many years I've been alive, like the texture, messiness, bed head, like all of these things became trendy. And this is just another form of it, longer haircuts. I think getting through COVID, people didn't go to the hairdresser as much, had longer hair and embraced it. And this is kind of the evolution of that. So last little bit, Kendall Jenner debuted her brand new red hair makeover during Fashion Week. The supermodel was out in Paris on February 28th when she had her new bright red hair down and straight. It's so funny, because like the title of this is Kendall Jenner is unrecognizable, but obviously they recognized her and they took pictures of her. So she's not unrecognizable. But what do we think of her red tone? I think it's soft. It looks almost like a muted tone a little bit. Not a lot of movement in it, it looks pretty one level. Her hair cut, center parting, some movement around the face, real light towards the ends, almost thin looking in this photo. And looks a little bit thicker in the other area. So yeah, so that's her new look. What do you guys think? Let me know in the comments. All right, so that's episode number one guys. I hope you enjoyed it. I had a ton of fun hanging out with you guys, talking hair a little bit, talking about business stuff a little bit, social media stuff, life stuff and just some ridiculous stuff. So I hope you guys are into the podcast. Let me know what you think on any of the platforms that you can, send me a message. I love to hear your thoughts and this is gonna be fun. I'm gonna try to put these episodes out on a weekly basis and just keep it going. So if you guys want to watch the show, then make sure you tune in to our YouTube channel, Freeslawn Education, so you can actually see the images that I'm talking about. I try to describe them as in depth as possible and we'll continue to do that. Just kind of breaking down things that are happening in the hair world so you guys can stay in tune with the new and now. And also make sure you subscribe for the podcast so you get alerts when it comes out and also make sure you subscribe on YouTube so that you don't miss any videos that we're putting out and go to our online store shop FSE. I put out a cutting system. So if you guys are struggling with your hair cutting or want to just go more in depth and learn the terminology that I focus on. When I cut hair, it has a PDF book, eight step-by-step haircuts. You get a certificate to hang in your salon. There's a terminology one-on-one video. There's all kinds of stuff packed into that thing. So it's 49.99 on our online store shop FSE. It's a download, you have it forever. You can keep it. You can show it to your salon, whatever you want to do. You know, it's just a tool for you to use to understand the videos that I create even better. And then also don't forget we're now, the patent status is pretty much legit at this point. We have a patented tri-raiser that is a three-sided cutting tool that allows you to cut 50%, 25% or 100% of the hair, create a ton of texture in the hair. So if you guys are looking to upgrade your tools, go to shopfse.com and you can do that. And I appreciate it because it supports free salon education, everything that we're doing here to create education for you guys. So again, hope you guys enjoyed the show. I really had a good time. Can't wait for the next one. And I'll see you guys soon. All right, see you. I'm just having a good time, having a bad day, yeah.