The NHBF have published the findings of their State of the Industry Survey, which had over 5,000 respondents.

Following the survey, NHBF are warning of devastating future for hair & beauty without further financial support. The National Hair & Beauty Federation (NHBF) predicts boarded-up shop fronts, significant job losses and a major mental health and wellbeing crisis across the hair and beauty sector if the Government does not step up with additional support.

Conducted across UK hair and beauty salons and barbershops, the survey highlights the significant impact of the current government-imposed restrictions on businesses and the financial and psychological impact on business owners and staff, as they see their bills and debts spiral.

The most significant statistics were as follows:

• 1 in 8 business owners (13%) had already made redundancies as a result of the pandemic.
• 56% could not rule out further redundancies without government support when the furlough scheme ends. 1 in 9 (12%) were certain that redundancies would be likely.
• 53% of respondents had cut staff hours in order to save costs. This rose to 61% when looking at the beauty sector alone.
• 62% could not be sure their business would survive until the end of the financial year, with almost a third of that number (18%) explicitly sure they would have to close.
•  2 in 5 (38%) of salons in the beauty sector were not earning enough to cover outgoings such as rent, overheads, staff costs and stock etc. Across the hair and beauty sector as a whole, only 2 in 5 are just about breaking even.
• 1 in 11 (9%) had not received any financial support
• Only 4% were likely to take on new staff in next 3 months
• Only 4% likely to take on apprenticeships despite recent government incentives. 

Find out more about NHBF’s State of the Industry Survey results here.