Covid-19 halted life-as-usual for the world and left a lot of failed companies in its wake. Some faltered with the introduction of regulations that allowed only “essential” businesses to remain open; for others it was not securing grant funding. In the business community, there was a sense of collective trauma.
Despite the challenges, Main Street Annex Salon, on East Main Street in downtown Los Gatos, made it out to the other side.
Teresa Hughes and Jasmine Astiani signed their lease in the late months of 2019. These two new co-owners to a long business were blissfully unaware of what lay around the corner.
But they first met while working at another Los Gatos salon, back in 2006.
“I’ve been working in Los Gatos for 18 years, then I began as a part-time renter at the Annex as an independent contractor for 10 years,” Hughes said. “One day, the owner was working here at this location and opened the conversation of selling the salon. So, me and my partner Jasmine decided we wanted to go through with it.”
Born and raised in Guadalajara, Mexico, Hughes came to America when she was 14 years old and couldn’t speak much English.
“I went to West Valley College, and shortly after then arrived at beauty school, always having a passion for hair,” she said. “I wanted to make people feel and look better. I had a guy who went through a divorce and couldn’t understand why his wife couldn’t work things out—after trying to get her back for many years. She moved on. Something about coming to a hair salon and talking about this makes me think that maybe it’s time to move on, too. Is it time for me to move on?”
Hughes paints a picture of how the significance of a salon moment can go far beyond the scope of just fine-tuning looks.
‘We looked like dentists at points, because we had to wear shields when cutting people’s hair’
—Teresa Hughes, co-owner
“People tell us beautiful things, but also the most scary things,” she added.
Both Hughes and Ashtiana went to community college, then beauty school.
“Hair was always something that I was really interested in since the time I was really young,” Ashtiani said, adding she began at Main St Annex in 2012. “We both rented our chairs there and then the opportunity (to buy) came about in late 2019. The salon owner approached us, and we decided to put our heads together.”
Then, Covid hit. And everything changed. Haircare was not deemed essential service.
“We never thought about closing the business,” Ashtiani said. “We had the mindset of doing whatever it was to make it happen and work again: dividers, spacing, signage—and all that.”
Hughes recalls how odd it was to being in sync over the 2019 holidays, then having to shut down for eight months.
“Suddenly we weren’t allowed to legally work,” she said.
That’s when the salon’s clients began to step up. One held a fundraiser, another developed a curbside pickup system. At times, Hughes and Ashtiani would make home delivery runs.
Giving up was not an option for the pair. And even though their landlord was understanding, the rent ultimately had to be paid.
“We looked like dentists at points because we had to wear shields when cutting people’s hair with only two people allowed within a 2,000-square-foot establishment,” Hughes said.
Five years on, hindsight is 2020 (no pun intended). Hughes says that keeping people inspired—and creating—is the goal.
“As shown by our customer loyalty in our first year of launching, beauty and haircare is essential,” she said. “We love our clients. And just to make them feel better by a haircut or color, it helped them get through everything that was going on in the world with Covid.”
They cut through the pandemic with scissors and resilience. And now, the owners know their customers will be there to help them face the obstacles that emerge on their path in the future.
