Hello Beautiful Salon is celebrating ten years of operation with their beloved clients. “Without them, we wouldn’t be where we are today,” owner Ashley Horne says.In March, she organized a celebratory event at the Muse as away to give back to clients and thank them for their loyalty. Ashley opened the salon in March 2014. When she started, Ashley’s salon consisted of two stylists including herself and a handful of clients. Now ten years later, her client pool has grossly expanded and she boasts 11 stylists including herself to keep up with demand.Their services range from men’s to women’s cuts and include a variety of customizable options for any type of style. They provide beard trims, hand tied extensions, lived in color, fashion color, blonding services, balayage,smoothing services, spray tanning, and waxing. Clients enjoy the plethora of choices Hello Beautiful Salon offers. While she has been a salon owner for ten years, Ashley’s cosmetology experience dates even further back. “I had been doing hair probably about nine years before I opened my salon,” she recalls. But even as a child, Ashley was primed for a future in cosmetology. “I’ve grown up in the hair industry my whole life,” she says. Ashley’s mom was a hairdresser. Additionally ,her grandmother often brought Ashley to her friend’s home salon where Ashley would help out.“My job as a kid was to pull the hair dryers down over the ladies getting their shampoo sets. At five and six years old, that was a pretty big job.” Ashley treasured those early days in the salon, but becoming a hair stylist was not her dream job. When she graduated high school in 2004, Ashley wanted to pursue a career in animal science. However, she decided to take her mom’s suggestion and see if a career in cosmetology would be a better fit.When Ashley studied cosmetology at Middle Georgia Technical College, she knew it was the right decision. “I fell in love with it,” she says. “I fell in love with the connection that you make with clients.”Newly graduated from the cosmetology program, Ashley started her first hair stylist job at Dales House of Style in Perry. Ashley attributes her success as a hair stylist to those early years at Dales House of Style. She says that opportunity helped build who she is today by giving her the confidence to excel in the industry. As her passion for cosmetology blossomed, Ashley considered an entrepreneurship venture. “My thought had always been to open a salon one day,” she shares. When a rental space became available, she decided the timehadarrived.In the beginning, Ashley shares that she maintained practical goals.“I started off small and I just prayed to God,‘Lord, provide me with what you see fit for me in my life.’” In those initial days, Ashley believed she would work alone at the salon. However, pretty soon the Lord brought another hair stylist to her door and the two of them worked there together before welcoming a third stylist.Ashley drew inspiration for the name Hello Beautiful Salon from conversations with her friends. “I’ll answer the phone when they call saying, ‘Well, hey beautiful,’ or ‘Hello beautiful.’ It makes people smile;you can hear it through the phone.” It was an easy decision to create this same feeling of adoration for her clients in the name of herbusiness.The first space she rented was less than one thousand square feet and held three spaces. Ashley looks back on it with much fondness, but the growth she experienced was a welcome change.After three years, Hello Beautiful Salon outgrew the original space and moved next door. They moved again in 2016 to their current location on Jernigan St. This building is 2500 square feet and accommodates Ashley andhergrowing team.Since the beginning of this venture, Ashley has been committed to creating a joyous atmosphere both for the clients and the stylists. “I want it to be family-oriented, I want us to be close,” shesays of the team. “We are afamily and we work to help eachother out.”The ladies share a group chat thread where they send each other silly pictures and life updates to brighten their day. Ashley truly values the ladies’ team spirit adding that they offer one another constant support, encouragement,and motivation.“I don’t call them my co-workers because they’re my sisters and that’s what they are to me.” Ashley can often be found referring to the ladies asBossBabes further addinga sense of empowerment to the group.These practices of hyping one another up translate into the way they treat their clients.

“It’s not always about hair to us, it’s about investing time with our clients and building relationships that will last a lifetime,” Ashley says.Many of Ashley’s clients have been seeing her since the start of her career twenty years ago. As such, she has walked alongside of them through life’s ups and downs getting to know more of their hearts each time they sit in her chair. She equates their visits to her salon to catching up with a good friend. Last spring, Ashley added Hello Be-you-TUFF-ul Boutique to the salon. The boutique contains hair accessories, jewelry, women’s clothing, and purses. Clients enjoy perusing these products and choosing pieces to complement their fresh hair styles.The boutique is very dear to Ashley’s heart for sentimental reasons. “Seven and a half years ago I gave birth to a little boy named Tuff,” she shares. “He was the strongest baby I’ve ever seen. From eight to twenty-four weeks,heshowed the world how tough and strong he was, but the Lord had plans for him and called him home to Him.”Not a day passes that Ashley does not think about her precious little boy and the short time they had together. She honored his memory when she named the boutique after him and is constantly reminded of his strength. “You yourself have to be tough in every situation and trust in the Lord,” Ashley says.In addition to the boutique, Ashley has decided to branch out into the permanent makeup industry and is opening Beautifully Inked PMU. There she will offer microblading, nano brows, lip blushing, powder brows, and combination brow services. “I’ll also be teaching the certification and teaching artists that are interested in this field.” Ashley’s shares her gratitude for her husband Josh’s support and involvement in the salon. “He’s my voice of reason and I’m thankful for that. He calms me,” she says. Josh plays an active role on the construction side of the salon. Ashley says they enjoy spending their free time with Makayla, her nine-year-old stepdaughter. Ashley falls more in love with cosmetology and the joy it brings people every day. “I just have a true passion for this industry, and I love it,” she exclaims. The entire Hello Beautiful Salon teams shares her enthusiasm for their work. They find great joy in the opportunity to touch the lives of their clients by taking care of their styling needs. “I want people to see themselves the way I see them,” Ashley says. A fresh hair style can boost people’s confidence in a way that reflects the beauty and light inside of them.