NINJ'AFRO
How do you find a good stylist or barber – Instagram, word-of-mouth or by chance? There’s a good chance you’ve used a variety of all three – but now there’s a platform to help make that discovery that bit easier.
Founded by twin sisters, NinjA’fro allows you to input the style you desire to find the best talent and products for the job. Customer feedback is also included: so unlike Instagram pages, which can be a measure of likes over experience, you’ll have real-life referrals of your chosen stylist, barber or product to draw upon.
Team NinjA’fro share more:
How did idea of NinjA’fro come about?
“We launched NinjA’fro in May 2020 but first discussed the idea back in 2016 on our way back home from a holiday. We had both tried completely new hairstyles for that holiday and, while talking about the struggles of finding great afro hair stylists, we thought, wouldn’t it be ideal to have a platform where you can find and book hairstylists that really get afro hair?
Today, people with afro hair in Britain lack proper access to quality hair services. We face numerous obstacles when looking to style or treat our hair – barriers that don't exist for our Caucasian counterparts. Given the critical role afro hair plays in identity, this ‘Afro Gap’ is unacceptable. As twin sisters who have dealt with the struggles ourselves, we decided to do something about it…and set up NinjA’fro.
NinjA’fro is a Black-led online marketplace that connects people with afro hair to stylists, salons and products that will provide them with quality care. The specificity and flexibility of this platform gives us all greater power and control over our own beauty.”
“We are optimists. We believe in the power of a strong community to come together, celebrate self-worth and overcome this challenge.”
As twins, do you yourselves find that you have different hair textures/needs, and if so what are they?
“People tend to assume twins are very similar but it isn’t always the case – especially for non-identical twins.
We were on the same hair journey for a long time: natural hair in childhood, jheri curls during our teens then relaxed hair after that. Five years ago we diverged, mainly because of the differences in our hair texture. One of us transitioned back to natural hair.
With age we have come to appreciate our different hair patterns and what works best for us individually. The great thing is the versatility of afro hair and we want NinjA’fro to be a platform that is inclusive of all afro hair types.”
What do you look for when adding a salon/stylist to Ninj’Afro?
“There are three main things we look for before we onboard a salon or stylist:
Expertise – The stylist has strong expertise in styling afro hair to a high standard. This doesn’t necessarily mean they have decades of experience or have won multiple awards, instead that they understand afro hair styling
Customer Care – The stylist does their best to put the customer first and understands that the customer is paying for both a service and an experience
Passion – This might seem obvious – but if they don’t have passion, it comes across in how they treat customers, their level of professionalism and the finished style!
We invested a lot of time to ensure our onboarding criteria reflect our customers’ views and we continue to invest time in the process. Many of the stylists on NinjA’fro have come through personal referrals (from friends or our wider network) and/or stylist services we’ve tried out ourselves.”
How would you handle situations when a stylist is talented but needs to improve areas such as timekeeping and customer service?
“Talent is important but delivering a good quality hairstyling experience requires more than talent – it requires growth through feedback. On NinjA’fro, stylists can read customer reviews and incorporate the learnings into how they work. We will also work directly with them to address the feedback – be it communication style or time management.
If the stylists are able to take the points onboard, they should see their reviews and ratings increase. However, if they don’t improve and feedback is consistently poor, we are able to take them off NinjA’fro.”
What do stylists need to know about joining your platform?
“The first thing we communicate to stylists is the importance of what we look for. If they are aligned with our focus on quality and professionalism, the actual onboarding is straightforward. We have a commission-based model but there is no onboarding fee.
For stylists, NinjA’fro is more than a platform where they can list their services. We want them to see NinjA’fro as a community that can support them with their business and professional goals. Being a business owner, as many of these stylists are, can be a lonely place. Added to that, the afro hair stylist community doesn’t have lots of support. As we develop NinjA’fro further, the community support initiatives will also be an added benefit to the onboarded stylists.”
