Ann explains why the aesthetics industry is not the best place for entrepreneurs to Alison Cowie.
I’ve been writing entrepreneurial profiles for more than 15 years and almost without exception, the primary drivers of those running private businesses are profit and growth.
But this isn’t the case for Ann Oliver Harvey.
This is not because Ann – who has established several companies – isn’t business savvy or driven. But prioritising profit and growth in the industry she’s dedicated much of her life to is simply too big a risk.
Ann is a qualified and fully certified medical micropigmentation technician and corrective tattooist, offering a range of services such as areola reconstruction to clients across the North East.
She currently works as a freelance consultant at Absolute Image, a Newcastle city centre-based clinic that specialises in advanced aesthetic treatments.
Prioritising profit and growth in the aesthetics industry is a mistake, Ann maintains.
“As an entrepreneur, you’re looking for a profit from everyone who enters your door. But in this business, you can’t do that,” she says.
“You have to be prepared to say no to potential clients, even if it means they go to someone else, who might be offering cut-price deals to get their business.”
Ann continues: “This is not like buying curtains, getting a new bathroom suite or booking a holiday. It’s changing your face or your body, and that’s a completely different ballgame.
“If a builder botches your new windows, it’s terrible, but what if someone botches your face? The ramifications are huge and that’s why you can’t come to it from a business perspective.
“In this industry, integrity is paramount.”
Ann established her first business, Corrective Colour, when she left college after studying traditional and advanced beauty and cosmetics for four years.
From her base in Durham, Ann worked with people who had facial birthmarks or scarring suffered through trauma.
“I would show them how they could use cosmetics to camouflage and disguise,” she explains.
A few years on and Ann embarked on a dramatic career change when she moved to Spain, spending 10 years working as a translator for the Thomson Travel Group.
When she returned to the UK, Ann got a job in recruitment where she travelled the globe headhunting mostly engineers.
This led to her establishing her second company specialising in recruiting architectural engineers with design knowledge around extreme events and terrorism.
“This was pre 9-11 and such skills were thin on the ground,” Ann reflects. “You could find pockets of people in India and France, and so this is where I spent a lot of my time.”
After becoming a mother, Ann felt the jet-set lifestyle of recruitment was no longer for her and she returned to the aesthetics industry, training to be a medical tattooist.
Her inspiration, Ann reveals, came from her dad.
“He wasn’t a tattooist by trade but my dad always had an interest in skin and paints,” she explains. “A lot of what I learned about blending and pigment uptake, and how to get a good return on the skin, definitely came from watching him when I was young.
“I never thought that it would be my end career but I’ve always been creative and I feel very fortunate to be able to use my creativity in my everyday job.”
Ann has worked with people who have experienced alopecia and cleft palates, as well as with women whose bodies have changed due to cancer treatment.
One of her specialisms is 3D nipple and areola reconstruction where she uses her skills in tattooing and pigmentation to create “the illusion of protrusion” for women who have undergone mastectomies.
Patients are often referred to Ann by their medical team in hospital, and she works closely with oncologists to ensure any procedure is safe and appropriate.
“I may meet a female before she goes through treatment, during or afterwards, and there’s a set of protocols I must follow,” Ann explains.
“An oncologist will write to the clinic saying they’re happy for a patient to proceed and that their blood counts are at the right level to go ahead.”
Ann knows her medical and corrective tattooing is not right for everyone, and she first conducts in-depth consultations with all her clients.
“Consultation tells you everything and often I consult more than once,” she explains.
“A person should come out of any aesthetic treatment consultation feeling excited, confident and comfortable.
“There shouldn’t be a question you can’t answer, and you should be willing to give answers the person might not want to hear – such as you’re not ready or not right for what they’re asking for. Even if that means losing them as a client.”
For those for whom it is agreed they would benefit from a procedure, Ann delivers her medical or corrective tattooing herself.
“I don’t want to sound arrogant but I wouldn’t be prepared to put my name against anyone else’s needle,” she says.
Ann’s partnership with Absolute Image began after she and owner Jill Tait began discussing how their services complemented each other.
“Jill is a qualified nurse who specialises in injectables and it made sense to join her,” Ann reflects. “The synergy of the two industries is incredibly complementary to the end user.”
In working with Absolute Image – which celebrated its 15th anniversary last year – Ann found a business owner that mirrored her own ethos.
“I will only work with people who have a similar ethic,” Ann explains. “Jill fits that. She’s good at what she does but she’s not afraid to say no, but in a nice way so that people go away still feeling good about themselves.”
Both Ann and Jill are well aware of the challenges the rapidly growing aesthetics industry face, and is often dismayed that so many people are entering the industry offering injectables, fillers and botox, with minimal training and experience.
“Often, the public doesn’t know the difference. They see people who are registered, certified and are advertising these procedures but without a level of experience, that’s when things go wrong. The lack of rule regulation is creating huge issues, which we see all the time,” Ann says.
The pair’s desire to bring about reform in the industry they love led Ann and Jill to contribute to a parliamentary review in 2019.
“We received a letter from an MP asking if we would help create a set of standards for the industry. They wanted credible clinics like Absolute Image to get involved, and so we jumped at the chance,” Ann reports.
In the statement Ann wrote on behalf of Absolute Image for the review, she outlined current problems in the industry.
She wrote: “Sadly, many of today’s aesthetic clinics are run solely with profit and an exit strategy in mind… a fundamental change of perception from a professional service to a price-led commodity has been a key failure in a high percentage of clinics,” adding: “The idea of effective regulation in order to filter out unqualified practitioners and subsequently improve overall industry standard is well overdue.”
Ann reveals that she and Jill were on the verge of visiting the then prime minister Boris Johnson and his team to further their cause, when COVID hit.
The pandemic has subsequently put the review on hold but the medical tattooist is confident it will be picked up again soon.
In the meantime, Ann continues to offer her high-quality services at Absolute Image, which recently announced a further partnership with Dr Philip Lamballe who will provide a range of new advanced aesthetics services, including vein work, at the clinic.
“We’d been speaking to Philip for a while so it’s great that he’d decided to join the team,” Ann enthuses.
“Philip was originally a surgeon before going into general practice. He’s been doing private aesthetic work for many years and is very well-known and incredibly well respected.”
Ann is clearly excited and proud of Absolute Image’s latest appointment, and the potential of working with a GP-qualified practitioner. But ask her about future plans for the clinic and she returns to her cautionary tone.
“When most businesses talk about the future, they’re talking about profit-driven growth. But at Absolute Image, we prefer to talk about maintenance.
The freelance consultant continues: “Could Jill use the model as a blueprint and expand it? Of course. But the reason the business is a success is because she has a finger on the pulse of the front line. You can’t pull away from that or you’re diluting the whole ethos of the company.”
Ann has been managing risk her whole career. Whether that’s weighing up the benefits of ending her first business to follow her Spanish dream, or managing the risk in the ultra-competitive world of international recruitment, finding specialists who, in turn, are dealing with the construction risks from such extremes as a terrorist attack.
In her latest work, Ann knows it’s essential to avoid all unnecessary risks in aesthetics, even if that negatively impacts the bottom line.
Of course, in taking this resolute approach, this highly experienced business woman knows that growth will come. But it will be long-term organic growth that she, and the similarly minded people she chooses to work with, will manage in their own way.
For more information on Ann and Absolute Image visit www.absolute-image.co.uk
