#awinewith Tara Clark
MEET Tara Clark, Founder of Black Lash MakeUp and Owner of The Lip Lab Perth
You can find them here:
Transcript
Danielle Lewis (00:05):
Tara, welcome to Spark tv.
Tara Clark (00:07):
Thank you so much.
Danielle Lewis (00:09):
I am so excited to share your story because I've been a long time stalker of yours on Instagram and so glad that we get to share this time together. Thank you.
Tara Clark (00:22):
That's very exciting.
Danielle Lewis (00:24):
So good. So let's start out by telling everyone who you are and what you do.
Tara Clark (00:28):
Well, thank you. I'm Tara. So I am the founder and lead hair and makeup artist of Black Lash Makeup, and I am also the owner of the Lip Lab Perth. So we provide hair and makeup services for events, bridal and photographic services, and we also make custom makeup in the form of lip gloss, lipstick, foundation, concealer, liquid blush. That's about it.
Danielle Lewis (00:57):
I love it. And again, from my stalking, I could come in and literally design the color of my dreams. Is that
Tara Clark (01:06):
Correct? Absolutely, yes. So with the lipsticks, the only color that we can't make is highlighter green. Don't get no damn, don't get asked for that too often though. So it's okay. But yes, the idea is that you can come in and select the texture of your lipstick and then we create the shade in front of you. You try it on a little bit until we get it right, and then we make you a lipstick or a lip gloss. Yeah.
Danielle Lewis (01:35):
Wow, that's so cool. And this sounds like such a fun group activity as
Tara Clark (01:39):
Well. Yes, absolutely. So we do loads of, hence parties and corporate events. We do like a bubbles and nibbles package, so you can come in with your best GS and just spend an afternoon playing with makeup basically.
Danielle Lewis (01:53):
Oh my God, that sounds like the dream Far better than what I have planned to do for the rest of the day.
Tara Clark (01:58):
Yeah, me too.
Danielle Lewis (02:00):
Oh my God, hilarious. So how did you actually get into this? So you've talked about hairstyling, makeup, artistry, business, and then the retail space. How did this all transpire?
Tara Clark (02:13):
I suppose? I'll give you an abridged version or we would probably be here all afternoon, but when I left school I studied makeup artistry and I didn't really do very much with that qualification. That was nearly 30 years ago, so there wasn't a lot out there. And then when I had my fourth child, I was looking to, I actually had a role in the finance sector and I was on maternity leave from my third child when I had him. And I just needed to find something that was going to work better with our family. We had four small children and it was just not going to, I wasn't going to manage a 40 hour a week office job. So I refreshed my qualifications and I started black lash makeup and I built that business up. I did some hair qualifications two years into that journey because I realized that there were lots of people who just really wanted one person to do both.
(03:16):
And then at the end of 2022, the lip Lab went up for sale and I had already started, I do a lot of private lessons in the makeup artistry side and most of the time when I was mating people, they would say to me, if you just had the products to buy from you, I would just get it from you rather than you telling me what to get at Mecca. So I'd started sort of thinking to myself, how can I create a white label product that's just some basics that people can put in their kit so that when I'm teaching them what to do on a day-to-day basis, they have something that they can trust and use. And then saw that the lip lab was for sale and just thought straight away for me, I need to do that. So. So we purchased the business in March last year and since then it's just been an absolute roller coaster.
Danielle Lewis (04:13):
Yeah, holy crap. Talk to me about the buying the business process, because we talk a lot about starting a business here, but not a lot about buying into something that's already established. What was that process like and what pitfalls should we be aware of?
Tara Clark (04:31):
Wow, so many. I think, do you know what, it's so funny, isn't it? Because we always say you don't know what you don't know. And I think in buying a business that has never been more apparent to me, I'm a very trusting person. So whilst I don't sort of classify myself as a stupid person, I also don't think that people are going out of their way to deceive me or to do things that are not in my best interest. So there were quite a few things that probably didn't go to plan or were omitted, and in fairness, that was as much because we didn't know to ask the right questions.
(05:23):
There were a couple of things that we hired a lawyer at the time to go through all the contracts and the lease and all the rest of it, but there were a few things that the lawyer probably said, oh, I would do this that we ignored because we were like, oh, they're not trying to do anything unto all. They're not trying to do anything that would be negatively impacting me. So yeah, my joke is if you hire a lawyer, just do what they tell you to do. Isn't it funny how we bring in these experts and then we listen to what they tell us to do? Absolutely. I mean, but it's so funny because so often I think about when I'm doing someone's makeup or I'm teaching them or I'm doing a bride, and you'll give them advice and then they don't do it and you're like, yeah, that's what I told you to do. But the same was the shoe was on the other foot.
Danielle Lewis (06:15):
Wow, isn't that funny? Why do we do this to ourselves? I dunno. We think we know better.
Tara Clark (06:21):
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So I just think it's probably do get experts to help you if you've never done it before. Absolutely. I've learned a lot. So yeah, so definitely heed the advice of the experts that you hire, I think would be my number one tip. And don't necessarily go into agreements thinking that people, and I'm not saying that they're definitely trying to do something bad by you, but they're looking after themselves, right?
Danielle Lewis (06:59):
Yeah, exactly. That's actually a really good way to put it. It's not that they're particularly malice, it's that they want to get the best outcome for them.
Tara Clark (07:07):
Correct.
Danielle Lewis (07:08):
It's no longer their business.
Tara Clark (07:09):
Yeah,
Danielle Lewis (07:10):
That is really good advice actually. How have you found the difference between running your own business and perhaps in more of a can do it from anywhere kind of vibe into that retail space where now you have the lease, fixed costs, assets, inventory, what's that difference
Tara Clark (07:29):
Been like? So in Blacklash, I have four subcontractors that work for me, which is an amazing setup. We have an amazing team, but obviously they're subcontractors, so I pay them when they do a job. So we've moved to a space and we've literally just moved into a brand new space actually, because the space that we were in wasn't big enough for me to do what I wanted to do with the business. So yeah, now I have rent, I have staff that I have to pay fixed costs. So that's all been a big learning curve. I have to know my numbers a lot better than I did probably with the sole trader thing, simply because there's things that whether I am making lipsticks or not, I have to pay for them
Danielle Lewis (08:21):
Full
Tara Clark (08:22):
On
Danielle Lewis (08:24):
The joys, the joy. And what about the difference between finding new customers? Have you found that any different from the makeup hair business to retail?
Tara Clark (08:39):
I think I have to be Sorry. There was a little midge there, that's why my arm, that's all. That's all right. I was like, oh, waving. So I actually think it's quite similar. It's a very similar demographic that I'm talking to, which is helpful. So my ideal client is not necessarily completely different. I do have to be a lot more consistent
(09:09):
With the marketing. I could get away with being a little bit slack with the black lash side of things. I had built up my clientele to be quite a regular clientele, which was good, and a referring clientele, which was amazing. Funny enough, since we've moved into the new store four weeks ago and I've moved my makeup artistry business out of my house and into the store, it's almost a little bit like I'm starting again because I had a lot of local clientele that I've now moved into a CBD store that are not necessarily going to come there for their brother's birthday party. It's different. So I have got some clients that traveled a long way to come to my home studio that were like, oh great. The city is actually easier for me. But yeah, so it's juggling the two and making sure that we're consistent on both ends. Now, I think where we've moved to in the new space has got a lot more foot traffic, which has been amazing. So that's definitely helped a lot.
Danielle Lewis (10:15):
Yeah, that's really interesting. In my mind I thought, oh great, now you've kind of got this upsell opportunity for people that were a customer. Now they can come in and have these experiences, they can buy the product, but that's really interesting. I never thought about that change of location will certainly impact some people. Some people definitely buy for convenience over loyalty.
Tara Clark (10:37):
Yes. Yeah, absolutely. I've got a clientele that are my regular clients that will always come to see me, which is lovely. But yeah, there is definitely an aspect of being when you're working from a home studio of being like, oh, it's convenient because you're 10 minutes down the road. Or I can walk there and I'm not going to go to Rain Square for that. I'll just find someone else 10 minutes down the road. Lots of us around now.
Danielle Lewis (11:03):
Yeah. So how do you reach new people, social media, or what other strategies are you using?
Tara Clark (11:10):
Yeah, I do a lot of, social media is a very big thing. It's a regular thing. I do Facebook advertising for my bridal clients because it's not really, I don't really find it for event makeup. It's not profitable for one makeup, but I use Facebook ads for my bridal clients. I do loads of networking. I was a relationship manager in my finance role, so that was kind of like my bread and butter was networking. And so as soon as I started my business, I got myself into different networking groups in Perth and have built my network that way.
Danielle Lewis (11:59):
I love that. What would be, because I know some people hate the word networking because they visualize walking into a room of hundreds of people and they're like, oh my God, I have to go and make small talk with these people that I don't dunno. Do you have any tips for making networking a little bit less confronting?
Tara Clark (12:17):
So I think you have to find the right group. Yeah, that's good advice. And you can really see by the way people talk in their social media and if you're looking at advertising, if you're looking on LinkedIn, you can really see what type of networking it is. So if you are walking into a channel where they're expecting you to come every month with three
Danielle Lewis (12:41):
Referrals, oh God,
Tara Clark (12:44):
No run. Yeah, don't love that environment, but you can spot that from the genuine connection networking, you can really see by the types of wording that they're using and the types of comments on the posts and the way people are interacting with the posts. You can see the difference. So that would be my number one thing. My second thing would be, and a lot of people won't resonate with this, but I really needed, I did not want to have to go back to my finance job. I really needed my business to work because I wanted to be home with my four children. And so for me, and this is kind of how I approached it in my finance role as well, it was like this is how you build your business. This is how you keep your job, this is how you meet your KPIs. You need to go into, and I am very describe myself as an extroverted extrovert. So granted it's a lot easier for me than it is for other people, but I just did not give myself any choice. I had to go in and I had to find somebody that I clicked with and there was no option for me because it was important that my business worked.
Danielle Lewis (14:01):
I love that sometimes we have to say to ourselves, this is what it takes. Do you want it or not? Usually give ourselves a little bit of tough love. We can do hard things, we can do hard things. And I think unfortunately businesses hard 90% of the time,
Tara Clark (14:21):
But
Danielle Lewis (14:22):
We can do it. We can do it. And I think that networking is amazing and it's one of the tools that a lot of people attribute to success because it can also, if you kind of move past the idea of I have to go and talk to random people that I don't know. The idea of just talking to random people and building relationships is actually pretty cool. When you think of in the grand scheme of the things that you have to do in your business, chatting, chatting
Tara Clark (14:50):
Is not so bad. And you could also find there's so many networking groups and communities that are just women, if that makes you feel more comfortable. Not all men groups with men, but they can be a bit like, here's my business card. I feel the women led communities are a bit more about a genuine connection and meeting people and really being interested in what others do. But you'll also find that probably over 60% of the room feel exactly the same way that you do. I'm in the minority where I enjoy it. Most people are feeling nervous, are feeling anxious, are feeling like, oh my God, I have to put myself out there. So you don't need to be working. We're all on the same boat.
Danielle Lewis (15:41):
And the other thing I like about women's networking groups as well is there's a bunch of virtual stuff available now. So if absolutely you are really struggling, getting on a zoom call with a network might be easier, or typing in a forum might be easier or going to social media might be easier. So there are ways to network virtually as well now, which I think is amazing.
Tara Clark (16:06):
I love your little emails that are like, bring wine. Yeah,
Danielle Lewis (16:09):
Totally. Hello. That's the best way to network. Exactly. Bring wine and you don't have to drive anywhere after. Yeah, so good. So good. I've got pajama pants on right now and slippers, so this is fantastic way to network. Oh, I love it. What do you think has been the biggest challenges that you've faced over these years of running your businesses?
Tara Clark (16:37):
Wow. Okay. Well, I did a talk recently where I finished it with, I'd been in business for seven years. So I did seven lessons and the first lesson that I had was that business is not linear. So when we first start we kind of think, oh, I've just got to get all my systems in place and then I've just got to nail my marketing or I've just got to secure a really good team. And then from there it will just be this upward trajectory that's like a fool's errand that we've been sold because business is like this no matter whether you've been in for two years or 20 years, that's how business is. So I think that was a mindset shift for me that I had to get over quite early on. But also I had a beauty and events business or in the events space during Covid. Yeah, that was a double whammy. Beauty for brides. Oh my God,
Danielle Lewis (17:48):
Oh my. I know. You just can't foresee the stuff that happens in the bloody business world. You, it's just an outrage. I think when
Tara Clark (18:00):
You take the time to reflect, you're like, yeah, I did that. I made that through. So that was pretty tough. I think definitely having four children and taking on the lip lab has been a lot. I think towards the end of last year I was like, wow, I am pretty burnt out. This has definitely been a lot. So I think there's always those challenges of making sure that you are looking after yourself as well as looking after your family and keeping your businesses running. But yeah, I know when things get really, really hard, that's usually a sign that when we come out the other side we get, there's a little bit of growth. So I think it's just that perseverance.
Danielle Lewis (18:50):
Yeah, absolutely. How did you deal with burnout? How did you deal with burnout but still keep the kids alive and the businesses alive?
Tara Clark (19:02):
Look, I'm probably not the best person to, don't worry, I'm the worst as well. I like to see myself as a very capable person. So the number one thing people say to me is like, oh my God, how do you do it? Well, I just keep doing it is probably the response, which is not, isn't that funny? The best way to do the thing
Danielle Lewis (19:26):
Is to do the thing.
Tara Clark (19:30):
We do have a holiday once a year. I've got a holiday coming up at the end of August where we're actually having a really big holiday. So I probably burnt out a month ago, to be honest, with the whole new store renovation and moving into the new store and everything. But we've got our grand opening this weekend, so I'm just like, I keep saying to the kids, we've just got to get through the next five weeks and then Monday we've just got to get through the next four weeks, right? It's just four weeks. So yeah, I think you do need to make sure that you have a light at the end of the tunnel. If you've got no break coming, you're never going to make it. And I know that I have a really decent break coming. I'm also one of those people that when I get to the airport, if it's not done, it doesn't matter. I can click that switch, which some people can't, but I'm very good at going, oh, well, no one's going to die. So yeah, so I think that that is probably what keeps me going. I love it. Exercise.
Danielle Lewis (20:40):
Yeah. Oh god, I'd love to be the 5:00 AM wake up, meditate journal kind of gal, but not for me. More
Tara Clark (20:47):
Coffee and run. Yeah, I do try to do it twice a week. I was doing Pilates and then that kind of got a bit way sided, so now I'm trying to do a 15 minute whatever. I've a 15 minute hi workout, can I get that in somewhere twice a week. So I've done something
Danielle Lewis (21:08):
And I feel like there's as much mental benefit as there is physical benefit, just stopping for 15 minutes doing something for yourself.
Tara Clark (21:16):
I
Danielle Lewis (21:16):
Feel like that actually compounds.
Tara Clark (21:19):
So
Danielle Lewis (21:20):
I love the 15 minute workout. I do that with yoga. I just do yoga search on YouTube and if it's over 20 minutes I won't do it. I'm like, I just want, by the time I'm getting tired, it's finished.
Tara Clark (21:35):
So
Danielle Lewis (21:35):
Yeah, I love that approach.
Tara Clark (21:38):
I think there's something as well, so powerful that when you start something like that, saying to yourself, this is me taking time for me. Sometimes I would go to those five 30 Pilates classes and be like, I don't want to be here. Why am I here? It's dark, it's cold. I cannot be bothered doing this for 45 minutes and just reminding myself that this is the time that I've put aside for me makes me go, oh, okay. Yeah, because when you go home, there is no time for you.
Danielle Lewis (22:07):
No,
Tara Clark (22:07):
None of the rest of the time is for you. So this is it.
Danielle Lewis (22:11):
Yeah, I know. And it is funny though, finding that 45 minutes or finding that hour by the time you drive there or Mac, which is why I choose YouTube because I can do it in my pajamas. I'm not traveling, I can just shut up and there's so much on there. Yeah, totally. There's something for everybody and something, depending on the vibe you're in as well. Some days I'm like, I need the kind of yoga that's just lying flat on my back doing nothing, and some days I'm like, oh no, I've got some pain. I need to stretch around a bit. And you can just judge it versus going into a class and it's all out for 45 minutes
Tara Clark (22:47):
And you're like, oh,
Danielle Lewis (22:48):
Do I have to
Tara Clark (22:48):
Do that bit?
Danielle Lewis (22:49):
Yeah, totally. That's actually why I love yoga. I once heard a yoga instructor and she said something like, it's just with yoga, it's just showing up and you can just do whatever feels right for you and your body. I was like, that's my kind of workout. Amazing. I love it. Well, I always love to wrap up these chats with one last piece of advice. So reflecting on your time in business, what would be a piece of advice that you would give to another woman in business on her journey?
Tara Clark (23:22):
God, one piece. Oh God. I always think of these and then a million things happen. One, you can do multiple, you can do anything you like. One piece of advice, look, I think I'll go with when I started my A of years into my business, I always thought that doing more training in my field was the way to go training under other makeup artists to see the way other makeup artists do things or I took on hair training and those sorts of things. And that stuff is good. I'm not saying don't revisit your skillset or don't try and improve, but when you are building your business, the best thing that you can pay someone to help you with is stuff that you don't know. So if you like a crap at systems like I am getting someone, paying someone to help you with your systems is far better at them paying someone to do what you are already good at or getting a business coach if you feel like you need some mindset work or something like that. Because I think I was a couple of years in before I realized I am a good enough makeup artist, I can do makeup. And while it's always great to work on that skillset, paying someone to help me with the things in my business that I was not good at and I was not getting around to because I kept putting them off because I wasn't good at them, was far more beneficial.
Danielle Lewis (24:58):
I love that because you are right. Sometimes when we're not good at things, we do put them to the bottom of the pile.
Tara Clark (25:05):
Absolutely do.
Danielle Lewis (25:06):
Yeah. And sometimes unfortunately, they can be the really critical things like getting new business, doing our accounts, all of those things that you kind of get to the end of the corner and go, oh crap, I'm in trouble. Yep. Marketing. So you actually get clients? Yes. Oh my god, I could not agree more. Tara, you are amazing. Thank you so much for coming on the Spark TV podcast and sharing your story with the Spark community. It's incredible. Thank you so much for
Tara Clark (25:34):
Having me. I really appreciate it. It's been a fun chat
Danielle Lewis (25:38):
Anytime and we will share all of your links so that people can come and visit you as well.
Tara Clark (25:43):
That'd be amazing.
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