ep107 – Mark Woolley

Today’s guest is especially exciting for me – not just because he’s an incredibly talented hairdresser, but because his passions extend far beyond hair to art, music, and fashion. Based in the UK, his creativity and vision have landed his work in TV and top industry magazines.

Recently, Creative Head Magazine honored him with the Business Thinker Award for building an outstanding multi-faceted brand. They even called him a ‘genius and an inspiration,’ and once you hear about his journey, you’ll see why. From salons and studios to academies and even a farm that sources ingredients for his product line, he has created a truly multi-platform empire.

He is the founder and creative director of the Electric brand, which includes Electric Salons, the Electric Studio, Electric Education Academy, and the Electric product range. Let’s dive into this week’s Headcases with the visionary Mark Woolley.

• 2:12 – The Legends art piece and industry collaboration
• 22:05 – Charity work and industry support
• 30:16 – Mark’s hair story and early work
• 41:14 – Building the Electric brand
• 58:50 – Creative Process and Industry Challenges

Complete Transcript

Chris Baran 0:00
How great would it be to get up close and personal with the beauty industry heroes we love and admire, and to ask them, How did you learn to do what you do? I’m Chris Baran, a hairstylist and educator for 40 plus years, and I’m inviting all our heroes to chat and share the secrets of their success.

Well, welcome to another episode of head cases. And I have to say this as I’m particularly excited today about today’s guest, because besides being a UK resident and an amazing hairdresser, the passions that he has as include as well as hair, art, music and fashion. And I have to say this does include him, and guarantees him as his work getting always in place for TV and in industry magazines. Recently, creative head magazine presented him with the business thinker award for building an outstanding business. And I have to say, when you when you hear him talk about the brands that he has and how he’s diversified, you’ll agree as well. And in inside that, the judges of that award, they dubbed Mark little hint as well who this might be, as he dubbed him as a genius and an inspiration because of his multi, multi platform brand that he’s created, and that has spanned salons, studios, academies, even boasting a farm from which the ingredients that he uses are the source for his products. He is the founder and creative director of the electric brand, including electric salons, the electric studio, electric Education Academy, and ultimately the electric product range. So let’s get into this week’s head case, Mr. Mark Woolley.

Mr. Mark Woolley, it is a pleasure and an honor. I mean, it’s been whatever, I think, two, three months since we saw each other in LA when you did the launch of your legends art piece. And I just wanted to thank you for everything you’ve done, but it’s a great to have you on here. I’m super excited to talk and get to know you better.

Mark Woolley 2:25
Thank you for having me on, Chris,

yeah, big fan of what you do. And yeah, I really appreciate you inviting me on. Thank you. Thank you.

Chris Baran 2:41
Well, listen, mark the first off the I just want to, I want to talk more about this in just a bit, but I do want to get into Legends and where that came from and how that all came apart. But just while we’re on that topic, that was such a nice event that I think you and Marlene RC put together were and if you’re the listener, and you’re not, you’re wondering what we’re talking about. We there was a little LA where you did a launch, one of the launches that you did, of the American version of your legends group, and you had a whole bunch of people that just were there having a great time. And if you’ve ever been to a an event, and you’re around a whole bunch of people that you’re enamored with, and I must admit, I was a bit starstruck with all the people that you guys had there, but yet, when it got down to it, at that party, everybody was so humble, so down to earth and just a regular human being. And I think that’s where I’d like people to what was your take on that?

Mark Woolley 3:36
Well, I what I love about our industry is we’ve all inspired each other along the way. You know, I’ve taken inspiration from you know, lots of different people in the industry, and we’ve all, you know, all of these people you know that are legends, and you know everyone you know, you know that have achieved anything you know, in any career. The great thing about the hairdressing industry is we, you know, it never feels like we’re competing with each other. We it’s quite, it’s quite closely knit. And you get the feeling you can phone anybody up, whether they’re whether they’re in the UK and Europe or the US or, you know, and you could say, Hey, I like what you do, could you help me learn a bit about it? And I think 99 people out of 100 would say, yeah, no problem. And so I do think we’re hairdressing is quite a unique thing, in that way, unique industry. And I think it comes down to what we do every day, you know, all the core of what we do behind the chair trying to make somebody look better and feel better. You know, that’s our job. And you know, if we’re doing it right, there’s a lot of job satisfaction in it for us as well, isn’t there? Yeah.

Chris Baran 4:53
And you know, you hit a great topic right there. And I want to, I want to find. Doubt a little. I always ask a bit more about your hair story and more of that. So that’s kind of where I want to go next. But you said something in there that I think was truly remarkable. Excuse me. Bless you. Yeah, you said something in there that was truly remarkable, and that was that we all look to one another for inspiration, and I think that you can rise to a certain level, but unless you have some collaboration or something input from somebody else, you can’t grow that next step up. And I think that’s the part about people listening and watching right now that you might be at the beginning of your career, but is to look to people like Mark and Trevor and Anthony and and Christopher Benson and all the people that you admire, and take a look at them and just say, you know, what do I aspire and not? I don’t want to be like that person. I just want to what can I glean from that person so I can grow and get to that level of success?

Mark Woolley 5:57
Yeah, and I think what we were saying earlier, and what we were trying to celebrate in the art piece is the ability to communicate with these people, and we all communicate with each other. And it’s, you know, it’s, it’s a very rewarding thing to give, I think, to teach somebody else, you know as you do. I mean, you know you’re, you’re a proper coach. You know you, you, you know you. You really share these things that make people’s careers more successful. And I think you know, you know, in that room there’s people that are celebrated for cutting hair, coloring hair, teaching people about life and business, taking photographs, starting product lines. You know, whatever some of these people have done, there is an ability to communicate with them and learn from them. And I think that’s the most exciting thing about our industry, because here, a lot of people compare hairdressers to chefs. You know, where you’ve had a you had a chef that’s become a celebrity chef, and they own their own restaurant. But you know, I think the fundamental difference between hairdressers and chefs is, you know, we are communicating all the time with people, you know, whether it’s clients or we’re teaching the people that work for us. You know, our job is a lot about people and a lot about communication. Whereas, I think a chef is the very artistic, creative thing, but it’s often done in an environment that isn’t so social. You know, the kitchen is, you know, a hot place with each person focused on the bit of the food they’re creating. And, you know, it’s a different people element. So I think that’s the great thing about hair, and it’s a great thing about those people in the room that you you asked about.

Chris Baran 7:55
And you know, I think that I was going to ask you more about this later, but I think it I would be remiss if I skip went back and then tried to connect this again, because it’s such a great topic in there. And for people that that don’t know or haven’t heard of this, of the legends pieces that you created, and I’ll start off with the UK, and then it went to America, and then you did Canada as well, and could tell us where, where did all that come from? Just if I want people to look up, and I think it’s really important. If you go to Mark woolley’s website, electric and it’s electric hair, yes,

Mark Woolley 8:36
yeah, electric hyphen hair, com, electric hyphen

Chris Baran 8:40
hair, and you go on there, you’re going to see the art piece that he’s done. And I’m going to challenge all of you to do that. But what I’ve always been wondering, Mark, and the questions I’ve always wanted to ask you, is, How’d they get started? Like, where was the brain that what happened that you went, Okay, there’s a there’s an idea that happened. What was that? Well,

Mark Woolley 8:59
I’ve always, I’ve always produced art, you know, I’ve always painted and and produced visual art. And I think in some ways that led me to doing hair, you know, I thought, well, here’s a piece of creativity that you can build a business out of, you know. So I’ve always done, you know, my whole life, I’ve cut people’s hair and, you know, and I’ve painted. I’ve always, I’ve always done those things. Some of the work I’ve done over the over the years has been art installations and collages. And I had this idea that we, you know, in because it did start in the UK, and it was starting to have a conversation I was having with with Anthony muscolo, great friend of mine, guy, you know, taught me a lot. Worked with him for many years that, you know, doing, doing air. Things. But we were talking about all of these camps, if you like, in London, where in the 60s and 70s, where everybody came out of one of these camps. So, you know, there was a guy in the 50s called Raymond, Mr. Teasy Weezy, yeah. So he was, like the guy. He was the celebrity hairdresser of the day, you know. And so Vidal came out of his camp, you know. And Vidal obviously started a movement in in cutting hair in a different way. And, you know, part of his magic was he wanted to teach other people to take this this way on. And his big rival in the 60s was was a guy called Leonard, Leonard Lewis. And Leonard was the flamboyant, you know, high profile hairdresser of his, of his day. So he was the guy that cut the Beatles hair and The Rolling Stones and, you know, and he was the, he was, he had an amazing salon in Mayfair, you know, very, very nice part of London. And everybody went there. And Vidal had created this thing that was, you know, cutting geometric lines. And, you know, doing hair in a very, very different way. And that made its way onto, you know, cat walks and on the way on to front covers of Vogue. And it became a statement of the 60s. And then he very cleverly wanted to teach everybody to cut like that. And I think that was he really invented hair education, yeah, I think so you have this generation of people that came out of the videl Sassoon camp, you know, and Malcolm and Dennis, the two guys that taught me. They they owned a company called stacks s, a, k, s in the UK. I went to work for them when I was, when I was a young guy, 16, and I learned from them. But they’d come out of the del assume camp. There’s lots of other people, Joshua Galvin, and you know, lots of big names in London that come out of the soon camp, and then out of the Leonard camp had come, John freider, Nicky Clark, you know, people that had been very, very successful as well, but in a different way. And then out of nowhere came the muscolo family with Tony and guy, and then they trained a whole generation of people. So we it started with that, and I had a photograph of Leonard Lewis, and it went in the top corner of the British legends of hairdressing, collage. And anyway, then, then the COVID lockdowns came. So I was, I was finishing this thing off, you know, I’d create a big board. It was about almost two meters wide. I had the original actually in the other room here, and two, two meters wide. And I was, I was thinking, Oh, well, that’s the story of hairdressing, and I’ve done a lot of work with silk screening and putting paint over the top of collages and images. So I, I created a painting of the Union Jack and abstract painting, took a scan of it, created a silk screen, and then, and then, with transparent paint, put it over the collage. And it started with a few people saying, Can I buy that for my I’d like to buy that off you, and I’ll, you know. And I said, Well, there’s only one of them, you know, we can’t, you know, it’s so I went to an art publisher who a big publisher here, called Harwood king, but it was the only one I knew. It would be a bit like going into one of the major record labels and saying, I’ve written a song, you know. So I went in and this guy said to me, Well, you know, forgive me, he said, but I’ve never heard of you as an artist, he said. And when I google you, he said, there’s a lot that comes up about you as a hairstylist, but, you know, a very small amount that comes up as an artist. So, you know, we, we wouldn’t publish, you know, something like that. So anyway, we got talking, and I had come up with, here, we have an industry charity, and then we have another charity that we do a lot of work for, homeless charity. And I said, Well, you know, we’re going to do this piece for charities, you know. And you know, I’ve had a lot of inquiries, people saying they want to buy it, you know, the other hairdressers. So he said, Well, okay, we’ll look at it. Then in the end, they published it, and it sold out on the day we released it. And he said to me, I’ve never seen that before, an unknown artist selling, selling out, you know, with a, you know, a limited edition, and then we had a big party for it, and, you know, and I thought, well, that that went well. It was a good, a good event. And obviously, I’ve spent a lot of time in America with a. Electric, you know, traveling, you know, with, you know, working there, and been traveling there, doing a lot of session work for years. And, you know, back, come out there and support the people that carry our products. So I thought, actually, you know what? There’s more America being what it is, you know, it’s, I think it’s the most exciting place in the world, you know. They you know. And what I love about America and American people is nothing’s a problem, you know. Somebody wants to go and be successful. They go on the bike and they go and do it, you know. And there’s nobody holding anybody back. And everybody’s quite happy for to see other people do well in America. I like it. I like the, I like the positive attitude American people have. And I, you know, I think, I thought, well, actually, there’s probably more people in America you can put on this thing, you know, there’s so many people doing, I’ve met so many people just doing different things in America and doing it, doing it well. So I thought, well, I’ll do an American one, you know, and obviously the Star Spangled Banner, the American flag, I thought, is a very visual thing. So I set about doing one of those. And you know what I didn’t want to do in America was miss anyone out that should have been in it, because I’m aware of, I think most I was aware of, I think probably 90% of the people that are on it. But I I wanted to cross check it so I I’m good friends with Randy and Gerrard, who own hair brained. And I started talking to them about it, and I said, Look this, these are all the people I’d like in it. Do you? Do you think I’ve missed anyone. And then Marlene, Marlene, I say that you’ve mentioned earlier, great person. And I knew her because she used to work for L’Oreal and I had met her a few times, and I could see what she was doing, you know, with her artists in the in the US. And I said to her, Look, do you think i Is there anyone I’ve met and missed here? And, you know, could you cross check everyone? And so there was a few people. I kind of bounced it off, because I was, I was with the UK. I didn’t feel nervous that I was going to miss anyone, because obviously, I’ve grown up here, but in the States, I just, but I don’t feel we have, I feel we’ve got everybody in there, and everybody was very, I think, happy to be in there. And we had two events, one in New York in the middle of Fashion Week, that was well attended, and then one in LA that was well attended. And it was just just great vibes and great people. And I there’s people in there that I followed what they’re doing, you know, people like yourself, and I, you know, like I said, big fan of what you do, but we’d never met in person. So and same with, same with some of the other people I was talking to Vernon Francois that night as well. He was actually, you know, and I, you know, he’s doing great things. And I didn’t know he was English, you know. I, you know, he’s built this whole thing in America. And when he started talking, I was like, why have you got an English accent, you know? And, you know, so it was, it was great. There were people, I’ve followed their work, but never met them in person. So it was a nice, very nice project, yeah,

Chris Baran 18:28
yeah. And I had to take my hat off, because not only does it pay tribute to just cut. I don’t know if anybody knows about here, but I have my my setup here so that we use whatsapp and we can go back and forth. And he just wrote in there, and he says he can’t hear your Canadian accent. And I went, Well, I haven’t said you Hoser yet. That’s probably why

Mark Woolley 18:54
the Commonwealth and having having spent the time in Canada, I do as well. It’s really interesting, because different different accents, you know the I mean, I can, I could now tell a Canadian accent from an American accent. But I think when, when people come to the UK as tourists, you know, and they’re asking for directions in London, you know, people do assume if some, you know, somebody’s from Canada, they’re American, and when I’m in the States, I if I’m on the East Coast, people never question my accent. They’re like, Oh, he’s English. When I’m on the West Coast, a lot of people ask me if I’m from Australia, yeah, yeah, yeah. If I get into an Uber they’ll say, oh, which part of Australia from and I guess the accent is similar, you know.

Chris Baran 19:44
Well, yeah, unless you know it. I mean, you know you and I both have very good Australian friends and UK friends. And you can know I tell you a funny story. I was just an Ace Hardware The other day, and this girl came up and talked to me, and I just said something. African, right? And she went, Yeah. He said, You’re the only person that hasn’t said that I was Australian and but they’re very distinct when you know them. But yeah, it’s I just, first of all, just want to say thank you for what you did in there. Because, you know, I think number one, and I’m going to say this as I can pinpoint people pretty good. And I love your humility in what you do and how humble you are in this venture that you’re on, that we call success. But what I what I also do think, is what’s so nice in our industry, because you talk about how we get equated to chefs or other people, or sometimes people don’t see our industry as as high up as we know that it is and has the opportunity to be and and the thing that I loved about what you’re doing is, and I gotta admit, I felt validated, you know, to be on that list I mark there was when, when I got that email that said we’re on there. And I just, I had to look around. Said, do they really know who I am? You know, do people on there like me? And they just said, Well, I’m suffering from imposter syndromes. Are people going to know one day that I’m really not that good at anything? And I don’t know if when you run into people, if you get that, but what I do say is, I just want to say thank you for what you did on that. Because anybody that’s in any one of those pictures, you know, and you know there’s hundreds and hundreds of people that are on those pictures, but yet, that little piece of you being on that, and that whole thing saying what it says, it does give each and every one of those person validity to what they do and everything that they put into their career. So for that, thank you. Well,

Mark Woolley 21:49
no, thank you, Chris, for being on it. You know, I think similarly, when you write to those people, you know you got your list, and then you write to them, and you know you’re aware of what they’ve done and what they’ve achieved is we have got some big achievers in our industry, and everyone was very happy about it when we wrote to them. There wasn’t anybody that was, you know, not happy. You know, everyone it was. It felt like a nice community of people, yeah,

Chris Baran 22:20
yeah, no, and they are. And so I want to chat just a bit more on the charity that you went to. Could you tell us a little bit about what the charity and where did that? Where did, how did that start up, and and even more, so you contributed all the proceeds from that to that charity, and what, what was it like when you went to them and gave them, you know, this check, this money, whatever that was, yeah.

Mark Woolley 22:44
Well, the the we’ve kind of got an ongoing relationship with a couple of charities. And it’s charities a funny thing, because there, I think there are a lot of charities now that are, like big corporate machines, aren’t they, you know, and there’s in the UK, we’ve, we’d aligned ourselves with the hair and beauty charity, so part of the money we raised in the UK was, was for them. And that’s, that’s interesting. It would be interesting to see somebody set one of those up in America, because it’s like a Benevolent Fund. And it’s four hairdressers that have fallen on hard times, and they it’s ran, it’s run by a lady you probably know her, called Jane Lewis, or who Jane is the publisher of hairdressers. She she runs the British hairdressing awards and Salon International, and she is the president of this charity. And basically, they collect money in all sorts of different ways. They’ll, you know, some salons will do days where they’ll donate a day’s taken from the salon. And you know, there’s other initiatives they run throughout the year and fundraising events. But ultimately, the front there that looks after hairdressers. And, you know, we, we had a guy quite a few years ago now, in one of our salons, and he just dropped down dead with a heart attack when he was 40. No, no signs of that happening, ill health or anything, but just, you know, and this Benevolent Fund were very good with his family, and very good, you know, there’s been other scenarios, you know, where, when maybe I could, I could think of one where there was a couple that owned a salon, and both of them died in an accident, they were looking after the fund. Was looking after their kids, and just a very good thing so that they that was the first one. It was the British hair and beauty charity, which is like a Benevolent Fund for hairdressers. And then the other one we work with, and it’s an ongoing thing. They’re called Center Park. Point. And they operate all over the world, but they started here in the UK, and they basically take homeless kids and they put them into apprenticeships and jobs. They’ve got a criteria the Amy Young, you know, under 30s, and people that have maybe only been living on the streets for 12 months or so, and have put them into an apprenticeship. And, you know, we mentioned chefs earlier, some of the success stories in London, these kids have gone and become an assistant chef or an apprentice chef. And there’s a couple of the big name chefs in London that have come through that system. So it resonated with me that I just thought, what a great thing, you know, you homelessness is a growing thing all over the world. You know, it’s, you know, it’s a different games of what it was 20 years ago. And, you know, certainly in the UK, it exists in every town, and I see it a little bit in the States as well. And, you know, to global things. So I think those those schemes that get people out of that situation and get them into job, I could quite, you know, that resonated with some of us are electric, so we do a couple of things throughout the year for that charity. And some of them have been artworks and but, you know, I think art something I’m always going to do, you know, I was going to, you know, the collar, the collage thing, it’s quite good because it captures the space in time with people that are doing things, yeah,

Chris Baran 26:45
and then, you know, I want to do, I want to, I want to take a little shift here, and I want to go back full circle, and I want to get a little bit more of of your hair story and how you got into it. But just before I jump back into that, if people want to get or want to see, and if Is there any of the either the Canadian or the, I think you said that the US ones are sold out, not the US, the UK ones, but if anybody wants to either see or purchase either the the the American ones or the Canadian ones, how would they, how would they do that? Yeah,

Mark Woolley 27:22
well, we, there are still the US. One is not far off being sold out. I think, I think there’s only about six of them left, you know, out of the, out of the whole edition and but there’s still, yeah, my the the art website is my surname. So wooly, which W, double O, Double L, E, y, dot art. So wooly dot art is art. And there is a whole section on there saying legends. And you know, it’s that, you know they’re on there. But yeah, I think I’m looking forward to this year that some of the traveling I’ll do to the US and attending some of the shows, I know we’re going to display the US one at some of the shows, and I think it’ll probably some of the conversations I’ve had. It’ll probably lead to us having an annual event in America, yeah, just to say. And then, you know, someone said to me, Hey, well, every year, why don’t you have a party for everyone who was in the original one? And you know, maybe a group of people induct five new people every year or something. You know, the great thing with our industry, it’s always moving, and then every five years, we’ll produce another artwork. You know, everything could get bigger because, you know, no one has to come off it. You know, it’s, you know, the people that are on it are on it. They are legends, but there’s, you know, there’s people, yeah, so, so it might be one of those things that fills an entire room one day, but I quite like the idea that some, somebody just threw that in at one of the events and said, Why don’t you do that? And I thought, actually, we could, we could do, yeah, you know, so who knows. But I love the community. I love that, yeah, so that you know they’re there, and we’ll, you know, maybe every five years will produce another one. Love

Chris Baran 29:35
it. So let’s, let’s take a full spin back. And I want to go back to whatever that 1415, 1720, year old kid that just made this decision to go into hair. So give us a little bit of the hair story, like, how did hair transpire? How did you get into it, and what was the journey like along the way? Well,

Mark Woolley 29:53
I didn’t grow up in London. I grew up in the north of England, in a county. Old Yorkshire and and, you know, so the big cities in Yorkshire and Leeds and and York. So I grew up quite near, near to York. And there was the big, kind of famous hairdressing company up there was this group called sacks. They had a salon in London, that most of the sounds were up in the north, and had a great training school. And I was aware of these guys all the time I was growing up, you know, and they and as a kid, I used to go and get my hair cut wherever my mum went or my dad went, you know, one of them would take me along as a kid. And when you get to, I don’t know, when you’re 12 or 13, you start taking a picture in and how you what you want to look like, don’t you, you know. So I’ve gone into the barber where my dad’s gone, you know, the picture, you know, it could have been anyone, sports person, rock star, you know, whatever. And I’ve given this picture that cut my hair, and it would never look anything like the picture, you know. And the guy would say, Well, I said, it doesn’t look like this, you know. And he’d say to me, Well, you know, you’re not very good looking, and you’ve got ginger hair, and you know, and you know, and this, that and the other. So I went, I remember, for a few years, I went away thinking it’s impossible to have a haircu that is the same as the picture you take in. Anyway, one day I’ve gone and got my hair cut this salon sacks. And I think some guys I knew at school went there, and I’d, I’d, I remember asking my parents if I could go there, and it was, it was double the price of where they went. And I think for whatever reason. They said, Okay, you can go. So when took my picture in this guy cut my hair, and it didn’t seem much older than me. This guy was maybe in his early 20s, and I might have been at 15 or something, and he cut my hair, and it looked, it looked like the picture, you know. And it was a combination of the haircut, the products and that, you know. And I remember thinking, wow, this, this guy must be a lot better than the other places a bit, you know, really, anyway, the next few weeks, I’ve gone back into school, and everybody commented on this haircut. To school, teachers, family, friends, everybody said, Oh, wow, Mark. You know, what a great haircut. You You look older. You look, you know, you look more sophisticated, you know, all the things you want to hear when you’re a young guy. So I remember at the back of my mind thinking a haircut is a powerful thing. And I think I was always a creative person, you know, and I was always into things that were artistic, creative. And I just had this appreciation for haircuts. I remember thinking, Wow, that guy must be very good at it. Anyway. I, I then went back and he, this guy became my regular hairdresser. And then roll forward 12 months, you know, in the UK, this is where I know in our reputation in America is we all like drinking and stuff like that, the British people, you know, but in the UK, the legal drinking age is 18, and, but most people you know, start having a few beers over the park with their friends when they’re 15 or 16 or that, You know. And, or if you’re Canadian, yeah, you try and you try and sneak into pubs and things. And I remember going on a date with this girl who was a year older than me, and she one of the things she asked me was, Can you, can you get into a pub without being thrown out, you know, without being without having your ID, you know, shown. And so I confidently, I said to her, Yes, I can. I’m very good at that, you know. In reality, I’ve never been into a pub without my parents, you know. So anyway, we’ve gone into this pub, and I was convinced I was going to get thrown out any any moment. Anyway, I’ve got a ordered a drink. The guy’s giving me and this girl a drink. So I’m thinking, right, doing well, here I’m with a girl who’s a year older than me. I’m in a pub. I’ve been served a drink, and I could see this girl was thinking, Oh, he’s good. This guy sophisticated, you know, I’ve looked over the room, and here’s this guy that cuts my hair. You know, this this new found respect I’ve got for hairdressers. And here’s this guy and a couple of other people that work at the salon. So I said to this girl, I said, oh, there’s some friends of mine over there. Said that he’s a good friend of mine. He’s a hair stylist at Sachs, you know. You know, you’ve heard of sacks, you know? Yes, you know. So I’ve gone over started talking to him to show that I knew some people in this pub and in during the course of that conversation, I said to him, I think I’d like to be a hairdresser, you know. And I don’t think I’d ever thought about it until that moment, but I remember it was obviously in the subconscious, because I was, I was so impressed with that. Good. This guy was at cutting hair. Anyway. He said to me, have you got a pair of black trousers and a white shirt? And I said, Yes, yes, I have it. Was what I didn’t tell him is, it was part of my school uniform. They were my black trousers and my white shirt. But so I’ve put on this black trousers and the white shirt, and I’ve gone into the salon the next day, said, Look, come in. You’ll be sweeping up and making coffee. Said, but you’ll know if you if you like the vibe, if you like the you know, the anyway, sure enough, I went in there, and within those weeks, somewhere, soon after going in there, I made the decision, that’s what I wanted to do. And the the two guys, Dennis and Malcolm, that were the founders of sax, they are real unsung heroes in the UK, because there were great hairdressers, you know. They both come out of the Sassoon camp. One of them was, was, was was was more down that route, you know. And he was traveling here, there and everywhere, doing, doing hair stuff. The other guy was a very, very good business person, and they built, and he was a good hairdresser as well. But, you know, one focused on one thing, and the other focused on the other. And they just built an army of people like me that I think had they not met them, probably wouldn’t have become hairdressers. You know, I because I didn’t know anybody that did that. And I think had this guy not cut my hair, I probably maybe wouldn’t have thought about it too much. Wow. Anyway, ended up in there, and I just found I loved it. I got strained and really enjoying the hair. And in the UK, you do an apprenticeship, which I really believe in. I think, you know, you at school, you at 16, you can go and do an apprenticeship. And you kind of finish high school. You can see you still have to do maths and English and, you know, all that stuff. So you finish high school. But instead of doing some of the other subjects you might not want to do, you know, you’re doing hair, and you, you know, it’s not like going to Beauty School, and you’re around other people that are passionate about doing it, and you’re learning off them and and so I was in this amazing environment, and I was doing, I was up there for three or four years, and that my then girlfriend, she got a place studying fashion at Central Saint Martins in London. And my ambition was to live and work in in London. And two things happened to me that year. I was I was 18, and my girlfriend got placed at Central Saint Martins, and she was the same year as Stella McCartney. She was two years below Alexander McQueen. You know, all the people went there. So that was instrumental in my career. And the other thing is that that year, I went on holiday to France and on a skiing holiday with my friends from school. So we’re all drinking beer and skiing and, you know, all that stuff. And I’m looking at the queue for the ski lift at the line. And here’s Anthony muscolo, you know, at that time, probably the most famous hairdresser in the UK. And I’ve never met him, but he, you know, he was like, the, you know, he was the guy. So I’ve wandered up to Anthony after having a few drinks, and said, Oh, wow. You know Anthony muscolo, I’m a young trainee hairdresser, you know, from the north of England, and met him, and he, you know, he’s introduced me to pat his wife and his kids, and we’re talking away. And he said to me, Look, next time you’re in London, call me. This is, this is, I’m telling you this. I know this is a long answer, but I’m telling you this story because it links into what we’re saying about people helping each other. So he said, When you’re in London, come to my studio, ring me, call me, you know, and we’ll and, you know, I’ll show you around. And so I said, Oh, my girlfriend is moving to London. She’s, she’s studying at Central Saint Martins, and I’m going to move down there as well, but I was sort of lined up to do it the following year. So sure enough, I knocked on his door one day, and you know, he gave me the time, took me up in his studio. He was in the middle of doing a shoot, started introducing me to all of his people he was working with. And, you know, I sort of, I met him that was pretty instrumental. And also meeting the people that were studying at Central Saint Martins got me into session work. Because, you know, that point, I’d only worked in a salon behind the chair, and people started saying to me, Oh, can you come and do the hair on a photo shoot. I’d never done that before, but I thought watched Anthony do it,

you know, I went along and started off doing that, and then I started working quite a lot with Anthony and learning from him, and that those two things were instrumental. It was, it was meeting in on a ski holiday. In France. And, you know, I was, I think I was 18, but we, you know, we’re having a few beers and skiing and, you know, so that was a chance meeting. The other thing was meeting Malcolm and Dennis, who had started sacks, and I think I learned a lot from them in the beginning, and that that’s what got me going.

Chris Baran 40:22
I bet we have something in common. I have this love hate relationship. I hate paying for something that I’m not using. I hate working in a small, cramped box, yet, I love working in a cool salon that impresses my clients, and I love the culture and synergy of a team while enjoying the freedom of being my own boss. You too. What if all that was available to you at the salon you rent from meet artist on go, a game changing way to rent salon space with artist on go, you only pay for the time you’re behind the chair. You can choose a salon that fits your vibe, location and amenities with artist on go, you’re a part of a stylist community, not hustling alone. Plus, you get to enjoy perks like clean towels and back bar supplies. Check out artist on go, built for stylists serious about their clients and growing their brand without the hassles of managing a space. Here’s the kicker, you can save more than 50% on your rent to find out more. Go to B, I T, dot L y slash. Artist on go, C, B, that’s B, I T, dot, l, y, slash, artist, on, go, C, B, yeah, so did that all? Excuse me. Did that all help with the business side and the artistic side of electric, because, let’s face it, you’ve got you literally won the business thinker award for electric, because it’s not just the salon you were thinking. Did you think brand straight off the bat and in the business sense, or did that all just happen, one after the other, not

Mark Woolley 42:22
brand. I think I knew I was going to open my own salon and own my own business, and I knew that. And I think one of the decisions, one of the decision making processes, was I could see hairdressing as an opportunity to own your own salon. And I thought, well, that would be great, you know, you know can so I’ve always, I’ve always been as excited about the business side, and sometimes, you know, this is more in the UK, I think. But here people are told you look you’re creative, so you’re over there, and you’re a business person, so you’re over there, yeah, and I don’t know why they do that, because they don’t do that with other industries. They don’t do that with restauranteurs. They don’t do that with musicians. They don’t do that with fashion designers. They don’t do that with design, graphic designers and people who invent drinks brands, and you know, they are creative people who enjoy entrepreneurship. Because I, you know, I think when you when you think of the word business, I’ve never worked in an office businesses, it’s just people, isn’t it? You know that Yeah, I think it was a conscious decision that electric was a brand, not a person, right? I’ve got a good story about that as well. Actually, that that, I’ll, I’ll tell you about a good, good story for anyone thinking about how they might brand their salon or but I you know, it was a conscious decision. It was a it was a brand, because then we could be a group of us. And, you know, lots of, lots of people are successful calling it their own name, aren’t they, you know, Trevor sorbe, Lee Clark, John fried, you know, the and that that great that suited them. And they’ve, they’ve, but I think for me, where I’d worked for a brand sax, you know, and when we were working as the sax art team, it felt natural to say we and us. And because sometimes when I’m talking to magazines and being interviewed, and they say, when we’re talking about electric, I would say, Well, we did this, we did that. They say, Well, who’s we have? You got a load of business partners. And, you know, as I would say, No, but, but, you know, we are a team. You know, we are, you know, and I feel comfortable it being a, you know, to probably just where I started, you know, working for a company. Yeah. Yeah, but I’ll give you quickly. I’ll give I’ll give you a good story in that when I, when I was leaving sacks, it was, you know, I’ve been with them a long time. I owned my own businesses within the sax group. You know, they were, I own my own salons and but I was employed by them as well. So I used to go down round to the salons, doing demos and seminars and, you know, and stuff like that. And when I was leaving, it was quite it was news in the industry, and people were talking about it. And Trevor saw me, said to me, he phoned me up one day and said, Look, I just want to say I really support what you’re doing, he said. And I, he said, I understand why you’re doing it, you you know? He said, It happened to me. It’s so soon I just thought I needed to do it myself, and it was my time. And he said, If you ever need anything for me, you know? And he said, but I’d really like to, I’d like to meet you and have a drink and talk about what your thoughts are. So I just had all of the branding design finished off for electric. And I was having a drink with Trevor in a hotel called Claridge’s in central London, and in it is Gordon Ramsay’s restaurant, where he has all the Michelin stars, you know, and the so it’s just called Gordon Ramsay. The restaurant doesn’t have a name. And sat in the lobby having a drink. And out of the envelope I pulled the design work for the electric brand, which, you know, we designed it to look British. It’s got a crest and, you know, it’s got electric and the word London underneath it, you know. And I thought, He’s gonna really like this. And I showed it to him, and I saw his face drop, and I said to him, I thought, Oh, shit, he doesn’t like it, you know. So I said, I said, Oh, do you think do you like it, you know? No. And he said, Well, can I be honest? He said, No, he said, he said, electric. He said, What sort of name is that? He said, He surely, you’re going to call it Mark Woolley. And I said, Well, now I was going to, I was going to call it electric. And he went, oh no. He said, I don’t like that at all. He said, who’d, who’d want electric hair, you know, like static, you know? He said, So I remember, I mean, good on Trevor, who’s so honest, you know. And so I put this thing back in the envelope, and I’m walking home in the rain, probably, and thinking, maybe I’ve got this very wrong. And maybe the next day, I was working with Anthony, and I was telling him the story, and I showed it to him, and he said, Oh no, this is right. He said that what Trevor’s doing is right for him. You’re and I think Anthony always felt like he was a team person, because Tony and guy were his two brothers, and he was one of four brothers in the business, and so he was always part of a team, you know. And I was at Sachs, you know, felt more natural anyway. So that story, I’ve told it a lot over the years. And couple of years ago, I was away on a L’Oreal trip somewhere, and Trevor and his wife were there, and I was telling the story at the table. He was, he was sat next door, but wanted me, and so at the time, he was saying, I never said I didn’t like it, you know. So who’s whose version of the story was the same as mine, apart from he said, I didn’t say I didn’t like it. I said, You did, you know, you know. So we kind of, it’s like that story of when the Beatles they met their hero in Elvis, you know, they only ever met him once. He was their hero. They only ever met him once. And all four of them had a different version of where they were, whether they were stood up or sat down, and what Elvis said, you know, and you know all of that stuff. So anyway, I thought I’ll throw that story in, because that, you know, lots of people now are starting brands, and you know, anyone opening their salon or starting anything where they’re gonna, you know, is the brand then, is it their name or is it a thing? I don’t think there’s any right or

Chris Baran 49:19
wrong. No, and I agree with you. I think that whatever you do, but here’s always the thing that I say and just I these are things that I didn’t know. I didn’t know way back when I do now, because I’m involved with franchise business and business as a whole and so on. But the one thing that I do know is it’s easier to sell a business, because everybody should always think about, what’s my How am I getting in and how am I getting out? So you got to plan your end game as well as you’re getting into it. And they say, I have business partners that say, the soon as you start a business, you got to think about, as soon as you’re starting it, how can you sell it later on, down the road and scale it, etc, and it’s easier to sell something that doesn’t have the. Initial like, if Apple can sell Apple really easily, but if it would have been called Steve Jobs, it would be harder to sell. So that’s what that’s the kind of the tack that I always think on, that some of my business coaches have told me. So I but I wanted, we’ve talked about your brand, and I want to go jump, jump a little bit more into because you’re it’s more than just a salon now. And you have, you’ve got electric space, and you’ve got electric studio, and you have electric electric product line, etc. How did those all start off? And obviously you started with the salon, yeah. So tell us a bit about what space, etc.

Mark Woolley 50:41
One thing led to another. And I think so when I, when I, when I left sax, I already had five salons that were owned by me, but they were called sacks, or they were a franchise, you know. So I was then employed separately by them as well, to represent the brand. And we had a, I mean, we’re still great friends. Now, sadly, one of them, Malcolm, died a few years ago, but Dennis, the other one is, you know, alive. And I, you know, and I, you know, we’re all good friends, you know, but it was when I came, when it came to the time to start electric. I already owned my my salon. So two of them I had. I own the buildings that the salons were in. I’ve managed to buy the building. And then three of them, I didn’t. So the franchise agreement is, you know, you got to set if you got a lease, you got to sell the lease back to them on your way out. So three of my salons I had to sell, and it left me with two of two salons, one in Brighton, one in reading. And so I rebranded them both at the same time, but I’m mainly based in London. You know, I live half the time in London, half the time down here at Falmouth court, and I’ve always worked in London. My clientele is there, but Brighton and reading, which were the two readings a city that’s just west of London, next to Heathrow Airport, and Brighton is an hour outside London on the south coast. So it took me about a year to try and find a site in London. So I when, when I launched electric, it was three salons, and I already owned my own studio, and I already had the word electric in my mind. So I’d, two years earlier, before I rebranded the salons, I’d I called the studio, the electric studio, and I had my own grave tea I was doing, you know, I’ve always done a lot of session work throughout my career as well. So I had my own art team that are based there in the studio. And where the word electric came from. This is what I was saying to Trevor. I always felt that the difference with my sack salons, that I owned, the difference between them and the other sack salons, was we had this great atmosphere in them. You know, where not that the others didn’t, but we we worked hard at that. We wanted people to have a good time when we’re in there. All of my salons have got a license bar in them as a general drinking theme here, isn’t there? But, yeah, there’s all got a license bar in them. You know, music’s very important to us, good music, and you know, there’s a whole curation process to that, but good hair so that, when I started electric, I thought, right, when a client comes in, they’re going to meet somebody really accomplished. They’re going to meet somebody who, yesterday, they were doing a Vogue cover, or they were doing a runway show, or they were doing a, you know, something great, but today they’ve got you in the chair, and they’re going to make you look and feel great. And that was, and I thought, well, if all that’s happening, if the music’s great, the coffee’s great, you can have a glass of wine that, you know, the person you meet behind the desk is amazing, and, you know, all these people are ambitious and positive, then the atmosphere in the salon will be electric. And that’s where the word so it was never, I was never designing a brand. I never really thought at the time all that we’ll do a product line. But it was at the time I thought I will open a great salon in London called Electric. And then, as it happened, I branded two existing ones first, and then, a year later, opened in Marley, Baran High Street in central London. So there were these. There were these three sounds I understood, operate more than one salon, through years of being at Saks, then the product thing, I’ve had a very close relationship with L’Oreal. But all of all of my career, you know, start sacks out. A big contract with L’Oreal so when I left, I they took me on as a an artist, assigned me as an artist and a an ambassador. You know, a lot of work with kerastas for a lot of years. And I met some of the chemists I met. So I was, I got one of the chemists I met in France was an English guy, and he was from a similar place to me, in the north of England. So we, you know, got talking to him in Paris, and I was, I was saying to him that the thing with hair products and using them on shoots, a lot of them so heavy, you know, you and he had a piece of technology that they use in skin care to evaporate residue, you know, when you rub like a face cream on the skin will absorb 50% of it, and then the other 50% evaporates. So if your skin is left feeling oily, you think, Oh, that’s a good quality product. My skin’s absorbed it all, but in reality, some of it’s evaporate. So he was telling me how to do that with skincare. And I said, Well, someone should do that with hair care, because, you know, half the time you’re promoting a product and you’re being told to use it, but half the time it’s less than the time you’ve got to work on it in front of the camera, because it’s weighing it down. So he helped me design a smoothing cream. And again, still wasn’t thinking about doing a product line. We just he helped me design a smoothing cream. Became very good friends with him. The smoothing cream was a big success. We only sold it in our salon, but we used to have other hairdressers coming to buy it, you know, from the salon. And I seeded it with a load of other session people. And this is 20 years ago. And then I told him that I liked the Bumble and Bumble prep spray I used. It was one of the things I used to use a lot. And I said, but the only thing is, I said, that doesn’t evaporate, but it’s liquid. I said, Imagine if you could make the liquid evaporate. He said, no problem. You know, same, same idea. So we made a prep spray where all the residue evaporated. So it was very good for people with fine hair, you know. And it worked as a conditioner as well. So those people who don’t want conditioner on the hair because they think it’s going to make it flat. We made a conditioner that. So we had these two quite unique products. And you know, this ingredient we use, we actually, we list it on our bottle as one ingredient, but it’s actually two ingredients. And to my knowledge, it still isn’t used in hair care anywhere, and we, so we the whole vibe with electric is we’ve designed a range of styling products for session hairdressers that evaporate on the hair, the products, you know, they’re now, that is the biggest part of our business, you know, we, you know, we sell it here in Europe and North America as well. And the unique thing is we manufacture it ourselves. We’ve got a farm here. You know, where we produce we source all of the ingredients ourselves. We you know, we grow some of the ingredients ourselves. And you know, we’ve been making products properly, I would say, for about 16 years, you know, and I’ve taken inspiration from I love what Michael Gordon did with Bumble I love what horse did with evader. I never met. He’s one of the guys. I really wish I could have met him before he died, but he, I think the product visionaries to me, Michael Gordon, Horst, Jerry reading, the Molo family, you know, there’s been people that have created things that, you know, I think the Sebastian thing was amazing, you know, in its in its time, and so I’ve Just, I’ve always loved products. So that was my natural progression, I think. And then the other things, I mean, electric space, I guess, was born out of everything, everything we did, because we already own the studio, separately and with salons, and we just put all that under one roof and made it a big creative space. Again, it’s got, it’s got a bar. So, you know, I’d really, I’d love, I’d love for you to come over Chris, because, Oh,

Chris Baran 59:10
I’d love it. And we’re talking about drinking so much, I know we can be friends.

Mark Woolley 59:14
So yeah, 100% it’s a shame. It’s a shame we’re a few 1000 miles away and I’ve only got a bottle of water.

Chris Baran 59:20
Well, I just, I’ve got my tea here because it’s the morning, but getting to the mid half, but yep, with your water and my tea, cheers. And here’s getting together. It’ll be fun. I love that.

Mark Woolley 59:31
Well, I was doing a Zoom meeting one day with a distributor in the US. And obviously everyone I meet, the reputation of the English and the Irish is a you guys like drinking. And one day we’re having a Zoom meeting like this, and I had a bottle of water, but it, you know, it was in a was in a glass bottle. There’s a brand of water here called Blue, the B, B, l, u, and they’re in glass bottles. So I picked up that one there in a meetings. Had a drink, and the guy leaned into the camera, he said, Mark, is that vodka? He went because it’s 11 o’clock in the morning. I was like, No, it’s not vodka. It’s just in a glass bottle, you know.

Chris Baran 1:00:12
But now you know that you could say, with that, with anything, I should have this, I can have this cup here, and as long as I’m doing this cupping the glass, and then I can go, I could have as much red wine or beer in here as you’d still think I was drinking tea. So for you, everybody knows it

Mark Woolley 1:00:29
well, I know, I know it’s obviously red wine. Now you said that, but you know, when you see musicians playing live, you know they often come on stage with a mug like you, like a mug, and it mug of tea. And I was thought, I wonder if that’s like booze hidden in there. But so I worked with Roger Waters from Pink Floyd and see he, you know, and I was on his tour this year. He walks on with a mug like this. And I said to him, I said, What’s in there? And he said, Oh, it’s lemon and honey. To kind of, you know, vocal chord thing, you know, like a solution for, you know, not, not ruining your vocal chords when you’re singing. There’s a thing we’ve learned today, but

Chris Baran 1:01:19
an old, but an old, he won’t let you smell what’s in it, though, probably I’ll tell you a funny story of good I’m not sure if you, if you remember Brian Smith, Brian and Sandra. There they were on your on your

Mark Woolley 1:01:32
bill. I know, I know Brian and Sandra really well,

Chris Baran 1:01:35
yeah. And he was one of my best mates. And he always tells because, you know he, he’s a he and Nazareth were best buds. And he always tells the story about, I’ll leave the one out, who had happened to but he, you know, he’s, he’s playing away. And so if you’re listening now, I imagine he’s playing away on his guitar, and he’s poking at his ear to the roadie and saying, you know, when he’s telling him my guitar doesn’t work. So the roadies running around, and he’s, you know, he’s checking out equipment and and and doing everything, and nothing is working. So finally he looks back at him, and he goes up to him and imagine when he strumming away. And finally, the road he took his hand and pushed it on the strings of the guitar, and he wasn’t even hitting. He was so drunk he wasn’t even hitting the strings of the guitar. I guess, I guess Pete, at the end of it, he came, went out, and he went walking off, and he just bought him one right in the chops when he got off the stage. But it’s those funny stories, it’s that kind of stuff that makes road the fun.

Mark Woolley 1:02:40
Yeah, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Chris Baran 1:02:43
Was there any, was there any wild stories, like, when you were teaching or whatever, like, did you do pranks or or try to catch one another at stuff? Or understanding that right now, it’s not like the same as when we’re on the road in the and I’m just gonna say, I’ll leave it at the 80s. In the 80s and 90s, when you could do you was more full rein, that you could put jokes on one another and so on. But

Mark Woolley 1:03:05
the world’s all got serious, doesn’t it, since then, you know, I mean, we that, what are some of the best times I’ve had some of the best laughs I’ve had with it, you know? And we’ve got electric a lot of people have been there for a long time when, you know, so at these salons, then we brought out these products, you know, and, and the good thing with our products, we’ve always, our main customers are other hairdressers, you know, it’s always been a professional line. So when we started doing the exhibitions in Europe, you know, like Cosmo profit belonged here, and stuff like that. I bought a, I bought an old VW camper van, and I had it restored and branded electric, and then I hadn’t. And we used to hire another like RV type thing, and we would drive from London down to northern Italy, you know. So you get, you kind of do the length of France, and you go through the Mont Blanc tunnel. And we’d always, we’d make about 10 days of this trip, and we’d go to and it was about, I think there was probably eight of us traveling, and all like minded people all liked having a good time. And so when we got there cosmopol, they would, they would book us as an artistic team to do a show, and then we would have a booth, you know. So we’d be there working on the booth, but we’d be out every night. We’d have a couple of days skiing on the way down there, you know, it would be carnage, you know, really, it would be like a band on tour. And, I mean, so we used to go there, and everyone remembered us. You know, we had this branded van, and you know, it was how we put ourselves on the on the map, and we drive the van in, and it was part of our booth. You. Then we’d build this thing, and then on that night, we’d be doing a show, and I don’t know, the Sassoon art team had arrived in a chauffeur driven car, and they’d just walk onto stage. We’d be there building our stand to sell the products the next day, get changed out of our overalls into our stage gear, go and do a show with all the models and everything. And then we’d be straight in the pub. And there was this Irish bar in in Bologna where everybody, you know, from all the other brands were there, and really good times one one year we we pulled up, and it’s probably the biggest show in the world. All these, all these big halls full of full of boots, and we saw an electrical generator box with a with a hole for a hookup, you know, like an RV hookup. One of the guys jumped down said, I’m going to plug into that, and then at least we’ll have some power while, whilst we camp in this in this RV overnight. So he pulled out the the jack that was there, and about four of these halls, all the lights went off, you know, all of that. But it didn’t stop him plugging our RV finger and, you know, and having power for the night. So, I mean, they were some of the best times on the road. Oh, yeah. And, you know, we’d go on stage like we’d arrived in a chauffeur driven car. But actually it was eight labs in an RV. They built the booth, and, you know, and so they were brilliant times. And, yeah, you know, I think they’re you bond building with your team, and it’s where you, you know, you’re getting the company off the ground, and you’re doing what you love, and you, you know, you’re having a good time doing it. And that is

Chris Baran 1:06:42
the, that is literally the, what I’d say, the quintessential part of of your history, you know, is all those good times you had when, when nobody’s rolling in money. It’s just, you know, you had to do what you had to do, and you made it work. And you had good laughs, some good times. I even remember when first starting off, when we started our business, well, I was still working for somebody at the time, and, and my wife, Rita, and I had, we had no money whatsoever, and, and I just remember some of the friends we had, we had to make our own booze. We won’t go into a lot of that, but that was some of the best times in our life, you know. And I still cherish those memories, you know, without money I could

Mark Woolley 1:07:27
imagine, you know, you you obviously speak to a lot of people, and you know, you’re learning a lot about lots of different people, but a lot of the people I’ve spoke to over the years that have certainly, they’ve built businesses. The good times have been when it’s it’s been tight, you know? And I mean, they were, they were times for us where we certainly weren’t making a lot of money, but we were any money we did have, we were investing it in trying to get the thing off the ground. And, you know, it’s funny, because before the COVID thing came along, I was thinking, Oh, this is great. Everything felt like it was doing quite well. And it was, it was, you know, upward only. And then COVID really ripped the heart out of it for us. I mean, the UK, the salons in total, were closed for eight and a half months. And it really, it’s taken all this time to recover. And, you know, it did go a bit like this, you know. And you’ve just got to, you know, I think, find it in, in yourself again. And for me, some of it was returning back to those times and keeping things simple again. But having a enjoy, you know, as long as you keep enjoying it, you know, I think that doesn’t seem stressful, or, you know, as long as you enjoy what you do, yeah,

Chris Baran 1:08:48
do the still do the good times outweigh the bad? And that’s always, I think, the surefire way of measuring, though, Mr. Woolley, and that’s the last time in my life I’m ever going to call you that. It’ll be mark from here on in. But, I mean, it has been such a joy, but we’re at that rapid fire part of of our session. So right? I’m gonna throw out a series of questions. First things that come to your brain? Yeah, what turns you on in the creative process?

Mark Woolley 1:09:19
Sharing it the most important part of the creative process.

Chris Baran 1:09:24
Yeah, and what stifles creativity for you

Mark Woolley 1:09:28
being bogged down with other things.

Chris Baran 1:09:33
What’s the thing that you love most in life,

Mark Woolley 1:09:38
music, the thing

Chris Baran 1:09:40
you dislike in life the most.

Mark Woolley 1:09:47
No, I’ve been any money. Exactly.

Chris Baran 1:09:51
I’ve had, I always said, I’ve had, I’ve had lots and I’ve had none. I like adding lots better. Yeah, my line is I always say I’d sooner be i. A sooner be crying in my Porsche than laughing on a bicycle, a person. And I think I know this one already, I’m gonna ask one more. First, the thing that you love most about our industry,

Mark Woolley 1:10:14
the people and the ability to learn off each other.

Chris Baran 1:10:23
Dislike the most about our industry.

Mark Woolley 1:10:27
There isn’t anything I really dislike. You know, I know that sounds cliche, but I can’t think of anything where I think, oh yeah, I can’t. I can’t. I honestly can’t think of anything that dislikes, that isn’t a diplomatic that isn’t a diplomatic answer either. Because, you know, there are things, you know, I guess every day we think, I wish this wasn’t happening, and I wish that wasn’t happening, but, you know, that’s in any walk of life, isn’t it? But our industry is a thing, I think is a great thing, yeah,

Chris Baran 1:11:02
person that you’d that you admire the most.

Mark Woolley 1:11:11
There are lots of them. You know, there are lots of them. And there’s a difference between admiring people you’ve never met, like Muhammad Ali or John Lennon, you know. And the people that you have met, and you know someone like Anthony I hold up there is like one of the all rounders, you know that. And you know some of that is because of the impact he’s had with the things I’ve learned from him. Yeah, yeah.

Chris Baran 1:11:46
The your most prized possession,

Mark Woolley 1:11:54
possession,

this is where you gotta remind yourself, people aren’t possessions. But i i It’s probably where I am now found the court. I think, I think I was meant to be. I mean, it’s a very old place. I was meant but I was meant to be here at some point, and I was meant my family were meant to grow up here. You know, which, which they have, and it’s, it’s our home. You know, love

Chris Baran 1:12:30
it. Next time we have you on here, I want to talk a little more about that, the person that you wish you could meet. I uh,

Mark Woolley 1:12:43
Muhammad Ali or John Lennon. Bit tricky now though, yeah,

Chris Baran 1:12:47
something, yeah, some something, people don’t know about you.

Mark Woolley 1:12:54
Well, I used to say, Oh, I paint, but now people do know that I don’t know about me. I played a guitar. Oh,

Chris Baran 1:13:09
okay, if you had you were saying snap of the fingers. You got a month off. Where would you go? What would you do?

Mark Woolley 1:13:20
I would go to Africa because it’s a place. I’ve been to certain countries in Africa, but I haven’t seen a lot. It’s the one continent I haven’t seen a lot of I’ve gone see some places I haven’t seen

Chris Baran 1:13:33
thing that terrifies you,

Mark Woolley 1:13:39
not being able to do the things I love doing

Chris Baran 1:13:44
that’s I love it, favorite curse word,

Mark Woolley 1:13:50
fuck, I’ve got to tell you. I know this is quick fire, but right fuck is not only International. It’s understood in every language. But it’s got you can apply it to almost anything you think. You can apply it to any situation, any feeling, any you know. And it is a great word, but the one that is also one of my favorites, because you don’t really have it in America, people don’t use the word wanker, do

Chris Baran 1:14:20
they in America? Most people know what it is here, though,

Mark Woolley 1:14:23
yeah. But anyway, sorry,

Chris Baran 1:14:28
what’s your favorite? Comfort food?

Mark Woolley 1:14:35
Comfort food on a hangover day, has to be painted. Yeah? Good pizza. Oh, right.

Chris Baran 1:14:44
Something in the industry that you haven’t done, but you want to

Mark Woolley 1:14:53
cool, it’s.

God, wow, that is a tough one.

Set up a chair on a remote beach and cook for a month. I was saying to someone the other day, the opposite what he was saying there that I said, you know, as far as the hair industry goes, we all end up having a go at most things that, you know we you know, we all have a go at education. We’ll have a go at owning a salon. You know, there are lots of things to have a go at, but if I’m totally honest, I still really enjoy cutting a client’s hair, you know? Yeah, a person where you cut the hair, talk to them for an hour, they go off feeling good. And so do you I still really enjoy that. So that was like you

Chris Baran 1:15:54
said earlier. You said a haircut is a powerful thing. It really is. Yeah, if you had one do over, what would that be? You could do over anything again, what would it? What would you want it to be,

Mark Woolley 1:16:07
or to go and do it again? Yeah, I haven’t heard the term do over, yeah, if I could go and do it again, I’d go and I’d go and do the first salon again, the first ever salon with all those people in it

Chris Baran 1:16:29
tomorrow. You couldn’t do hair. What would you do?

Mark Woolley 1:16:35
Definitely, art, paint, yeah,

Chris Baran 1:16:37
yeah. I don’t think I was too far off on that one. So I just want to say, first of all, before I’ve got one more question for you. Is that, you know, if I think for us, it’s really important, I love doing our podcast here, and if everybody is listening and watching, if you could just make a comment on this so we know how you like things. And if you want to give us a rating, that would be awesome that would help us to get into more people’s lives and be able to bring people like Mark to you so you can listen and watch them as well. But one last question before we sign off in here is, if you had one wish mark for our industry, what would that be?

Mark Woolley 1:17:22
The community, camaraderie, giving each other inspiration, that that continues forever, never changes.

Chris Baran 1:17:33
I love it. I love it. And Mark, I know it’s UK time, probably time to go down to the pub, but I would say this, I know you gave up your time and energy to be with us here, and I just want to say thank you again for everything you do for our industry, for you know, and I always say, you know, unselfish Lee, that you’ve done. And I just want you to thank thank you again for taking that time to be on here and being on our podcast. And I know, I know that one day we will get together, we will have that pint together and share more good stories. So I just want to thank you so much for being here.

Mark Woolley 1:18:10
Well, Chris, thank you. I wanted to say thank you to you, because it’s amazing what you do. You know you’ve obviously, you know, you’ve mentored and taught a whole generation of people out there, and I think the fact you’re doing this, and you know, sharing yours and other people, your guests experiences as well, I’m very honored that you’ve invited me on here. And thank you. And I’ll, I will look forward to seeing you again soon. I’ll message you when I’m coming to the US, and which will be if you’re in thank you as well. Thank you very Listen,

Chris Baran 1:18:46
Mark, thank you again, and it was a pleasure and an honor, and thank

Mark Woolley 1:18:51
you. Thank you very much, Chris. We’ll see you. See you soon. Cheers. Take care.

Chris Baran 1:18:59
Cases is produced by cut action media, with Marjorie Phillips doing the planning parts, Lee Baran on the video bits, and Adrian Taverner mixing the audio jazz you.