Mom and daughter duo run salon together | Southeast Iowa Union

Oct 25, 2024

Oct. 24, 2024 11:42 pm

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Kristen Anderson and Kylen Harbison are the co-owners of Beauty with Grace, a salon in downtown Washington. They’re also mother and daughter.

They get asked about their working relationship a lot.

“We’re kind of doing our own job, just next to each other,” Harbison said. “I don’t need mom to do my job, and she doesn’t need me to do hers. We’re just coexisting … it’s nice working with someone that you’re comfortable with. If she’s doing something that’s bothering me, I can just tell her, and it’s fine and she’s not going to hold a grudge. The same vice versa.”

For the most part, they try to leave work at work, and avoid talking shop at family dinners or over the holidays. The two also make time to get lunch together every Thursday, part of an effort to ensure they maintain their relationship as family members, not just coworkers.

Before Beauty with Grace, the pair rented chairs at another salon, where they also worked together alongside other stylists. Anderson said she was glad to help guide her daughter as she learned the ropes.

“I wanted her to learn in a somewhat similar way to what I did,” she said. “I wanted her to learn from an accomplished stylist, and I wanted her to learn good habits and things in the industry, things like that. And honestly, what better way than to learn them from me?”

At some point, the two discussed a small downtown storefront across the street from the Washington Evening Journal. Both agreed it was a nice location, wondered what business would pop up there next, and moved on with little thought.

About a week later, Anderson saw the location was up for rent as she drove by. That was all the family needed to start their own salon.

“It felt kind of like a sign,” she said. “It wasn’t an elongated conversation … it just seemed like a no-brainer.”

Each co-owner has carved out their own clientele. Anderson, a stylist for over 30 years, works largely with longtime, regular clients who tend to be older women and often schedule their appointments up to a year in advance. Harbison works with a wider variety of people who tend to schedule more sporadically, and have more demand for hair dyes and ever-changing styles.

Despite their contrasting customers, the two said they found their work enjoyable for similar reasons: both love talking to people every day, and recognize their dual roles as both a professional and a friend for those they work with.

“What keeps me loving what I do is just the people,” Anderson said. “I see some of them more than I see family. They are what keeps you going, and I do love it … we’re considered therapists, or like bartenders — somebody told me the other day — all of those things.”

With their salon now well-established and well liked in the community, the mother and daughter say they’re happy where they’re at. Asked about the future of the business — parents tend to retire long before their kids — Harbison said she wasn’t sure quite what to expect.

“I could be about 98% sure that I will not work with somebody else,” she said. “I don’t know if I could switch to that, that would be quite the change. I would probably just work by myself. Or who knows, maybe someday I’ll have a daughter and we can recycle this, that would be pretty cool!”

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