Head on over: Rosie’s Hair Creations ‘back to what it was’ before shutdown
Festus resident Rosie Johnston has seen a lot in her 47 years as a hairdresser, 36 of them as the owner of her own salon – Rosie’s Hair Creations, 236 E. Main St., in Festus
“I came to Festus in 1976 and went to work for the previous owner of the shop,” Johnston said. “Then I bought it from her when she retired in 1984.”
Johnston, 66, who closed the shop completely during the early weeks of the pandemic, said she put the six weeks of downtime to good use.
“I’ve always been a cleaning fanatic,” she said. “During those six weeks I was down here all the time, cleaning everything from top to bottom and then some.”
Once the lockdown was lifted and businesses had the go-ahead to reopen, Johnston said there was a bit of a bottleneck.
“The first couple of weeks in May we were swamped,” she said. “Nobody had gotten anything done in six weeks and some of them were in pretty bad shape! Now, though, it’s kind of leveled out.”
The shop offers basic hair services plus waxing.
“Right now I have two stylists, plus me,” Johnston said. “I’m probably one of the last shops where my employees work on commission.”
The shop is open Tuesdays through Fridays for appointments and walk-ins, and Saturday by appointment only. Johnston said she and her staff are diligent about mask usage and social distancing.
“We have a lot of weekly shampoo-and-set ladies who are regulars,” she said. “We called them all and booked accordingly, spaced out so we didn’t have a lot of people in here at one time. Pretty much everyone has come back and we’ve actually got some new ones. July is always a slow month, but I think it’s getting back to what it was.”
