Perm Tips for Tricky Hair

Some of these tips may seem like common sense, but bear with me. You may find a tip you could use.

Loose natural wavy hair

If a customer is resistant to getting a perm because she says that perms always fry her hair. Here are some questions to ask:

  • Did you have naturally wavy or curly hair as a small child?
  • Does anyone in your immediate family have naturally wavy hair?
If the customer says yes they do and the customer is in their twenties or thirties, quite often the hormones will straighten their hair, but it will still have the characteristics of naturally curly hair. The characteristics of naturally wavy hair are the hair shrinks up A LOT when it dries, sometimes it grows unevenly on different places on their scalp, quite often it dries quickly, and it takes a perm very, very easily. This means you can use the gentlest perm on this customer, of course, don�t leave it on too long, and they will have a great perm. What is too long you may be asking?

On occasion a client with naturally curly hair will get a perm and every time you pull out the rod to check it there is no ridge. For this customer count the hair separations. If you see 7-8 separations, rinse her she is done. If this is the case this customer will complain that her hair is always too curly. Quite often their hair will continue to perm even after they walk out the door! Rinse longer you may say � I tried that too, and it did not make a difference. I know you may find this difficult to believe, but if you have the rare customer with a loose natural wave you will know what I�m talking about.

I had a customer that had a loose natural wave that was all over the place and she wanted a perm so that her hair would be easier to manage, but every time she had had a perm it would fry her hair. She had fairly fine hair so it would break and frizz. It looked awful. I gave her a perm (after her frizz grew out) with the gentlest perm I could find and rinsed it after 4 minutes. How did I know you ask? Thank God I was at a hair show and someone was talking about hair that is easy to over-process and they said to count the separations. If there are 7 and no more than 8, the hair is done. It worked like a charm! Even when I took the rods out it did not look like it was as curly as she wanted, but as it dried it got curlier and curlier. This hair is definitely tricky to perm and it is not an exact science.



Board-straight hair and the customer wants a loose perm

Have you ever had a customer that has board-straight hair that wants a loose perm? You know that chances are really good that the perm will fall out within 2 weeks and you will probably end of doing it again. Here is how to avoid this and make more money for you. Explain to the customer that you do not want to damage their hair by using a perm that is too harsh, but because their hair is so resistant to a perm you will need to do a re-wrap. I would charge an extra $10 - $30, depending on the length of their hair, the amount of time it will take for you to re-wrap it, etc.

You wrap their hair in pink to grey rods, depending on how long their hair is and process it. The purpose of using a smaller rod is so more bonds in the hair are broken which will make for a stronger perm. After you are done processing rinse it and gently take out the small rods. If their hair is long you may want to apply a light conditioner to get a comb through it. You do not want to use too much of this conditioner because it may interfere with the neutralizer and the perm will be too loose. Then re-wrap their hair in the larger rods � the size that your customer wants. Placing picks under the bands where you can. When you perm hair like this it does NOT loosen up. What you do is what they get. Spray their hair with a protein solution like CAT and place them under a hot dryer for 10 minutes.

The hot dryer opens up the cuticle layer, pulls out some of the water that is in the middle of the wrapped curl. If there is a lot of hair on the rods you may want to wait for the moisture inside the rod to come out, should only take a few minutes. Depending on the condition of their hair you may want to spray their hair again with a protein spray. Then apply the neutralizer and process as usual.

Using this double wrap method gives a strong springy curl that does not loosen up. This is why it�s very important for you to communicate with your customers why you believe this is the best way to perm their hair. This technique is an excellent way to perm the customer with the strong straight short hair that just needs some body. You can directionally wrap their hair so that in the morning the client has hardly any work to do to fix their hair. They will love you for it! If you are interested in other tips or want to share some of your own write to me and let me know.