Exceeding Expectations…

Elle Vive Salon & Spa Features the Best of the Best

By Bob Cox

When Lan Nguyen discovered the depth of her mom’s (Jenny Mai) sadness, she resolved to do something about it. After 30 years of hard physical work as a premiere hair stylist, Jenny felt it was time to hang up her shears and devote more quality time to her family and growing grandchildren.

During her brief retirement, Jenny realized that there was a gaping hole in her heart shortly after selling her beauty salon in Folsom, CA. She missed her work, her clients and her coworkers.

Amongst all the lessons Lan learned from her mother, the single most important was to be true to yourself and follow your heart. When you combine passion and hard work, extraordinary things can and do happen. “My mom taught me the value of working hard and to do your best to please every client. She didn't mind coming to work early and staying late because her goal was to always satisfy the client and give them more than they were looking for”, said Lan.

During her childhood, Lan grew up in a salon and carefully observed how her mother interacted with others and the effortless joy she freely gave and received her with customers, coworkers and other visitors of the salon. Following in her mom’s footsteps, Lan pursued a career as an attorney. After a heart to heart conversation with her mom, Lan convinced her mom to follow her passion and go back to doing what she loved, helping her clients look beautiful.

Since Jenny was busy working on a client, I asked Lan a few questions to better understand the secrets of her mother’s success and the things that motivated her to join a brand new family salon called Elle Vive Salon & Spa in Gold River.

Q: Can you tell us about Elle Vive Salon & Spa?

A: Mom wanted a fresh start and decided to join a new salon that features the very best beauty professionals in town. Elle Vive is a full service salon, which includes hair styling, manicures, pedicures, facials, massage, waxing, permanent makeup and eyelash extensions. Everyone in the salon is excited to let the community know they’re now open for business and feature the best of the best in every service provided.

Q: How does Elle Vive provide the best of the best in each category?

A: The owners have been in the field for such a long time, they can tell just by talking to them. They can usually tell in the first couple of weeks if a person has exceptional skills.

Q: Why is it so important to have the very best people?

A: The owners of Elle Vive want their clients to feel confident enough to try the other services offered in the salon. By hiring highly skilled people, their clients can spend all day in the salon and enjoy their experience without feeling uncomfortable. Everyone here treats their clients like family.

Q: What does Elle Vive do specifically to create a family like environment?

A: Elle Vive selects people with a warm and friendly personality. They look for people that love their work and treat people special. They want to build a team working environment where every person helps each other to become better.

Q: Does the salon have meetings where various members of the team can exchange ideas?

A: Yes and while everyone here rents a station, it's not just about themselves; it's about teamwork. We encourage each other to reach out and help one another improve. But overall, the owners are always looking for the best already, so we don't need to worry about that as much.

Q: How did the owners come up with the name of this salon?

A: Elle Vive means she lives, she survives.

Q: How long has your family been in Sacramento?

A: We came from San Jose in 1991 and mom opened her first salon in South Sacramento. Many of those clients still follow her! She has also worked at a salon on Madison and Dewey and then Madison and Sunrise before opening her shop in Folsom. She actually has almost too many clients, so she likes to share her clients with other stylists that she personally trains. This is also why Elle Vive hires the best in the field. They want their stylists to be able to take care of the clients like my mom, who is exceptional.

Q: Why did your mom go into the beauty field?

A: When mom was young, she wanted to become a doctor but that wasn’t an option. Since she really wanted to help people, she decided to become a hair stylist. A lot of her clients say she has a gift, that she does everything perfectly and very fast. A lot of her clients get in and out quickly and look beautiful. So she has trained a lot of people and her clients have followed her everywhere.

Q: Aside from your mom, who else is working in Elle Vive?

A: Tracy and Phally are the other hair stylists and both are exceptional. Fong is the nail technician who also provides facials, waxing and eyelash extensions. She is versatile and excellent! Right now, Elle Vive is looking for one massage therapist, one more facialist, two more hair stylists and three more nail technicians to rent stations. The owners don't want too many employees though because they want everyone to make money and stay longer.

While conducting this interview, the client Jenny was working on (Melinda) spoke up enthusiastically and had this to say about Jenny. “I have been with Jenny for over 20 years. My children are now 27 and 32 and she did their first haircuts! I used to live over by Dewey and Madison where Jenny used to be and I traveled with her to every shop she's moved to. I don't let anybody else do my hair because I don't trust anybody else (laughing). She has the best work ethic of anybody in this business and she's very accommodating, polite, generous and easy going”.

Elle Vive Salon is located at 11226 Gold Express Drive in Gold River (Near Chevy’s Mexican Restaurant and across the street from Bel Air). Their phone number is (916) 859-0797.