Tab Salsman
Tab has quickly become one of our favorite people and solely due to the fact that he is so kind and willing to share and support everyone in this wonderful industry. We love when we find like-minded people and hang on tightly to them. He isn’t just an incredible hairdresser with an awesome story, but a husband, father and business owner of Tools and Bags.
Describe a day in the life of Tab…
Well, my day starts off with me hitting snooze for the first time at 4:50 am… and quite a few more times after that. After some snoozing, I eventually wobble to the kitchen and make myself 4-6 shots of espresso before heading out to the gym.
Morning is my favorite time of day. While my family sleeps it’s quiet in the house, which allows me to respond to emails, read the news, work on photo retouches and edits – whatever it is that I need to work on. I have found that by doing these activities in the morning I’m more focused and have the least amount of distractions. It’s really the time I get to clear my head and mentally prepare for the day. I think we all have a time that is our ‘zen’ and mine happens to be in the beginning of my day.
The gym is the place where I can multi-task by working out and listening to podcasts or audio books. Although I do love listening to music I prefer to use this time to feed my brain. I exercise for about an hour, come home and make my wife breakfast and bring her coffee in bed. Yes, I do this every morning I’m home – I’m not making this up. My goal is to do anything I can to make her mornings and day easier while she’s home with our 4 month old son.
After my productive morning, I head off to the salon for about 9-10 hours then I get to chill out and decompress on the ride home while listening to music, preferably jazz or my iPhone on shuffle. Once I’m home I get to spend my evenings relaxing with my wife and son and hopefully get to bed early enough that I don’t have to hit snooze as many times the next morning.
Something most people don’t know about you.
I’m sure there are plenty of interesting things that most people don’t know about me, but I recently found out through my Great Aunt that Cindy Crawford is like my 3rd or 4th cousin.
Tell us everything we need to know about Tools and Bags.
Tools and Bags (T.A.B.) is a company that wants to help hairdressers be more organized, take better care of their equipment yet be stylish all at the same time. Our flagship product, theCLASSIC, is a carry-all bag that holds more hairstylist and barber tools than meets the eye. Being that I am an educator who travels frequently, I needed something to carry my tools across the country that was specifically made for my needs and in my search for a bag I realized I wasn’t alone. I decided that I would make a bag that met my needs and standards. As of right now we have theCLASSIC and we will be expanding the line to include different products and tools through carefully selected … well, you’ll see soon. Our company motto is DISRUPT. CREATE. IMPROVE. and we plan on delivering on that. You can check us out at www.toolsandbags.com
What advice would Tab today tell Little Tab on his graduation day from beauty school?
I wouldn’t tell him anything. There isn’t anything I would change. For every pitfall in life that happened there were so many great things that also happened and all of these experiences, good or bad, made me who I am today. I wouldn’t be here today if I didn’t experience all of it.
What are your top 3 favorite social/editing apps?
Social Media: Linkdin, Instagram, and Facebook.
Editing apps: VSCO, Lightroom (which is linked to my laptop through the cloud and mobile phone, helps with maximizing the work flow), Word Swag/Typorama (its a tie).
What do you think the biggest struggle stylists are experiencing in the industry today?
This question depends greatly on where the stylist is at in their career. For the sake of this conversation, let’s talk about a new stylist. I think the expectation is that if you put some photos up on IG you’ll be busy over night with a full book. There’s so much more to it. Learning chair side manner with your clients, doing a thorough consolation, having work ethic to come in the salon at the same time every day. It’s simple, the only way you get new clients is if you are there day in and day out, and if you’re not there, someone else is going to get them. You have to be present. I feel if more newer hairdressers put as much effort in real life to meet clients as they do in their social media accounts they would probably have more clients, and by default more money. Sadly, this struggle also affects more seasoned hairdressers. Social media is an EXTRA layer to the tried and true way of building a clientle. You use social media to add to your marketing materials and you do not discard the foundations of building a client base the “old fashioned way.”
We are pretty openly obsessed with the entire Mascolo family. What was it like getting to work with them so closely?
One of my favorite memories was being able to be on set for a collection toni&guy was doing. I was so stoked to not only see the collection before anyone else but to actually be on set and see how its all done behind the scenes, especially with a budget as big as theirs. It was also around this time that I was getting more and more into photography and I was taking notes like crazy.
At the collection set, Zak had cut this really cool short haircut that was looking great and he’d gotten a ton of great shots of it, but I noticed that now he’s fussing with it a bit – you know, when its not ‘RIGHT’ but it’s close. So Zak kept moving the hair and pushing it all around just trying to find the sweet spot and out of nowhere Anthony comes in the room and politely asks if he can take a swing at the styling. Anthony grabs a random brush nearby and then woosh….woosh…..wooosh… three swipes of the brush and the haircut looks banging. He hits it with some hairspray and causally picks up the camera and snaps some photos. If I had blinked I would have missed what happened-it was that quick. Zak and everyone if the room all gave each other this look like ‘this is why Anthony is Anthony.’ Before Anthony stepped in the haircut was classic T&G but when Anthony was done with it, it looked like British hairdresser of the year T&G. I learned at that moment that Anthony has magic hands and can take ‘really cool’ to a whole new level. I’ve never seen anyone move hair with so little movements and have such a drastic and cool outcome – that is a moment I will never forget.
If people follow you on Instagram, they’ll see that you work with a lot of musicians. Who are your top 5 musical influences and why?
When it comes to music I have a wide variety of tastes.
Nirvana
Smashing Pumpkins
Fear Factory
David Bowie
Stevie Ray Vaughn
Nirvana changed my life!!! Sadly, I never got to see them play. When I first heard them I wanted to sound like them and look like them. The 90s shaped me completely.
Smashing Pumpkins … Billy Corgan is a genius of musical composition and all the layers of modulations and distortion. He’s really talented.
When I first heard Fear Factory I was absolytely blown away. I had never heard anything so heavy and powerful. It’s super syncopated and structured and brutal! Then all of a sudden the chorus comes in and the screaming/growling stops and this amazing singing starts. They popularized the singing and screaming for the heavy metal genre.
I don’t think I need to explain David Bowie for music or his style – I think he was an alien.
Stevie Ray Vaughn, aka SRV, took the best of Jimi Hendrix and just ran with it with his Austin, Texas roots. He made the guitar sing … truly sing.
I feel each of these groups/individuals all have an identity that you know who they are within the first few notes you hear. As an artist you want that identity, fingerprint, or signature in your own work. It’s not about copying someone’s work it’s putting your own spin on it.
An example of someone taking music that is not theirs but redoing it in their own signature style are the following…
Hurt by NIN performed by Johnny Cash
Little Wing by Jimi Hendrix performed by Stevie Ray Vaughn
I know it sounds a bit of a stretch but I’m not going to cut a 5-point the way Vidal did and I wouldn’t even try to cut it like him. Instead, I would want to cut a 5-point the way I cut hair. There is no reason to copy him verbatim – its already been done! Much like the songs I mentioned, the originals are amazing but what these musicians did with the songs took it to another level – I hope to do that with my haircutting and teaching. It’s the goal I’ll likely never attain but it keeps the drive going.
Who is your Hair-Hero?
Christiaan
What is your doughnut and/or taco of choice?
Donut – apple fritter
Taco – el pastor from Tacos el Gordo
I knew I was a Hair Nerd when…
I was in beauty school
Where can people stalk you?
ig – @tabcutshair
ig @toolsandbags