Thea Green of Nails Inc: ‘I don’t ever want to switch off’
November 9, 2013 Leave a comment
Thea Green of Nails Inc: ‘I don’t ever want to switch off’
In the first of a year-long series focusing on the most innovative and inspiring businesses in Britain today, Abigail Townsend meets Nails Inc founder Thea Green.
Raising the bar: Thea Green of Nails Inc Photo: Dylan Thomas
11:51AM BST 24 May 2013
“Neon pink, then green, peach, pale blue and orange.” Thea Green is describing nail polish shades she’s wearing. “Rainbow nails,” she calls them with a laugh. Most women would balk at wearing five colours, but then the founder and owner of Nails Inc is not most women. After leaving journalism to set up her chain of nail bars, her commitment has never wavered. Any downtime is spent with husband Nick, who runs a digital printing business, and their three children – aged between three and nine – in their Fulham home, a few miles from Nails Inc’s Regent Street head office.“I don’t ever want to switch off,” she says of her work. “It’s a big extension of who I am and I thoroughly enjoy it. It can be difficult, of course, to find a work-life balance but when you’re running your own business it’s up to you to find that balance.”
Green was fashion editor at Tatler and travelled regularly to New York, where nail bars are common. Back home, however, she realised there was nowhere similar.
After extensive research she raised £200,000 and, aged 23, opened her first nail bar in South Molton Street, off London’s Oxford Street.
The big break came when Green persuaded department stores to open concessions: “Back then, there were no services in department stores: no eyebrow threading, no teeth whitening, nothing,” she recalls.
“But there was a real desire to keep customers in store for longer.
“People were nervous about whether women would want to get their nails done in public. But I knew convenience would always win over privacy.”
Nails Inc now has bars in Fenwick, Harvey Nichols and Selfridges, and 59 stand-alone stores. Treatments range from 10-minute manicures to luxury pedicures costing £120.
Green, 37, has an MBE and was a finalist last year for the Veuve Clicquot Businesswoman of the Year award.
Turnover is already ahead of last year, boosted in part by expanding internationally. In a recession, people may forgo new outfits but they can still find cash for nails. And Thea Green is the woman to provide it.
Factfile
Company Nails Inc
Established 1999
Turnover £22m in 2011/12
Number of staff 450
Website nailsinc.com
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