How to Become a Beautician

Are you thinking of starting a career as a beautician? If you have a flair and a passion for cosmetology, and love working with other people and helping them to look and feel their best then a beautician job could be the perfect path for you. It is a versatile and exciting career in which no two days are ever exactly the same. Working as a beautician is a great job for someone with endless creativity, great interpersonal skills, and a desire to work in a public-facing role. Beauticians are highly qualified, and experts in their field.

Not sure if the role of a beautician is right for you, or how to even start? From the average beautician salary to the kinds of beautician jobs that might be available to you, here’s everything you need to know about how to become a beautician:

What is a Beautician

A beautician is an individual who provides face and body treatments that will help their clients to look and feel better. The primary role of a beautician is to work with your customers to ensure that, when they leave your salon, they feel their best. Beauticians can offer a wide variety of different services, but they must be qualified to carry out each treatment that they offer. When you work as a beautician, no two days are ever exactly the same because the services that you provide, and the conversations that you have, are driven by the unique needs of your customers.

If you are excited by the world of skincare and make up and have a drive and a passion to ensure that people look and feel as good as they can, then looking for beautician jobs could be the right career for you. The beauty industry is an incredibly popular one which offers a great amount of flexibility for working parents, or for those with other commitments outside of the workplace. The field of beauty is an ever-changing one, and it is also an incredibly lucrative one.  In 2018 alone, the hair and beauty industry made an incredible contribution of  £14.2 billion to the GDP of the United Kingdom. Making people feel good about themselves by providing beauty treatments can be an incredibly rewarding career choice, and innovation in the beauty industry means that now is a great time to begin your training in this fascinating profession.

Personal Qualities of a Beautician

If you’re thinking of becoming a beautician, then you will need to possess the following qualities to be successful in the field:

• Plenty of energy and stamina. Beauticians are often on their feet all day administering treatments, so a certain level of physical fitness may be required to fulfil this role
• Good communication and interpersonal skills. You must be able to build a relationship with clients from all different backgrounds, ensuring that they feel comfortable and at ease whilst you are providing their treatments
• In order to communicate with so many different people each day, you should be outgoing and confident, and enjoy talking to a wide range of different individuals. Relationships are key to the role of a beautician: without them, you will not build and maintain your client base
• You will need good listening skills, and good writing skills, in order to take details from your clients and maintain their records appropriately
• You will need to be able to understand your clients’ needs and provide advice on the services and treatment plans that are most appropriate for them
• If your clients are feeling nervous about new treatments, you will need to be reassuring and able to put them at ease
• Strong attention to detail, both when organising your business and when undertaking precision-based treatments for your clients
• A clean and well-groomed appearance that promotes the kinds of services that you offer
• The ability to create an environment that feels relaxing, where your clients can unwind and leave the stresses of the world behind
• An inquiring mind to enable you to keep up to date with new services, techniques, and products that your clients may be interested in receiving
• A good business sense and keen organisational skills to keep your paperwork in order and ensure that your business is run smoothly

What a Beautician Does

The role of a beautician is varied, with the day-to-day tasks you perform being determined by the kinds of treatments that you specialise in and the unique needs of your clients. Whilst no two days are ever exactly the same, you can expect to undertake all the following tasks at some point during an average working week:

• Fulfilling appointments by performing beauty treatments on your clients. These can include, but are not limited to, hair removal, facials, tanning, and manicures and pedicures
• Managing and maintaining your own appointment book and booking appointments for both new and existing clients
• Greeting your clients and making them feel welcome and at ease as they enter your salon
• Undertaking ongoing training and new courses to enable you to provide new and innovative services to your clients as they come onto the market
• Many beauticians are self-employed. This means that you must carve out some time each week to promote your business and your services through traditional advertising, social media, and word of mouth promotions
• Offering advice to your clients on the best cosmetics and the best treatment plans for them
• Undertaking all the administrative tasks needed to maintain your business. This includes, but is not limited to, completing paperwork, maintaining stock levels and ordering supplies when needed, and keeping your client’s treatment records and contact information up to date

How Much Does a Beautician Earn

Because many beauticians are self-employed or work flexible hours, the amount you can earn in this role will be determined by how many hours you work, where you are based in the UK, the type of services you offer, and how much you choose to charge for your services. However, to give you an idea of the beautician salary you can expect, the average salary for a qualified beauty therapist is around £17,000 pa, working on a full-time basis. The more experience you have, and the larger your client base is, the more you can expect to see your earnings grow. You could also choose to progress your career and work as a beauty manager or a salon manager: the average salary for this role is £25,000 per annum.

If you choose to work in a high-end salon, then you can expect your salary to be higher than the figures noted above. What’s more, it’s important to note that many beauticians are self-employed, and the type of beautician salary you can earn when you work for yourself varies wildly from this average. A self-employed make-up artist specialising in fashion shoots or wedding make up, for example, can command more per hour than a beautician that specialises in in-salon waxing, for example. Some services are also more time consuming than others, and that will also have an impact on your average hourly earnings.

There are ways that many beauticians choose to boost their earnings. One of these is by working with specific brands and manufacturers to promote their products within their salons. Many brands will offer commissions to beauticians on the products and treatment lines that they can sell to their clients: this commission can provide a significant boost to your income. Regular training to upgrade the number of beauty services you can offer will also help to enhance the amount of compensation you can receive as a beauty therapist.

Qualifications Needed for a Beautician

Wondering how to become a beautician? There are several different pathways to a career in this role. The most popular of these are:

• A college courses
• An apprenticeship
• Specialist courses run by private training providers

Before you can start researching any of these routes, it is important to note that, in order to work or train as a beautician in the UK you must be over 16 years of age, and many courses or salons will require you to have achieved a minimum educational level to be accepted. This will vary from course to course, or salon to salon, but a good rule of thumb is that you should have:

• 2 or more GCSEs at grades 9 to 3 (A* to D), or equivalent, to enrol onto a level 2 beauty therapy course
• 4 or 5 GCSEs at grades 9 to 4 (A* to C), or equivalent, to enrol onto a level 3 beauty therapy course
• 4 or 5 GCSEs at grades 9 to 4 (A* to C), or equivalent, including English and maths, to enrol onto a T level course

Some of the courses available include:

• Level 2 Beauty Therapy Course
• Level 2 Nail Technician Course
• Level 3 Make-up Artist Course
• Level 3 make-up Artist and Nail Technician Course
• Beauty Therapy and Start Your Own Business Level 3

If you choose to work as a self-employed beautician, then a good base level understanding of both English and maths would be useful to ensure you have the skills needed to run a business and complete the paperwork that this kind of role demands. You could also choose to undertake a business management course, if you do choose to run your own business.

If you would rather learn on the job, instead of in a formal college environment, then you could also consider finding a salon that offers apprenticeships to beauticians. You can do an intermediate or advanced beauty therapist apprenticeship, depending on what is offered by the salon that hires you. These typically take between 15 and 18 months to complete and will involve a mix of workplace learning and off-the-job study: apprenticeships are a great way to develop the customer relations and interpersonal skills required to be a beautician, which are often harder to develop in a college environment.

On the Job Training

Because beauty therapy is such a hands-on career, so many of the vital skills needed to succeed in this profession can be learnt via on-the-job training. Undertaking regular training courses will help you to keep up to date with new skills, treatments and techniques, and this is important in a trend-led, ever-changing industry such as beauty therapy.

Many of the on-the-job training courses that could enhance your career, and improve the services you offer your clients, can be completed online, meaning that you won’t have to take time away from your business to develop your career. Online courses are often more affordable and can help you comprehend the basics of the human body, dermatology and physiology, which is so vital if you wish to become the best in your field. Some examples of online training courses you might wish to complete will depend on the qualifications you already have, but if you completed a generalised course (such as level 3 beauty therapy) then you could use on the job training to choose a specialism such as nail art, make up artistry, waxing, or other popular personal services.

Professional Bodies

You may find it useful to get professional recognition by joining a register like the Guild of Beauty Therapists. The Guild of Beauty Therapists is a highly regarded organisation that has been in operation for more than 25 years, and membership offers beauticians at all stages of their career access to professional development, training courses, advice and support (including a full guide to safe working during the Covid-19 pandemic, which may well prove particularly reassuring for both therapists and their clients) and insurance cover worth up to £6 billion, which is particularly useful if you are working independently, running your own business, or simply take responsibility for your own liability within a wider salon setting.

Beautician jobs can be incredibly competitive, so being a member of a highly regarded professional body, such as the Guild of Beauty Therapists, could be a wonderful way to help you stand out from the crowd when you are applying for jobs, or trying to catch the attention of new clients.