Has your child ever had nits? If they haven't you are certainly one of the very few. And for most mums combatting nits is becoming harder than ever as the little critters have apparently become resistant to shampoos.

So a business that guarantees to 100% eradicate nits sounds a good prospect. That's what Dee Wright thought when she set up The Hairforce – Lice Assassins around five years ago.

Dee, whose background is in advertising, was inspired after reading an article in Time Out New York about a head lice company in the US and Canada which offered nit clearing sessions. “I thought it was a good idea and it stuck in my mind. It's become a big market in the US and trends in the US usually come over here,” she says, adding that her experience as a strategic planner in advertising proved useful in coming up with an innovative idea.

The idea came after a childcare nightmare for Dee forced her to take a radical change to her life. She had had a great nanny who had to move on and her replacements didn't work out. She freelanced for a while, but says freelancing in advertising is always a full-time job. “It's not a career conducive to work life balance,” she says. “It's client facing and you work in tight teams. If you're not there you're forgotten. It's not an easy environment for a mum.”

She adds: “I was worried about the kids [then aged four and six] and felt I could not juggle things, but I had never though I would give up work,” she says.

She says part of her ambition in setting up her own business was to provide creative, flexible working opportunities for women which were not on the bottom end of the payscale.

Business options
The Hairforce offers two different business options – the possibility of buying a franchise or setting up a rapid response unit.

Dee, who has won a top award for her business acumen, first franchised the business, but says she came up with the rapid response unit because she believes that in the current economic times it is more accessible than a franchise as people who opt for it can start to work quite quickly as sole traders rather than having to build up a business.

By the end of the next couple of weeks the third rapid response unit will be up and running in Bradford.

People who set up rapid response units get one day’s training in how to use the LouseBuster machine. It was developed by the University of Utah and is like a huge, very powerful portable hairdryer. It dehydrates nits and head lice and is 96% effective. Most other products are only at best 20% effective, according to Dee. “There are not many markets where people use products they know don’t work. People still come back to buy these products because there has been no alternative up to now,” she says. “We are supplying a viable alternative.”

The rapid response units cost £2,420 plus VAT. This covers the training, a uniform, a bespoke email though the website, publicity and a two-year lease on the LouseBuster. The units can be run from home. Dee says it depends on what the person who runs them wants to do.

A franchise costs £9,950 plus VAT. The franchises offer a full service from a Hairforce Lounge. This involves hoovering the hair with a lice hoover, using the LouseBuster, nit combing and nit picking. “It’s a forensic process,” says Dee. “Parents don’t have to do anything.” A week later there is a second appointment. This is to remove eggs which may have gone unseen the first time around, what Dee refers to as “the 4% that are under the radar”. The whole process over two appointments takes two and a half hours and is guaranteed to eradicate the infestation.

Dee charges £150 for the process. Rapid response units offer a half-hour session with the LouseBuster, but parents then need to nit comb out the dehydrated eggs and lice. They can charge £50 or less per session and offer discounts for people with larger families.

Dee, who also goes into schools to offer discreet checks on children’s hair, works from home. Her children are now 14 and 16, but working from home means she is home when they get back from school in case they need to talk. She is keen to promote a way of working that fits with working mums’ needs. “The rapid response units are right for the time we are living in at the moment,” she says. “They are flexible and allow women to get earning immediately.”

 

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