OVER THE RAINBOW
Scotland’s largest salon group, Rainbow Room International, joined together for their 28th Annual Congress at the luxurious Airth Castle Hotel and Spa. Team members from Rainbow Room International’s twelve hair and beauty salons arrived at the spectacular venue for a day of inspirational challenges and presentations.
The day started with a welcome speech from Owner of Rainbow Room International, Alan Stewart and a team building exercise with a difference, with Key Account Manager Derek Wall from Schwarzkopf Professional capturing the Rainbow Room International salons’ attention with an engaging presentation on the physical impact of communication with Visual, Audio and Emotional ways to work with a client. The individual salon teams worked together to produce ideas on each subject, before presenting their ideas on stage. The winners were announced by Linda Stewart, Owner of Rainbow Room International, with Uddingston and Bearsden becoming joint winners with their campaign.
Rainbow Room founder Alan Stewart then took to the stage to introduce Schwarzkopf Professional’s Kay Brady and presented a short presentation – giving a taster of what to expect from the Essential Looks campaign for 2017. After a quick lunch break Riccardo Corvi (owner of the Ayr salon) introduced the Rainbow Room International Artistic Team to the stage to showcase three different looks.
The Young Artistic Team members Syd, Cara, Maxine, Alijah, Misha and Kyla took to the stage to present their models and for all of the team was their first time presenting their looks on stage. Riccardo then introduced Artistic Team Members, Diana Carson, Megan Deigan and Patrick McDougall who set to work demonstrating and presenting their models. Riccardo spoke to them on their journey and how Megan has recently become involved with the Schwarzkopf Young Artistic Team and the opportunities they have been given. The final presentation of looks came from Artistic Directors and current Scottish Hairdressers of the Year; Suzie McGill and Dylan Brittain, showcasing models inspired by their Culture collection which focuses on sharp, short cuts and beautiful bold colours. They demonstrated their colour techniques, talking through the step by step process.
In the evening the teams came together for the RRI Congress Awards. The awards include Assistant of the Year and Fantastic Hairdresser of the Year, through to the sought after Salon Team of the Year award. This year the Salon of the Year award went to the team at the Rainbow Room International Academy salon on Howard Street, for their outstanding entry which set them apart from the rest across many aspects of the business – the team also achieved an Excellence Award due to their HM Inspectors Report in 2016.
Academy Director, Leigh Kerr weas joined on-stage by their entire salon team to collect the prestigious award from company directors Alan and Linda Stewart and were overjoyed; “We are just so proud of our team! We can’t describe the feeling to be taking this home tonight, to win Salon Team of the Year is an incredible achievement. However, our Congress isn’t just about our salon as an individual, it is about working together as a team and spreading the Rainbow Room International brand across the UK and keeping the dram alive.”
With the awards over and everyone happy, it was time for the party to begin with the team dancing the night away. A delighted A lan and Linda Stewart said; “It’s a wonderful event and really builds team spirit and gets everyone motivated for the year ahead. Each year the standard gets higher and our judges find it more and more difficult to call. We recognise not only winners but those who are continuously improving as we believe each individual member of our team is special and deserves their own particular recognition of success.”
