A Safe Place

February 8, 2017

Kindiss Stiller, director of Juut’s Edina location and colorist, is amazed at some of the things her clients have told her in the past 23 years.

“You never know what people are going through,” she says. “I have had guests tell me some horrible things nobody else in their life knows—stories and secrets they don’t share with anyone else because they don’t feel safe.”

Stiller says Juut guests have a lot of trust in their service professionals and that’s why they share.

“We have a gift of being in close range, so they tell us when they’re pregnant, or had a miscarriage or when a family member is sick,” she says. “Sometimes they aren’t ready to tell their friends or family members. I feel so honored that I get to be the first person who hears some of these things.”

Because she isn’t in her guest’s inner circle of friends, she says the conversation can be more fulfilled and all about the guest.

But every once in a while, a guest surprises her when they make a revelation.

“I had a guest I saw regularly for five to seven years. She and her husband were prominent business owners in town,” she says. “Then, all of a sudden I didn’t see her for about three years.”

Years later, when Stiller saw her name pop up on the books, she was thrilled.

“When she came in, she didn’t look very good, and she said, ‘I have to tell you I only have $95.’”

Stiller told her that was fine and they would make it work, and then the guest revealed she had just been released from jail.

“They give you $100 when you leave jail,” she says. “She used $5 to take the bus to the salon, and wanted to use the remainder to get her hair colored so she could face her children, who she hadn’t seen in four years.”

Stiller told her guest to keep the $95 and gave her a complimentary color service. She then had a makeup artist come do her makeup.

“I then saw her every eight weeks until she moved—and she still comes up a couple times a year to see me,” she says.

While the salon is in a high-end suburb, Stiller says you never know what’s going on with people.
“They come here because they know we will hold them in a respectful way and they will get their day made,” she says.

Stiller says being in an environment of Daymaking helps in the here and now whenever there is negativity or she has a challenging client.

“You always have Daymaking in the back of your head,” she says. “Little gestures can make a day—you never know who is going through something, whether it’s a guest or someone at the grocery store.”

When she’s educating at the academy, Stiller says she tells new stylists they can have a bad day, but they’re still responsible for how they make other people feel.

“If I’m having a bad day, the only place I want to be is work,” she says. “I get to feel good and happy here because we all lift each other up.”