Salon Lane’s Jared Keen on the growing demand for independent salon spaces

Salon Lane is expanding to meet the demand from a growing number of beauty and hair professionals wanting their own fitted-out premises to work from.

An army of hairdressers and beauty therapists wanting to operate their own professional salons is driving the growth of Salon Lane, a specialist co-working space provider founded six years ago in Sydney by three entrepreneurs.

Starting off with a site in Surry Hills on the fringe of the Sydney CBD, Salon Lane now spans five locations – three in Sydney and two in Brisbane.

The company announced its expansion into Melbourne last month, striking a deal with developer Fortis to open within its $330m Richmond Square development in the inner suburbs. “Our seventh site in Woolooware Bay, Sydney, is currently in concept design. So that’s all locked and loaded and DA-approved,” co-founder Jared Keen told Green Street News. “We’ve invested in significant growth, whilst staying pretty disciplined economically.”

Driving the expansion are hundreds of independent beauty therapists and stylists wanting to operate from their own premises, but who don’t want to be locked into a commercial lease or having to fund expensive fit-outs. “We currently have almost 300 independent businesses representing over 400 members. So around 80% of our members are sole operators – or solopreneurs as we like to call them,” Keen said.

Keen, who founded Salon Lane with fellow entrepreneur Lance Kalish and Canadian-based Moss Kadey, said the idea for the business came about from the structural changes occurring in the U.S. beauty industry and after interviewing 30 hairdressers, barbers and beauty therapists to see if the idea of a co-working style offering had legs. “The concept itself comes from recognising that the traditional salon model in Australia and the U.S. wasn’t keeping pace with how hair, beauty, wellness professionals wanted to actually work,” Keen said.

“So historically, if you’re a talented hairdresser, barber, beauty professional, massage therapist, you basically had three options. One is you could work for someone else as an employee. Two, you could work from home as a sole trader. Or three, you can take on the considerable costs and risks of opening up your own salon as a salon owner.
That meant signing a commercial or retail lease, funding a fit-out, signing a bank guarantee, employing staff, managing staff, and all the other complexities of running a business,” Keen said.

A pathway to independence

After doing their research, the three business partners saw an opportunity to remove those entry barriers and give hair, beauty, and wellness professionals a much more accessible pathway to independence.

“We have effectively removed the vast majority of barriers from becoming a business owner or a sole trader.” Keen said the offering has proven attractive to operators looking for a premium branded physical space in order to build and grow their client base. “We effectively take a large commercial tenancy and we transform it into a collection of smaller, flexible workspaces,” he said.

“We find the property, we design it, we fit out the premises, and then we provide shared amenities such as a front desk, utilities, cleaning, etc, alongside providing business support, education, and effectively a professional community of like-minded professionals.”

Salon Lane provides fully equipped or move-in ready private salon studios of all different types and sizes as well as hot-desking.

Around 30% of its membership base are independent operators looking for a home base, 30% are ex-salon owners, 30% are former senior hairstylists and beauty therapists, and around 10% are home operators upgrading to Salon Lane premises.

Expanding into Melbourne

Salon Lane’s newest hair, beauty and wellness destination will open in Richmond Square in 2027. The 675 sq m facility will span two levels.

It will offer 21 private studios and 14 open workstations, supporting up to 50 independent professionals.

Developed by Pallas Group’s Fortis, Richmond Square at 1–5 Wiltshire Street includes retail spaces, premium residences and a 57-room boutique hotel. Built by Hacer, the mixed-use precinct reached practical completion last month.

Alongside Salon Lane, Fortis has secured famed Melbourne restaurateur Guy Grossi as an anchor tenant for the retail component of Richmond Square. Across two ground-floor tenancies spanning 292 sq m and 161 sq m, Grossi will deliver two hospitality concepts exclusively for the precinct.

Fortis associate director-development Mitch Crawford told Green Street News that Salon Lane was “very cohesive to the rest of the Richmond Square precinct” and the lifestyle amenity. “It gives residents a place to go down to and get dolled up before heading out,” Crawford said.

“What we really like about Salon Lane is that it really enlivens entrepreneurial spirit, in that it’s individual businesses going in there, and it’s really giving these sole traders the opportunity to flourish,” Crawford said.

Keen said Salon Lane has always been keen on expanding into Melbourne given it’s the second-largest beauty and personal services market in Australia, with a “strong culture of independent businesses, sole traders, creativity, and quite a sophisticated consumer base”.

“We wanted to establish ourselves in Melbourne sooner, but we were prepared to wait for the right opportunity rather than just enter the market simply for the sake of expansion. Richmond specifically works for us because it’s got a really high density of both hair and beauty operators in the area as well as consumers. It’s got high foot traffic just off Swan Street, and it’s got a strong existing beauty and wellness culture in that pocket of Melbourne.”

“The other thing we liked about the Richmond Square opportunity was the opportunity to be part of a major mixed-use development rather than just taking a conventional standalone retail or commercial tenancy,” Keen said.

Looking ahead, Keen said Salon Lane was keen to grow its presence in Brisbane and open on the Gold Coast, provided it could find landlords that understand and support its business model.

“Salon Lane is a very capital-intensive business, particularly during the development and construction phase of each new location,” Keen said.

“So, landlord contributions [to the fit-out] are really important components. We’re effectively creating a substantial amount of value within their properties that we occupy. We spend in the high thousands of dollars per square metre for the fit out,” Keen said.

“So we look for landlords who really understand our model and are prepared to work with us, partner with us on commercially sustainable arrangements.”