Hairdressers - AIBU to be unhappy with my £170 balayage?

[Bumble88]

I’ve recently had a baby boy and have a three year old girl. So you can imagine my excitement at finally being able to get to the hairdressers (for the first time in over a year) to have a fresh new balayage done.

I went to a small chain which has a branch locally. I showed the hairdresser a photo of what I was looking for in terms of colours and depth of the colour. My appointment was 1pm and I came out at 5:30pm, £170 lighter and with a huge feeling of disappointment.

Whilst I’m not naive enough to expect to look like the model, I just don’t feel the colour looks anything like what I asked for😓To me it looks very flat and single tonal. Some of the hair also has a metallic/brassy look that kind of glistens (like my old highlights had become over time!)

I didn’t say anything at the time as I was a) running so late as I hadn’t expected to be in there nearly 5 hours and b) I felt too embarrassed to say it was way off what I wanted, when what could be done to fix it?

AIBU to think my £170 has not been well spent…? (Image on left is my hair, image on right is what I showed the hairdresser for the colours I wanted…)

You really should complain. It's pretty awful, especially for that price and 5 hours is excessive unless they're doing a full removal of existing colour first! It needs re-doing by their best colourist and you should insist on that.

That doesn't look remotely like a properly done balayage and I suspect that she's a recently qualified hairdresser and definitely not very experienced or a colour specialist.

The problem with chain salons is that you often get lots of mediocre hairdressers amongst a couple of really good colourists who produce the quality stuff that's used on their social media.

Never go by their social media pics but always try to get a personal recommendation.

Actually it doesn't take several appts to do that if you know what you're doing and using the right products for the job.

I trained in college for my level 2&3 and did additional courses at a Sassoon Academy.

It’s way off. Just looks like they’ve slapped some highlights (brassy ones at that) over natural brown. I wouldn’t be happy either, and would request my money back.

It's not balayage if they used foils. I thought the whole point of balayage is that it is painted on freely, to give less of a "stripy" look.

Your hair looks OK, but yes nothing like the photo on the right.

You need to decide whether to complain or not, you are within your rights and the hairdresser should discuss it with you and help to fix it to what you want.

I'd ask for a refund, not a correction. Never trust the people who fucked it to fix it.
Then take your money and time elsewhere, ideally somewhere that does the hair of someone you love. Personal recommendation is best.

Plus, as others have said, balayage is hand-printed not foiled.

To be honest OP, I don’t think your pictures are helpful as I would like to see what your hair looked like when you went to the salon, you’d have over a year worth of roots alongside old highlights? Plus did you ever dye it at home? What is your natural hair colour? Do you have grey hair?

Your before state/condition may have meant that your inspiration photo isn’t achievable.

so first it doesn’t look awful so that’s a plus.

Money aside, it’s not the colours you asked for. And that’s ultimately what you’re unhappy about. Time wise is likely due to hair length/thickness. Am always around the 4/5hour mark as my hair is so thick. Nothing we can do about that.

so you have a few choices;

a.) go back to the salon & explain to the hairdresser that although you like the hair you don’t love it & it wasn’t the colour you had shown her & ask if she could suggest something to fix it to be more like the original picture colour.

b,) go back and ask them to put another toner on your hair as it’s much darker than you want, you could say you thought it might lighten after a few washes at home but it hasn’t.

c.) do nothing, sometimes things don’t go to plan, we live & learn & move on. next time go to a different salon but when you book ask for a colour consultation first so they can tell you how achievable the colour you want is in one sitting then you will feel more comfortable knowing they understand excatly what you want.

personally I wouldn’t email head office as ultimately they would have to speak to the hairdresser in question first, then tell you to go back to the salon & since the hairdresser has no idea your unhappy it seems unfair.

£170 is sore definitely but I wouldn’t say completely out there - am £130 for mine, it’s all relative to where you live I guess. Some places are always gonna be more expensive.

hopefully this helps you.

Also I don’t really know if you 100% do want your inspiration photo, because it’s very high contrast and the highlights would look quite chunky and stripy when it’s not styled.

if you want your hair to look like your inspiration photo, you’d need to go darker to get the depth/pops of colour

I constantly show my hairdressers photos and he’s like

its lighting. It won’t look like that.

or if it looks a nice way he’s guaranteed to tell me it’s styling

hes always right. I wonder if it’s the lighting in the photo making it like that and it not looking the same.

I thought that was a before and after!

I could do a better job at home, definitely complain.

You have lovely hair

That’s incorrect. Foils are often needed for balayage on very thick hair (like OP’s) and for clients who want a high level of lift (like OP).

What you’ve asked for is like how my hair is styled, and what you got wasn’t it. To achieve this look my hairdresser bleaches pieces balayage style. He takes pieces of varying sizes and weaves the hair that he’s bleaching so it looks really cool. He then adds a champagne toner, but you could go for an ice colour if you prefer. I don’t get mine redone too often because I like how it changes and grows out & I can have a toner added to brighten it when I get my hair cut. What you’ve ended up with reminds me what mine looks like when it’s long overdue to be redone. I suspect they’ve avoided using bleach. But I’m not a hairdresser.

It’s really hard to communicate tone online so please hear the following in the kind-but-firm tone of your most sensible friend 😊

It would be very unreasonable and very unfair to go to head office when you haven’t given the salon the opportunity to fix the problem. It does not need to be a confrontation. Either ring them first (write yourself a script if you want) or go in person with a friend.

If you saw a high lift in the sections before toning then I strongly suspect that the issue is simply with the toner and if this is the case it is an easy fix.

Good luck, and next time post on Style and Beauty. AIBU brings out the folk who will tell you that they can create exactly this look with a swimming cap and a bottle of Domestos.

Not an expert, but the hair you requested would have been lifted (bleached) to a very light shade for the super blond bits. I'm guessing yours won't lift that far without serious damage.
An all over toner would give a more even colour, it wouldn't leave the high lift areas that blonde.
Did they say anything about what they could achieve? My dark blonde (which looks brown) needed a few bleach processes to lift out the red/yellow, then toning to the light blonde. It's a science.
Thankfully I'm metallic silver now 😁 But it's natural.

It doesn't look great, but hair reacts differently and it very much depends on what you have done before, your virgin colour and condition.

Please could someone explain toner to me? Is it like an extra colour? To tone down the yellow bits? Is it permanent? My work colleague often has a pinky tint and looks icy blonde fresh from the salon and then it sort of yellows. Is that toner?

@GellerYeller toner changes the "tone". It can be a semi or demi colour left on only until the tone changes or it can be a true toner, depending on the salon and the needs of the client/hair texture etc.

It works using the principle of the colour wheel. Some tones cancel out other tones for example purple cancels yellow so a purple tone would make bleached blonde which is typically yellow appear to be whiter. Blue cancels orange so a blue toner would make brassy bleached hair appear light blonde.

They can also add other more natural tones such as golden blonde, caramel etc.

I had balayage done for the first time recently and paid similar. I think I would definitely complain OP. My hairdresser warned me that it would take a few sessions to get up to the lightness desired but already I can see notable difference and different blonde tones. I hope you can go back and have a conversation with them.

Also - when I say complain what I really mean is to go in and say that you’re unhappy with the result and would appreciate if it could be rectified - not to be confrontational, just honest. Not a hairdresser but I’m sure any hairdresser would want to know that their customers are satisfied - plus you’re literally a walking advert for their handiwork!

There's one odd patch of very light blonde at them bottom right. Seems odd.

It doesn’t look professionally styled either… there’s no shine or « pop » if you get my drift.

Also is it just me or does the cut seem a bit wonky on the bottom right? Seems to be a large chunk which doesn’t quite fit?

Argh!!! I would be gutted OP 🫣🫣🫣
That’s a lots of money to pay.
I personally would go back &
ask if the toner will gradually wear off to leave
the hair more like the original picture you took to
show.
i would also make it clear how disappointed I was, wouldn’t go back and maybe leave a poor rating review on their Facebook page/SM account depending on the outcome of how the complaint is resolved.

i colour my own hair and it looks better than that 😵‍💫

Very expensive for what looks like a few highlights. The photo of what you actually wanted does look very stripey so perhaps the hairdresser tried to make it a bit more natural. I would go back and complain

Doesn't matter what the hairdresser thinks. If the OP wanted it stripy then that's her choice.

The hair on the right is foils, 3 or 4 colours and not Balayage