Kim Cloud | Connecting with Clients in New Ways and in New Locations
On this week’s episode of Around Flower Mound, we speak with the Owner of Cloud 9 Salon & Spa, Kim Cloud. She owns one of the fastest-growing salons in North Texas and is a National Ambassador with Zilis. She purchased her first salon in Lewisville in 1991 at the age of 20 and had a staff of eight stylists and nail technicians working in a 700 square foot space. In 2005, she expanded by purchasing land and building an 8200 square foot facility. Kim is also the founder of Cloud 9 Charities and helps operate bedtime rescue programs to help homeless families find shelter.
Kim says, “I find that those services that we offer are even more important right now than ever in just making someone feel connected. We're one of the few industries where it's okay to touch someone, so even though we're limiting that and keeping that safe, we still have that touch and that personal conversation that we get to have with them to make sure they're okay, and to make sure that they do feel beautiful when they leave.”
We chat about the incredible ways Flower Mound residents support small businesses, as well as:
Creative social media connection with salon clients during stay-at-home orders
Outgrowing physical spaces and preparing for new locations
The importance of mentorship for exponential growth
Cloud 9 Charity contributions to help homeless families find shelter
Supporting and encouraging a team environment
And more
Mentioned in this episode:
Kim’s email address: Kim@Cloud9salon.com
Kim’s phone: 972-317-4384
Kim’s Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kimmycloud
Kim’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kimcloud
Transcript
Voiceover: You're listening to the Around Flower Mound podcast with your host, Nicole Smith Woodard.
Nicole Smith Woodard: Today I am so excited to introduce you to an absolutely fantastic Flower Mound contributor in so many ways. As you know, Around Flower Mound is all about bringing light to community leaders, business owners, parents and charities within our fantastic community. We in Flower Mound are so blessed to have a neighbor who is widely known as the owner of Cloud 9 Salon and Spa and a tremendous contributor to the community. Welcome, my friend, Kim Cloud.
Kim Coud: Thank you so much. I am so excited to finally get to do this with you. I’ve heard some of your interviews and I’m excited to be chatting with you today, for sure.
Nicole: Well I appreciate you and your time so much. I’m going to share a little bit about you and your background, then we’re going to jump into some of these fun questions. So Kim Cloud is a native Texan. And by the way, what generation Texan are you?
Kim: Oh goodness, forever. I don't even know. That's a great question. My parents, my grandparents, my great grandparents so as far back as I know, and that I've heard them speak of, and, of course, same for myself. We're all Texans.
Nicole: I'm a 5th generation Texan, so I totally can and you know, I'm right there with you. So I love it. So Kim owns and operates Cloud 9 Salon and Spa in Flower Mound. Cloud 9 is one of the fastest growing salons in North Texas and she's also a National Ambassador with Zilis. So an astute businesswoman, Kim purchased her first salon in Lewisville at the age of 20. Now in 1991, Cloud 9 Salon and Spa opened in Lewisville with only a 700 square feet space and eight stylists and nail technicians.
In '05 Kim expanded this salon, she purchased land and built an 8200 square foot facility, the first time that Cloud 9 was housed in its own facility and today, we're going to hear about her future plans which by the time this airs may very well be in full progress and this is big. So Kim is amongst her Zilis a leader amongst her Zilis team and has over 1000 ambassadors. Now the exponential growth of Cloud 9 Salon and Spa can be attributed to Kim's personal involvement in the daily operation of the salon, and the leadership that she shares with her son Nathan Dean for support.
Everyone has a commitment to continuing education and to providing each customer with the very best available services and consistent quality. Kim believe strongly in her responsibility to give back in the community. She is the founder of Cloud 9 Charities and helps operate bedtime rescue a program to help homeless families find shelter. And we're going to talk about that today too. Kim is married the proud mother of three and a grandmother, girl you are busy.
Kim: Yes, ma'am. I am.
Nicole: Again, thank you so much for being here with us today. So first question, what is your favorite thing about Flower Mound?
Kim: That was tough for me, I would say just a community that it's been such an awesome place to raise my kids. They all are, you know, native Flower Mounders. And, and to have a successful business. I know there are many towns throughout our country that probably don't support small business, the way that Flower Mound does from, you know, purchasing my land and going through all of the processes of that.
They made it more simple for me, they were definitely Pro Cloud 9, they wanted us to be, you know, in their town, I feel like they really put a lot into the effort of helping mom and pop businesses. And I love that there's 1000s of homes and 1000s of families that support that business that we made a decision, you know, to open in, in Flower Mound.
So you know, just having the right demographic of clients to help us win I feel like is huge. They keep such a beautiful town that people want to live here. So that helps our our business as well. And I like the leadership of this town and of Denton County and the way that they support philanthropy in the community too. For sure.
Nicole: Absolutely. Well, I see evidence of that with you a lot. So tell us about, let's start with talking about your company, Cloud 9 Salon and Spa. What do y'all do? And who do you want to be a hero to?
Kim: Well, you know, we we are a full service Salon and Spa we offer all the services that you know have to do that with hair and nails and permanent makeup and lashes and facials and wonderful massage and just all of the common services that go along with salon spa, we have some unique services as well with some of the new permanent makeup called blush for the lips and the eyelash extensions that are very popular right now we have a very well trained, talented team.
There are currently about 45 of us, and that's who I want to be a hero to, to me during this year, especially during our two months that we were closed. It became very evident to me that Cloud 9 is nothing without this team. Cloud 9 is just a name. I'm just a stylist and what makes me a leader and what makes the salon successful is that team and so at the end of the day, the people that I want to know I've got their back and that I will do everything to help them have success in their decision to be part of Cloud 9, I want to be I want to be their hero, I want them to know, there's nothing that I wouldn't do to help them with their success.
Nicole: That's amazing. Well spoken like a true leader, for sure. Well, you and your team are definitely experts at helping people feel beautiful. So why do you think this is so important?
Kim: Oh, gosh, I think everyone wants to feel beautiful in some way inside or out. I think that, you know, we, we saw again, during COVID, when people went eight weeks without getting their color, or their nails done. I mean, it was everywhere, all over social media, how do I get these nails off? How do I hide my roots.
And so we actually tried really hard during that time, to be a heavy vision inside on social media, where we were showing a video every single day, on something to do to help them continue to look and feel beautiful, even though they weren't being able to have their services professionally done. Whether that was how to get a little more lift and have Texas hair to hide those roots, or how to soak off your nails. Or just every single day, we tried to do something to show because it's just super important.
And I've found lately in the past couple of weeks, on two I've always thought of is extremely strong, extremely faithful, extremely, extremely up, that they're struggling, they're struggling with either worrying about someone in their family being sick, or they're worried about, you know, work and is it going to hold through this, these times. They're worried about, you know, their own health and their own sanity, of staying home and not being around people as much. And I find that those services that we offer are even more important right now than ever, and just making someone feel connected.
They you know, we're one of the few industries where it's okay to touch someone. And so even though we're limiting that and keeping that safe, we still have that touch and that personal conversation that we get to have with them to make sure they're okay. And to make sure that they do feel beautiful when they leave maybe not just their services, but something that we've shared with them or given them hope, you know, with, with stories and things that we have right now.
Nicole: Absolutely one the value that you continue to bring to your clients to the community, even while your doors were closed. I mean, that is a huge gift that you continue to give. So talk a little I know you've been in the beauty, but you've been in this business for your entire adult life. But how did you get to where you are today in this stage of your career?
Kim: Well, you know, I grew up my mother had a best friend that lived across the street and grew up. I grew up in Garland, and she had a little salon in her garage, and I loved to walk across the street and sweep and watch her. And then my mom had big dreams of me being a flight attendant and I did not want to do that. And so on the day that I was supposed to be going to check out Brianna that's my mom worked for about being a flight attendant I snuck over and checked out this local Cosmetology College in downtown Dallas that I've been hearing about and went home and gave her the pros and cons of both and definitely chose the salon industry knew that I wanted to do that for forever started off doing makeup.
And of course the first thing someone says after you do their makeup is boy, I wish you could do something with my hair. And I just I've never looked back and I landed when I moved to Lewisville from garland there were no salons, like what I had envisioned and the very first salon that I was working at I was 20 years old. There were five people working there. And she said would you be interested in buying this place and just recently saw this banker who bill Ellis who had a bank in Old Town and he says salons don't make it anyway, he was at the salon the other day. And he goes I hate that story.
We got it. He made me get a cosigner and I think I paid $5,000 for that salon and, and just never looked back kept moving forward until Cloud 9 opened. And with Cloud 9, my dream was to provide a salon that was different that we were a team, you know, that's something that's really changing in our industry is these salons pop up. And they all have individual rooms. And that works great for many, many people. But you're not part of a team and you don't come out of your room and see people and connect and cloud nine is kept itself differently.
Even the private rooms that we have. They don't have shampoo bowls, and that's for a reason. It's so that they come out and they're part of the team and they converse and we learn from each other and I hope that I'm able to always have that difference where there's a front desk that they get greeted when they walk in the door and your client feels special. And we have housekeeping that, you know, keeps things clean. And of course, right now, you know, sanitary and there's just all these things that set us apart that I make, I think it's what makes Cloud 9 special. And I think it's been a huge part of the success is that we're just, we're just a little different. We're weird. We're, you're self employed, you lease your space, but you're part of a team.
And so I love that I feel like that's what's gotten us to this point, I feel like it's what's allowing us to continue to grow in the future with all these broad ideas that we've got. And so I think it's super important. I definitely believe it's what's gotten us to this point today.
Nicole: That is fascinating. Now, a big announcement was made about your next location. So let's talk about that. What's right around the corner for Cloud 9 Salon and Spa.
Kim: So I'm either going to look like the most brilliant business owner ever, or I'll look like the most stupid. And then the next few weeks will determine that now. We are our current building, as you stated earlier we built. I was a single mom, Nathan was doing hair at the salon, but he wasn't interested in the leadership portion at that time. Now he's a huge part of the daily operations.
I didn't have Christopher in my life always say it was BC Before Christopher. And I built that building with a lot of help from Todd Weaver. He was my agent, but he was so much more than that. Because I didn't have a clue what I was doing. And I always say you surround yourself with people smarter than you. But we built that building, and I thought we'd be there forever. I didn't buy the frontage, because it sounded like it was so much more expensive. I look back now and thought man that would have been like, you know, a couple 100 bucks a month.
At the time I just felt like we were an oasis is what they used to call us. You know, we set out there by ourselves for a couple of years. And then of course, I mean, just we're completely surrounded. Now there's a carwash being built right now to the to the east of us. That was kind of the last of the land. And everything was going along great. And one night Christopher and I went to dinner at Mardi bees and we were we had parked over by the fountain. And we were walking in us and witness lawn be beautiful right here, totally 100% came out of my mouth, no plan at all.
And he said do it, I think it'd be great. And he's he's with Coserve. And so he did some research for me to see what was coming within a certain mile radius. And how many 1000s of homes were growing in that area. And it just became obvious that it was the right thing to do. When we reached out the first time about the land, it was not for sale. And I think about six weeks went by and all of a sudden we got a phone call that said if you're still interested, we're interested in talking.
And so we went through all of those processes and purchase the land and put our building for sale. And I truly thought it would sell like immediately, I just thought it would be so fast. And it took two years. And I had so many people especially since April this year, say, you know, one thing about it is it may not have anything to do with you, the sell of your building, and the timing of it could have everything to do with the people that are purchasing it. And that let me just relax and shut up in my head. And, you know, is this ever going to sell it's time it's time it's time I've got to go do something on that land, to just relaxing with it. And the building showed more since May of this year in combat, you know than it did the whole rest of the time combined.
And all of a sudden, we had lots of people looking and wanting it and the dream buyer would have been someone that would not be in a hurry. either an investor or someone that had time left on their own lease, and would let us lease back for a year while we built. Boy, that would have been nice. That's how we got a. Yes, so we decided that it wasn't going to sell anytime soon. Let's remodel. And we did a beautiful remodel. It looks so pretty and so fresh and so new. We went from warm colors to black and white and green. I mean, it couldn't be any more opposite. And we finished that remodel on a Wednesday. And on that Friday, two doctors, husband wife, came in and saw the building, fell in love with it and did a letter of intent. And we were like, of course they are you know, of course.
And what was interesting is they really wanted it to work for us too on the year thing of leasing back so much so that we tried really hard to work out something where we co mingled and when they first came to me about it, I was like, that's not gonna work we're full. But in looking at it and looking at the layout, we figured out ways to make it work and that was moving along really well. And all of a sudden something with their financing. SBA didn't love the fact that they were going to do a little bitty part of their construction and sit on their loan for the rest of the year. And so they came back to us and said, it's just not going to work. We need you to get out. And so then we started negotiating, getting out, which I needed, probably needed six months. No, and then it went three months. No, it went to anyway, it ended up being seven weeks.
From the time we went under contract to the time they needed us out. And 100% by face without closing, I had to go secure a spot. Find a spot and I got a phone call after a couple of days that a dance studio had moved out in Lantana. During the night, and did I want to come see it, they moved down on the Sunday, we went and saw it on Monday, we walked in everyone that was there was like, Oh my gosh, this is perfect. And we made an offer. And I had to make a decision on whether or not to sign that lease. And this is where this talented and loyal team comes in.
After a week literally of not sleeping, I woke my husband up when Thursday morning at 3am. And said the part I think that's making me crazy, is I haven't told the team yet. And I can't sign the lease. If I don't have people going with me. I can't hire anybody, you know, an architect or a contractor unless I know I have people and the only way I'm going to know I have people is to sit them down and be honest. And just share my heart with them. And so we did that on a Sunday night at Marty B's, we gathered everybody. We said, first of all we want to celebrate for just a second, raise your glasses. You know, we've sold the building, and we let them boop, and holler and clap.
And if you ever been buying a house in the house, you were in sold really fast. And you had to move to the itty bitty apartment or to your parents house and people raising their hands off the wall. That's what's happened to us. In order to make this work, we got to move back home to mom and dad's house. So they wrap their head around it, they got excited. They've supported it. They've covered us in prayer. And so we signed that lease, we hired an architect. And we've hired contractors, and they're almost done. And we haven't closed yet. Wow. And so we're I say that I'm either going to be brilliant. I mean, it's against everything you would ever do ever do. And everything was moving along great.
And now they've asked for an extension. And so we're back in that our brains are really having to focus on faith and trust. Their extension isn't about the building. It's about the remodel, and they're trying so hard to combine that loan. So it's slowing things down, because they're of course waiting for their contractors. So every day is testimony of faith in this whole process, and I just, you know, I prayed that the building wouldn't sell if I wasn't supposed to do this, I prayed right that, you know, I every step of this, we've prayed and it's happened and I just have to believe and do believe that. We're on our way. And this is just a stepping stone. And within a couple months we're gonna look back and laugh at this adventure and what we went through but it we have to do this step to be able to get to that dream location on frontage road of 407 with heavy traffic, you know, in front of Marty B's.
Nicole: Love it. Oh, my gosh, I'm so excited. Well, I said by the time this airs, who knows? It'll just be a little blip in it. And then you know, like you said, just don't just walk by faith, what a testament to. And I know a lot of what I know a lot of the demonstration of your faith I've seen in the community is through your Cloud 9 charities. I know that this has evolved. How did that charity come to be?
Kim: I had someone that was very, very dear to me. Mentorship is extremely important to me. And I had someone that I approached I was volunteering for a local charity, and I met her there. Sandy Thurman is her name. And I said how do you get involved with the community? I mean, I've been in this community for a long time. And I've been taking taking taking and you know, how do I how do I give back and she said, we know you volunteered. So she helped me that was at PG place. And then she said you've got to get involved in the, you know, with the chambers and so I did that and all and then I decided that I wanted to do some type of little fundraiser and I wanted to raise money. And so we started with this little bitty fashion show out here in Lantana.
On a Sunday afternoon, I think we had about 75 people there. And that grew over the next 12 years to a very large event. And at that time, Cloud 9 charities was all about helping other nonprofits have success with their mission. So if you were a nonprofit, and you needed help, in conducting your mission, you would reach out to us for basically, I guess, what you would want to call a grant or a donation. And that went like that for years, probably 10 years. And about nine years ago, I was watching a 60 minutes program. And it was a single widowed man who was homeless, living in his work van with his two children. And she was a high schooler and the boy, his daughter was a high schooler and his son was Middle School, and it showed what they went through every morning and how they got ready for school. And it was like a wonder, you know, if we have an issue with this, because it gave the numbers of how many homeless they had.
And I started doing my research. And it was mind boggling to me how many students we had registered in LISD that were considered homeless. And so we, in just carrying on that research, we discovered that there was a hole, it was getting fant homeless families off of the street fast and into a local hotel so that they could make a long term plan. So we've also often been called a band aid, and that doesn't hurt our feelings any because they just need a minute to be safe and warm, and decide what the heck am I going to do next. And we always help families, we've become well known enough to police officers and churches and other nonprofits that if they come upon a homeless family living on the streets or in their car, they know who to call. And within minutes, we can have them set up in somewhere in Denton County, in a local hotel. And then we give them information about other nonprofits that help them with a long term plan, or a lot of times, maybe they've just gotten a job, but they haven't gotten their first paycheck.
So we help them anywhere from a week or more, just to get get that minute to make that plan safely. Lately, we've also had additional phone calls from battered women. If you've read anything, or seen that in the news during these COVID times, the numbers for that have risen, sadly, and so we now are getting some phone calls from police stations and things like that, where there's a woman that needs to get out of a situation quickly. So we're also doing that as well. But we are now 100% Cloud and charities is 100% bedtime rescue, we made that decision in February of last year, that this is such a great need, that we don't need to be giving away any of our proceeds from events to other nonprofits, we in fact need to 100% work the bedtime rescue program. So we've been doing that for a little over a year.
Nicole: I love that evolution. And isn't that the truth where once you get really, really focused in on where your gifts are, that the the resources just present themselves. So I love that I know to request timbers rotary, we you know, we are one of those that share with a lot of the different nonprofits. And that's one of the reasons why I know we picked y'all is because of we didn't want to just re give to somebody who's going to re give right we wanted to do that impact within the community.
So I love that. Well, you have obviously first of all, thank you again for just sharing your heart with me and with with us and, and just getting a little bit of behind the scenes of what what it takes to be you to run a successful business to contribute in such a big way to our community. Now, you've obviously had a lot of successes. And I'm assuming in the process, maybe things that would be considered learning opportunities. But what do you believe? What do you believe that makes some people successful while other struggle?
Kim: I think for me, I was raised by human cheerleader. Literally, my mother was all three of us. I'm the baby I have two brothers. We all are what some people might call a workaholic. I choose to say we're just you know, hard working determined people. I never remember ever being able to be negative and I'm just mean like, or to consider giving up. She just was behind us all the way wanted us to dream and dream big. And then in doing that, so I just always had this vision of where I wanted to go.
And I think when you have that and your mind and your eyes are focused on that vision, I think that's huge. If you're just getting up every day and just kind of doing life and don't have those dreams and those goals, you're, you definitely have a bigger struggle in getting there. And I would secondly, say mentors, I, I am surrounded by people that are so much smarter than me in different parts of what I do. And so during this process of making this decision on whether to move forward with this buyer, there's been lots of phone calls to many different people, from banking, to business, to leadership to whatever in helping me make that decision.
And I, I just think that in this day and time to have a successful successful business, you got to have a can do attitude, but you've also got to have mentors that help you get there. And you just got to be willing to take huge risks.
Nicole: With with huge payoffs too, so I love that. Was there anything I didn't ask I know, we talked a little bit before about, you know, before we started the recording, is there anything that you just have on your heart that you want to share as part of this platform?
Kim: I just think that I think we talked about it a little bit this team, I, I get super emotional, I found I discovered this part of myself during COVID when we were closed, and how important this Cloud 9 team is, to me how important their success is to me, and how important it is that they know that every single day when they walk in, they've got to two people that are that have their back. And that dream. I mean, I cannot wait to get them into an area where we're seen from the road, that there are fewer salons for competition. And that to watch their businesses just thrive. I'm excited for that. I'm very excited about the future for Cloud 9. And the future of this team's success because they've shown such loyalty through this year through such a difficult time.
Nicole: Well, I love that they're lucky to have you at the helm. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for joining us today on the Around Flower Mound podcast. How can people connect with you if they want to learn more? Or if they need some sort of beauty service?
Kim: Yeah, absolutely. So, the phone number is 972-317-4384. That's Cloud 9. You can reach me by email, and I can help you set up an appointment or just to chat it which is Kim@cloud9salon.com. Kim@cloud9salon.com. And then of course you can private message me on any of the social media, Facebook and Instagram, things like that. I'm pretty easy to find. Yes. I'm easy to find.
Nicole: Exactly. Around and in between.
Kim: Who knows where I'll be. When the client pre books right now they say where am I going? I'm like, I don't know. I'll let you know.
Nicole: I love that. Well, we'll be watching social media for all this to play out beautifully and perfectly in perfect timing, I'm sure. So, thank you again for being on the program today. And I look forward to seeing you soon.
Kim: Thank you so much. I appreciate you.
Voiceover: Thanks for listening. And when you're ready, here are three ways Nicole can help. One. subscribe to the podcast for more inspiring stories and interesting people right here on the Around Flower Mound podcast. Two thinking of selling your home? Email Nicole@NicoleSmith.net. for a copy of this month's up to date report on Flower Mound home prices. Three, looking to buy a home and Flower Mound? Join us for this week's Flower Mound home tour. Email Nicole@NicoleSmith.net for the details.
