Saturday, April 25, 2009

Wax on NJ- We did it!


On 4/13, we found out late at night that the NJ Board meeting would be early in the morning the following day. We woke up and took my sons to the sitter and drove down to Newark. No coffee yet because we were pressed for time. We arrived by busy Broad Street filled with one way streets and we did not know where we could turn, we finally found Halsey Street but had passed the building and needed to go back again and go around, I could not believe we found parking on the street, I parked and we rushed in. Only to find a security check and that we were 10 minutes late. We ran to the elevator and arrived on the 6th floor where a big conference table held members of the NJ Board of Cosmetology and a small group sat on the side and they were already speaking on the issue of genital waxing.

They allowed for public comment and ASSP Director Rosemary Wiener, presented the board with documents with great illustrations on the different types of bikini cuts and once again the definition of Brazilian Waxing and she explained that the procedure and safety for genital waxing is the same of any other body waxing. They just thanked her and asked if anyone else would like to speak. A member from a beauty school asked when the new rules would be published and Assistant Attorney General, Ms. Sharon Joyce explained end of May and I was still unsure if the Brazilian Waxing would be approved with the new regs. The Board continued speaking on other matters, voting very formally. My Joyce left the room and I immediately followed. I asked her what was happening with the new law in regards to waxing. She dearly explained to me that the section which was stating that genital waxing would be prohibited will say reserved which means that section of the law is on hold. Now the NJ Board had to come up with a committee who would review all the protocols, safe guards, schooling in regards to genital waxing, they are no longer using the word Brazilian Wax since this varies from salon to salon.

So the doubt remained, can we offer or not offer the Brazilian Waxing. Ms. Wiener said we could not since insurance companies would not cover it. I went to greet Mr.Jay Malanga who had been the director of the NJ Board of Cosmetology and works as administrative staff. He is a very sweet man and he greeted me and asked me if I received his letter. I had no idea what he was speaking of and asked if he had sent it to Rosemary and he said no you are the only one who got this letter. He said we could offer the service and use the letter from Division of Consumer Affairs for insurance purposes. I was still not totally convinced. The Board was going into closed session and we drove home feeling good about the meeting but still unsure if we could offer the service and how long this committee would take. We did find out that we could ask to participate in the committee.

We get home and I immediately called Sherry Butler, our publicist ( http://www.slbcom.com/ ) and she thought we should call Jeff Lamm from the Division of Consumer affairs so we gave the media the right info since it was still a little grey. Mr. Lamm explained to us that we could offer and even advertise the service and use their letter for Insurance purposes and also told us we could write to the NJ Board to ask to be notified and be considered for the new committee that will be reviewing information on genital waxing. We got off the phone so thankful and a few minutes later. There it was, a letter on my kitchen counter top, from the Attorney Generals office. I opened the letter and there it said Dear Ms.Reis, on behalf of Governor Corzine. Wait a minute, a letter on behalf of the Governor of NJ on Genital Waxing??????? I was in awe but kept reading on, the one line that totally cleared things up was the following:


"During the Board's further review and reconsideration,genital waxing can continue to be performed"


It is Black and White now, we have the green light to offer Brazilian Waxing once again. We are happy to announce our second location it is now opened, route 9 South, South Amboy, NJ by the Dairy Queen. More info on our next blog post. We could not do this without of God first of all who helped us not panic and to do what was needed. Second of all our wonderful Publicist, third of all Social Media, Twitter and Facebook that helped us in our grassroots campaign. Also Jason Nark from the Philly Daily News who was the only reporter writing facts and not cookie cutter stories. And all of you clients who petitioned, wrote in, supported us, did not turn your backs on us. God Bless you all and now it is back to waxing. 10% off for all our blog readers, just call in and say Wax On and give me my discount :-).


Monday, April 13, 2009

Brazilian Wax Craziness Part II


So on 3/18, we hit our climax where newspapers began to call us for the scoop on how we were fighting back the NJ Brazilian Wax ban. We did not know but the Saturday before SNL mentioned the issue on their weekend update saying that New Jersey would now be called the Overgrown Garden State. TV's got interested in the story as well as radio. a Big thank you to Channel 12 news for coming out on 3/19 and doing a story with us. And a big shout to NJ 101.5 who also came to interview and did a long discussion of the issue with Dennis and Michelle as well as their morning news. We were so excited to have the press involved and the whole world began to discuss the silly NJ wax ban. We were surprised that Philadelphia TV stations and news papers were the first to really be interested in the story. A reporter from the Daily news Jason Nark, was the first to write on the issue and his articles were copied in over 100 blogs., The Division of consumer Affairs had told him it was due to two complaints from women who had placed lawsuits and that the NJ Board would be meeting on 4/14 to vote on the ban. When we saw Jason's first article we immediately contacted him and he called to interview us. He then wrote his second article which was updated info and explained that the Board had already voted on 3/10 and that it was out of their hands now and we needed to appeal to the Division of Law in order for them to investigate if the Board's decision was constitutional or not. Here is the link for Jason Nark's article: http://www.philly.com/philly/hp/news_update/41249322.html.

But people kept saying the same wrong info over and over and were fighting against the current because it was hard to get that out of peopl's heads. So we were so excited that Channel 12 did a great story explaing it better and it grew and grew. We then saw that the controversial Rush Limbaugh mentioned that no government should be involved in women's crotches and we could not agree more. Never though I would say that but I did.

3/20, when we were still getting lots of PR feedback, my phone died and I did not have my cell for an hour. When I finally was able to charge it, I could never have forseen the messages I was getting. " The Ban is off. All is back to normal". I was so confused and so our publicist Sherry Butler and I called Rosemary Wiener to fully understand what had happened. The director of the Division of Consumer Affairs wrote a letter to the Associated Press saying that the NJ Board should reconsider the Brazilian Wax since it was done safely in other places. The media went nuts and began reporting the Ban was off. NJ looked even more ridiculous, Ban one day, no Ban the next. Mr. Schuzman's letter was not a mandate, as Ms. Wiener explained but a recommendation that the NJ Board reconsidered this. The service is still illegal because it has not been written into the rules and regulations and although right now they are not enforcing fines, it is still illegal. Never had such a think occurred, the buck was passed back down to the NJ Board of Cosmetology and they meet tomorrow to discuss how they shall proceed with this issue. In the meanwhile, Brazilian Waxing remains ILLEGAL in the state of NJ. We held a petition meeting at our salon where Ms. Wiener explained all of this to us and we gathered petitions and signatures. The ASSP did another petition now to the NJ Board of Cosmetology for them to really place the Brazilian Wax into the rules and regulations. We shall see what will happen tomorrow.