Episode 45: Leia Love Shares Why Purpose Matters More Than Profit

What if the business you built could help people recognize themselves again? Today we are talking about purpose-driven businesses, so stay tuned. Today's guest has one of the most unique and purpose-driven businesses we've had on the show. I'm joined today by Dr. Leah Love, restorative tattoo specialist, educator, speaker, entrepreneur, and founder of the Leah Love Spark Beauty Fund. Leah, operates at the intersection of beauty, healthcare, and confidence and healing, helping women reclaim their identity after surgeries, trauma, and cancer treatment through restorative tattooing and trauma-informed care. And what I appreciate most about Leah's work is that she's built a business that is both deeply human and operationally excellent. So Leah, thank you for your time today.

Thank you, that was amazing introduction.

What you do is really wonderful. So I would love to start at the beginning. I mean, we've known each other for a long time, and I've, I've watched your entrepreneurial journey. So can you share your entrepreneurial journey with the audience?

Yeah, so I am a 20-year licensed cosmetologist. Um, I did cosmetology in high school, and I went to college to learn how to run the business side. Um, so after I left college, I think I worked for about 2 years, and then I was like, oh, I'm ready to go ahead and start my business. Um, in reality, I don't think I actually was, but you know, that's what entrepreneurship is, right? Building it as you go. Um, and so now 14 years later, and a nonprofit added in I am surviving as a business owner, salon educator, um, just doing everything that I absolutely love.

So at what point did you realize that your work was becoming something much bigger than just beauty services? Because you do a lot of different things.

I do a lot. Um, and I think that honestly, I say this job of doing areola tattooing is my God job, and it's one of the most impactful pieces of business that I have ever done. Um, and I just never knew how big this was going to actually become. And I say that because I think when you think about the impact that you're making— hair, nails— that's always like, to some people it's life-changing, right? There truly is. Um, but to have somebody literally their their human essence has changed. Someone who has come in and told me they don't feel like a woman anymore, and then to be able to look in the mirror and say, "Oh my gosh, I feel like myself again." Yeah. That's not something that is just easily given back to people. So, I think that whole intersection is what really, really allowed me to see the impact and purpose of what I'm doing. Yeah.

So, I know you've described your work as beginning where medicine leaves off. So can you talk a little bit more about how you identified this gap? What made you, made you go into this field?

Yeah, initially it was after somebody had hair loss. And the conversations that I used to have with cancer is it stopped. Oh, I had breast cancer. It was just that very superficial. So I would see people when their hair was messing up, when their nails were messing up, their skin's messing up, when they lost their eyelashes. I did all of those. But when I realized I was at a conference for cosmetic brow tattooing— okay, again, never thought I would ever be doing this portion of the work. But there a lady was talking about how women were left after mastectomy, and I just had no idea how they were left after mastectomy. And so it really just kind of ate at me, and I was like, this is something I have to learn how to do. So I took so many classes. I even went over to London to learn and train with this lady. And so just being able to do that, I was like, this truly is the intersection of any type of healthcare crisis. We see everything. And just as a— and as an example, I had a client who she was having hair loss and normally they're shedding, we know. Then there's breakage. I'll tell them how to identify that kind of thing. But when it's an excessive amount of hair loss, Most of the times it's something internal that's going on. And as a cosmetologist, we can't diagnose, treat, or anything like that, but we can recognize those symptoms to say, hey, you need to go talk to your doctor. Yeah. And so she went and talked to her doctor. They ran a few tests, nothing. She said she's fine. Okay. We kept doing some things, still had the hair loss. I was like, you need to go back again. I was like, you need to advocate for yourself. Yeah, because there's something going on. Fast forward, she says, "I found the lump in my arm. Never would have thought it was cancer." Wow. And she worked in the medical field. So, she ended up having cancer, and her biggest symptom was that she was having this hair loss. So, you know, there's always this intersection that we see the signs and symptoms, and we see people so much more, so much more frequently than they see their actual doctors. So, just being able to help them be better advocates for themselves is a, a very powerful tool for me in my beauty industry.

So something else you also talk about in your organization is you specialize in trauma-informed care. And as, as a cosmetologist in the beauty industry, it's not something that you would often see, which I think is, is amazing. How do you build those systems and standards to protect the emotional wellbeing of clients while you're still running your strong business?

Well, I think that one of my values is care. And I always tell my employees, I'm like, "I can teach you all the techniques, but I can't teach you how to be a good person. I can't teach you how to care for people." That kind of has to be inside of you. So, it's not necessarily that we even had to change any of my operating procedures. It's engraved. It's who we are. It's what we just naturally do. But when you are just thinking about trauma-informed care, it's really just making sure you're not re-traumatizing somebody. And if you're not intentional about that type of thinking, you will easily retraumatize somebody, and then you won't even recognize that they're being retraumatized. And it'll just be this whole situation of, well, I don't know what happened. I never paid it, you know, like, um, one of the things I, I also look at is like my consultation. When I'm having a consultation with somebody, it's not only just listening to the questions. I'm looking at, are they looking at me in the face? If they're not looking at me in the face, sometimes they've been so beat down, I have to just work on that part first. Are their hands really fidgety? Are they super anxious? Do I need to give them a stress ball or something like that? Or, or maybe they just need actual time. And that was one of the things I implemented in was, um, I have a calming room that they sit in first, and it has a mood therapy light. So I really try to get them relaxed and ready to go mentally. Um, but then, I mean, you just really have to observe people and see how they're moving and reacting to things. And a lot of it is so unspoken. That you just really have to be detail-oriented and people.

Yeah, I think a lot of times business owners think that systems are all about efficiency, but there are so many and there are really great systems that you've created that can really protect people. So appreciate the work that you do there.

Yeah, really building that safety, that place of safety.

Yeah. So you pursued a doctorate in professional cosmetology. I mean, you became, you became a doctor in your field where most people stop at just licensure. So how did pursuing that mastery change the way you lead and the way you built your business?

Honestly, it's about mastery. I want to be the best at what I do. I want to provide the best level of care. I want to be the most skilled. And so that never stops. Like, I've never stopped learning, training, going to different classes, presentations. And I feel like I learned something everywhere. Like, not only in the beauty industry, I can look at other industries and take from them. And like, I'm reading this book, Uncommon Hospitality.

Yes.

You know how to— I know, right?

Yes. So good.

How do you really enhance that customer experience in that customer journey? But I think that my level of education builds that trust that I have done the work. I am about precision. I'm about being prepared and being consistent and that I know what I'm doing.

Yeah. How do you— because I feel like you do a really good job of scaling trust and building trust with your clients. How do you continue to do that and scale it effectively?

Honestly, I think it's a gift. Uh, because I would agree for you, it is.

I think it's, it's absolutely a gift.

Wow. Because I can be in the grocery store and people will literally tell me their whole life story. Mm-hmm. Um, so I just think I have a natural level of trust with people that they know that they're in good hands. Yeah. Um, and I know at a, at a period of time I was like, I'm gonna stop advertising and I'm just an entrepreneur of faith. Um, and I was like, all right God, whoever you want to come sit in my chair, I know that you've I sent them. And no kidding, every single person who from this new area of areola tattooing, they'll say, oh man, um, I think God just wanted me to come to you. I was supposed to go this place or that place, but they told me I needed to come to you. Um, so just that level of trust that this isn't a very well-known type of thing, but people know that they can trust and they've got word that they can trust me. Yeah.

Well, well known too. I mean, you've done some, some pretty impressive things in, in competitions and, and continue to get higher level certifications. I mean, you continue to build at your craft as well.

Mm-hmm.

So you've got some, some pretty good things going on. I would love to hear or learn more about the Leah Love Spark Beauty Fund. Can you tell us, tell the audience about, you know, what made you move in that direction, what it is, how it supports people?

Yep. So I was, I had a client who reached out to me and she wanted to get the areola tattooing, but price was, was a barrier to access. Um, so I was like, you know what, I'll go ahead and do it for free. But then I realized that this was something that wasn't just a one-time issue. Um, you know, there's a lot of reasons why people can't afford certain services, whether they have insurance, they don't have insurance, they've met their deductible, something has to go into the next year, now they have to do that again. Um, and then there's just people who can't afford to pay private pay. But there's just a lot of underserved communities, and I did not want access to confidence to be a barrier for people. I just I don't feel like that's something that should be. So I created the Spark Beauty Fund so that I could provide the free services, um, to those, those women who really, really deserve to be able to have this. Um, so it's, it's been a great addition. Um, and I don't know if it's like a— wasn't necessarily like a business move, so to say, but, um I don't know. It's, it's definitely one of those things, again, that's purpose-driven, that allows people just to have that access.

How long did it take you to kind of determine this was what you wanted to do and then put everything together?

Again, you know, this all took me by surprise.

Yeah.

Um, and even when I started, like, there wasn't even a ton of researching that I had to do because it was like, you understand that 1 in 8 women are going to get breast cancer. I mean, that's just the numbers. Those are crazy numbers. So it's not something that's going away. Our numbers are increasing. I had a male who had breast cancer, so the male numbers are increasing as well. So it was like, this is something that's going to be around. I need to do it. There's not a lot of people who offer this. And then my background with hair color, never would have thought that that really translated into seeing people's, like, skin tone, undertone, being able to match these colors artistically. Because I never realized there were so many breast colors. Yeah, I have not created the same color yet. Wow. Um, so, so yeah, so there's just so many nuances to it. That there has not been a huge plan. And like, I'm, I'm literally building it as I go. There's not a lot of people I can look at and say, hey, you know, what's this blueprint? I'm literally creating a blueprint as I go. Um, and I hope to be able to expand that into training other professionals, um, so that they can have a better blueprint of what, what to do in this, uh, industry as they're moving through. Wow.

So I know you've got the Spark Beauty Fund. You also do a lot of different work in the community. Community impact is something that are fairly passionate about. So what would you say to business owners who are starting to think about maybe getting involved in their communities that want to make a difference, but maybe they don't know where to start?

So I went through the Emerging Philanthropist Program. Okay. And that was one of the best things to help me really hone in and decide what I was passionate about. So I'm passionate about women, I'm passionate about cancer, and I'm passionate about entrepreneurship. Um, narrowing those three areas down, I've been able to be way more impactful where either I can I can donate financially, I can donate my time, or I can, um, actually physically work. So like, I physically volunteer at Stuart's Caring Place, I sit on the board for the Black Chamber of Commerce, and then I donate to a ton of different organizations. So I think that if you just find what you're truly passionate about and then don't try to spread that out so far that it's not really making an impact, you know, you have those core places and you can really do more with a core than you can with so I love that.

Tell me about, you know, I see you everywhere. Yeah. You're, you're at all the different meetings, all the different networking things, all the different community events. How do you balance between, you know, the business owner work that you're doing, the things that you're really passionate about, the community work and, and taking care of yourself?

So I do not believe in balance. I feel like there's an opportunity cost to something. And so what I do is I just weigh that opportunity cost. Am I going to be okay when I wake up that I look the other way. I chose left for right. And like one of those things is I have nephews and they started getting to the point where they would say, "Oh, Titi, you have to work. Oh." So, I didn't want that to be the narrative with them. Now they do know I still have to work sometimes, but now I can make that a priority of what I'm actually shifting for them. But when I get burnout, and I think that a lot of people don't really take the time to sit and listen to their body, I know it's time for me to travel, get away, or take a class. And I have to do those things to keep myself refreshed, to keep from getting burnout, because I think that's when people lose their passion and their desire for what they're doing. And I never wanted to get to the point where I was at that. And then the customer suffered because of that. Because sometimes you just look at somebody like, if you don't want to be here, just quit. Like, yes, you do not like this job, just go.

No one's a hostage.

Yeah, you know. You know, so I, I don't want to be at that point and I don't wanna provide that type of environment. Nice.

So we're gonna go back in time for a little bit. So I know that you served on the Professional Services Task Force during COVID Mm-hmm. What did that season teach you about leadership and uncertainty?

Main thing is being prepared.

Yeah.

I think during COVID we found a lot of the gaps that businesses had that they thought were not gaps.

I know I did.

Right? Um, and one of the, one of the things for me, um, and being on the task force was really great experience. Um, but looking at how we operated, the biggest thing that saved me, I would say, was having an emergency fund. Yeah, like they tell you 3 months. Nope, it's 6.

Yeah, it was a lot more.

Um, but thank goodness that I had that emergency fund. And not only do you have to have one have for your household, you have to have them for your business as an entrepreneur.

Yes.

Um, and I was able to— half of my staff was getting paid, they're all W-2. Somehow the system messed up, half weren't getting paid, half were. So for the half that weren't, I was able to still give them like a little something, like $100 I think a week, just to make sure that they still had food. I'm like, y'all should have prepared yourself on the other end. But, um, just being able to have that, still have my rent because all that's— all my overhead was still due. Yeah. Um, and not have to worry and stress out about that was a big gap that I was so happy that I had built foundationally. But I noticed that there were other gaps, and I think it was a good learning opportunity to people to really sit down and examine if this happens again. I mean, I'm looking at this virus that just came from the ship, and I'm like, we are not about to go through another COVID. No, no, no, we're good. But you know, I'm thinking about that. I'm like, okay, did I implement everything? Let me make sure that I actually did.

Yeah.

But yeah, that was, that was a big learning lesson and how to lead and how to make sure that you have all those gaps filled. Yeah.

Did anything change permanently for the way you run your business now?

The things that changed, I just think were minor operational things that needed to change. There was nothing that we had to pivot completely as an industry or as a business as a whole because of it.

Okay. So, Leah, last question we ask all of our guests that are on the podcast. So, If someone wants to get 1% better in their business today, what would you tell them?

I think 1% better is really just continuing to figure out how to be the unicorn. I think when you look for ways to be different and unique, you never get complacent. And complacency is such a terrible place for a business owner to be. You want to stay innovative, you want to stay engaged, and you want to continue to look at how your business operates. This is another thing I'm going to add in too. Sit in each seat. Oh, at— yeah, your, your table. Um, because sometimes it's so easy to get removed from different areas and you assume something should be operating a certain way. And when you go back and sit in there, you're like, oh my gosh, how are you operating like this? Yeah, like they have made a way out of no way for some people. Um, you're like There's a way more efficient way to do this. So I think that's a really, really good principle to continue to follow.

Wonderful. Well, Leah, thank you for your time today. We're going to link all of your information in the show notes, and I'll be back to talk about the summary. Here's what I hope people take from our conversation with Leah today, that the best businesses are not built only on skill. They're built on care, on trust, and on standards, and really on being unique and having the willingness to truly see people. So Leah, Chrissy Myers' story is such a powerful reminder that businesses can absolutely be profitable and purpose-driven at the same time. And sometimes the most impactful businesses are the ones helping people recognize themselves again. And if this episode encouraged you or made you think differently about leadership and service, share it with another business owner who needs to hear it. And again, let's always keep getting 1% better in our businesses.