Beautiful minds

The pandamic mantra ‘we are in this together’ holds true for the beauty industry. The initiative – Beautiful Hearts Funds – is an initiative by the beauty industry for the beauty industry.

 The beauty fraternity is setting industry goals of being united during these tough pandemic times. The top-notch of the industry is extending every possible help and support to those in need. Beautiful Hearts Funds is one such initiative, established in April 2020, out of the desire to support smaller barbers and parlour owners and staff who have been struggling during the last lockdown phase. This initiatve has been started again as several states have once again announced the lockdown in India, which has impacted the salon and beauty parlour industr Priyanka Parshurami connected with Blessing A Manikandan, CEO, TONI&GUY (South India), to know more about this initiative that is touching lives across the beauty and wellness industry.

Tell us about the vision behind initiating the Beautiful Hearts Funds.

On our beauty and wellness community WhatsApp group, there were a lot of discussions on the challenges faced by the industry due to the COVID-19 effect and aftermaths. We observed and sensed the distress faced by several. This is what led to the Beautiful Hearts Funds, an initiative that will act as a fundraiser for those in the industry in need of financial support. As part of this initative, I would personally like to thanks Rekha Chowdhry and Uday Takke for their volunteering spirit and Savio John Pereira and Rajesh Iyer for the motivation. (refer to the box for list of contributors)

Why the name Beautiful hearts? What was the thought process behind this name?

The word ‘beautiful’ is synonymous to the beauty and wellness industry, and since this is related to the well-being of this business, we arrived at the name – Beautiful Hearts Fund.

How much funds has been raised in 2020, and in this almost year-long initiative, i.e, from April 2020 till date, how many professionals have benefited from the initiative?

This year-long initiative has managed to raise close to Rs 250,000, and this has helped almost more than 25 families who were badly impacted by the pandemic wave. The major barrier in extending the support to the needy is the silent hunger, where people are not willing to ask help openly and shy away to give their name, photos, profiles and problems to verify, evaluate and route the support.

How do you plan your outreach to pool in the funds?

We discuss and talk about helping our peers on different beauty WhatsApp groups, and this helps us spread awareness and pool in the funds. Someone who is not the part of these groups but wants to contribute can just give a commitment (amount) with their name and contact details. We are not taking the money to our account from the contributors.

Blessing A Manikandan, CEO, TONI&GUY (South India)

Brief us about the working and evaluation process.

We have adapted to a transparent working and evaluation system. Every member of the group can nominate one person who needs financial aid, which must be approved by any two members of the group. Once we identify, evaluate, approve, and announce, the contributors can directly transfer the amount to the beneficiary, after talking to them, understanding, and verifying! In this process, there are no chances of fraud or money laundering. The same evaluation criteria is being followed in the second phase of lockdown too.

How can the industry avail these funds? How can they reach out to you?

Share your contact details, name of the salon and location. Once approved in the evaluation process, the funds get transferred. One important thing here is that this is a project by the beauty industry for the beauty industry. I strongly believe that as we all are travelling in an unknown territory without a navigation system to forecast the future, we together wish to take few brave steps to help the needy on the way, ensure their survival and make sure we arrive safely together to the shore.

Watch  Blessing A Manikandan’s Instagram Live session with us

We would encourage the customers to check with their stylist, beautician, makeup artist, spa therapist, nail artists, and salon managers; to understand if they are going through any hardship, counsel them and support them generously, as those who beautified many lives might be battling for survival. If you have identified a needy or have supported them, take a selfie with them and post it in social media with a message and inspire others to do the same with the hastag #BeautifulHeartsFund.