YES! YES!! YES!!!

What my beauty therapist reminded me about business finances

Decision Consulting | June 2026

At a glance:

• A conversation in a beauty salon reminded me why so many service business owners feel something isn't quite right, even when business is busy.

• Profit feels lower than expected. Cash feels tighter than it should. And important decisions are often made without a clear understanding of what's really driving the numbers.

• The instinct is usually to fix the most obvious problem, often pricing. But pricing is rarely the whole story.

• Before changing anything, every business owner should ask three simple questions about profit, cash and what the business needs to do next.

• Businesses like Daisy's don't need quick fixes. They deserve clarity about what's really happening beneath the numbers so they can make confident decisions without compromising what makes their business special.

I walked into Daisy's (names have been changed to protect privacy) for my regular monthly beauty appointment. A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do to keep the façade going after all!

I sit down and wait for her to start with me and just like usual, we get into our "what's been happening" chat. During this exchange (which the client before me is also listening to - another regular occurrence at Daisy's, where complete strangers listen into others' stories and sometimes even contribute), she asked me about my business.

What exactly do I do. I looked at her and said " I help service businesses understand and act on what their financial information is telling them. Why profit feels lower than expected..."

"YES!"

"why cash feels tighter than it should..."

"YES!!"

"and what they need to do next to improve the performance of their business"

"YES!!!"

Those enthusiastic "YES"es were unexpected. But I also felt relieved. Relieved that the problem I had seen and wanted to help businesses solve when I started Decision Consulting, was real.

When I stopped talking, Daisy looked at me with her eyes bright, and said I have all these problems. Her client before me who had also been listening to our exchange then left, but not before wishing me luck with the business.

I've been with Daisy for almost 20 years. The last thing I want to see is her business in trouble. So, I was glad when she continued on and said "I have two ladies coming into fix my pricing. But I don't want to change my pricing, my customers are like my family. Everyone is doing it tough these days and I don't want to increase my pricing but it's costing me more and more."

This comment took me back down memory lane...to another small business owner, Tom, a hairdresser I was faithfully visiting for 10 years. He wasn't cheap. But his service, the location of the salon and the entire experience was something I wasn't willing to sacrifice for price. Then, he moved to another place, and the prices increased. Slightly. I visited once. After that I realised it wasn't value for money for me anymore. The new place, the new experience, same service and higher price point just wasn't working. Sadly, not long after, his entire business stopped.

This is the reality many small and growing businesses face every day.

Businesses like Daisy's aren't built on price alone. They're built on trust, relationships, consistency and years of looking after people. That's why customers keep coming back. Change one part of that equation without understanding the whole picture and you risk creating a much bigger problem than the one you were trying to solve.

So what does a business do when there are resounding "YES"es to the questions on profit, cash and knowing what to do next?

The instinct for most businesses is to fix the most obvious thing first. And when profit is the problem, pricing usually tops the list. And I understand why. When costs are rising and margins are shrinking, raising prices feels like the logical lever to pull.  But pricing is rarely the whole story. Sometimes it's not even the main story.

If you raise your prices without understanding what's actually driving the problem, you risk doing exactly what Tom did. Changing one thing in a carefully balanced equation and watching the whole thing shift in a direction you didn't expect.

Daisy knows this instinctively. She knows her customers. She knows the relationship she has built with them is worth something that a price list can't capture. And she's right to be cautious.

But neither does instinct alone pay the bills. 

So where do you start?  This is where many business owners get stuck. The instinct is to change the thing that's easiest to change. But before changing anything, I believe it's worth asking three questions.

Why is profit lower than expected?

Sometimes it is indeed pricing. But other times it's something else entirely. Costs that have crept up quietly. Jobs or clients that look profitable on the surface but consume far more time and resource than they generate. Revenue that's growing but margins that are quietly shrinking.

Why does cash feel tight?

This one catches almost every business owner by surprise. Because profit and cash are not the same thing. A business can be profitable on paper and still struggle to pay wages on time. The gap between money earned and money actually in the bank is where a lot of businesses quietly get into trouble.

What does the business need to do next?

This is the question most financial conversations never get to. The numbers tell a story. But the story is only useful if it leads somewhere. What decisions does this business need to make right now? Can they afford to hire? Should they take on that new client? Is the growth they're chasing actually making things better or just busier?

These three questions don't replace an accountant or a bookkeeper. They do something different. They take the financial information that already exists and turn it into practical actions that move the business forward.

Back to Daisy

I've been going to Daisy for almost 20 years. I've watched her build something that goes well beyond a beauty appointment. She has created a space where people feel welcome, where strangers end up listening to each other's stories and where loyalty runs deep in both directions.

That's not something you can put on a balance sheet. But it absolutely shows up in the numbers if you know where to look.

What I want for Daisy, and for every business owner like her - is not a price increase or a cost cut or a quick fix. It's clarity. A clear picture of what the numbers are actually saying, what's driving the problem and what she can do about it without sacrificing the things that make her business worth coming back to.

Because those resounding "YES"es she gave me? They told me the problem is real.

What Daisy deserves isn't a quick fix. She deserves to understand what's really driving those problems so she can make decisions with confidence, while protecting the business she's spent almost 20 years building.

I think every business owner deserves that.

About the author

Anushka is the Founder and Principal Consultant of Decision Consulting, a boutique finance advisory practice working with founder-led small and medium service businesses across Australia. With over 18 years of senior finance experience managing large, complex cost portfolios, Anushka helps business owners understand where their profit is really coming from, why cash feels tight, and what their numbers are actually telling them. She is CPA (Australia) and CIMA (UK) qualified.

Enquiries: hello@decisionconsultingau.com