U.K.-based nail salon chain Townhouse is kick-starting its Stateside expansion.
The company has purchased the two Glosslab salons in Tribeca and Flatiron in New York, per an asset purchase agreement approved March 10. Townhouse paid $425,000 for the businesses as part of Glosslab’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings. Concurrently, Glosslab’s intellectual property was sold to VD Brand Holdings Inc.
Townhouse currently has a salon in Los Angeles with a second on its way, and has now set its sights on New York.
“Our aim is to get to 12 to 15 locations as soon as possible, which will likely be in the next 12 to 18 months,” said Jonathan Millet, cofounder and chief executive officer of Townhouse. “When we got going with expansion in the U.K., at peak, we opened 25 locations per year.”
In the U.K., Townhouse now has 39 salons. “First and foremost, we serve an aspirational customer base, similar to something like Equinox,” Millet said. “The criteria is that these locations have an aspirational high-end customer, and there are a lot of places like that in the U.S., though New York and L.A. are the leaders.”
Part of the brand’s differentiation strategy has been high-profile brand partnerships, said Juanita Huber-Millet, cofounder and creative director.
“We’ve collaborated with brands like Chanel, Givenchy and Tom Ford, and what we’ve done with them and others is curated a treatment that’s specifically curated by that brand,” Huber-Millet said. “We have curated nail art looks, we use the products during the treatment, and press and influencer events around them.”
The treatments offered will mirror those in Los Angeles and the U.K., Huber-Millet said. “We start with a color refresh format for a manicure, then gel manicures and pedicures — we also offer extensions, different types of nail art. We’ve got spring-summer and autumn-winter collections for nail art, which we change every six months.”
The two locations will be temporarily rebranded as Glosslab by Townhouse locations and, pending construction permits, will close for space renovations. “We want to settle the team and don’t want to change too much immediately,” Millet said. “We will do a full renovation and then they will reopen as Townhouse. People can book their current treatments in the meantime.”
