One of Pakistan’s leading salons, which has branches in major cities of Pakistan, Nabila’s Salon, recently announced that they would open up the salon for business after taking all the necessary precautions.

Nabila, in a video, said that the service industry is suffering the most due to the pandemic but that “we all have a choice”.

“We all have a choice. We can either live in the circle of concern, freak out, watch the news or wait for things to happen, or we can live in the circle of influence and take full charge,” said Nabila.

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She then went onto say that because she is an optimist, she would choose the latter option and make decisions regarding her personal and professional life by ‘Raising the Bar’.

The salon, in a video, stated that it will be “a safe space with a superior level of hygiene combined with best practices and medical level sanitisation to ensure the health and well being of everyone who walks through our doors.”

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The salon’s announcement to open was met with immense backlash and Nabila took to personally respond to them and defend her decision. While comments have now been disabled on the post, screenshots are being widely circulated on social media.

Later while speaking to various media outlets, Nabila said that she will not be bullied. She said that she has not opened the salon as yet but will wait for the government to give the green signal. She said the videos the salon had posted were to tell their clients of the precautions they will be taking once they open and to also let the government know that they are fully equipped to provide services. Nabila shared that she consulted doctors and experts before making her decisions.

The entrepreneur further added that as the President of Pakistan’s Hair and Beauty Association, it is her duty to ensure that her industry, which employs thousands of workers, is also looked after. She said that she spoke to several salon owners who were also feeling the brunt of the pandemic as they have workers and staff to pay and they decided that they will prepare themselves and then approach the government to allow them to provide services with the necessary SOPs and precautions in place.

On the question of wasting PPEs, Nabila said that the country is now producing a surplus of protective equipment and that a friend of her’s who has a garment factory lent her kits for the promotional videos. She said that if needed, she will place an order with him for the salon.

Nabila stood her ground and said that she is being responsible and proactive. She said that she also has employees to pay and that for the past two months, she has been paying them from her own pocket.

Nabila added: “We are responsible for the bread and butter of hundreds of families. How can we not think of ways to fall in line with this new norm? Should we not be considering the possibilities on how the world would work post-corona?”