Faith Ariremako (The Hair Queen), founder of Royalpriss Hair Hub, is driven by a passion for empowering individuals through their hair and building meaningful relationships with her clients.
Her journey with Royalpriss began with the desire to create a space where people could feel confident and cared for, both in terms of their hair health and overall well-being.
Faith Ariremako shared with Today Africa about her entrepreneurial journey.
Tell us more about yourself and why you are called the hair queen
My name is um God’s Faithfulness, which Faith is just part of my name. My name is Faith Ariremako and I’m passionate about haircare. And it started when I wanted to regrow my hair.
I grew up in a Christian family where the literal word is SU. So we had the rules of virgin hair. So it went on and on and like that, but somehow along the line, my mom retouched that hair because her hair was seriously hard.
And I was so concerned so one day my mom wanted to help me work through my hair because most times my mom was also the one that styled it.
She wanted to work on it this very day and my hair was very thick because there’s one thing about natural hair, when you wash it and you don’t use or put it in a protective style, it becomes very, very hard.
I wasn’t even aware of that and my hair was hard. I left it for five days and she was very angry. She tried to comb my hair and the comb was removed from my hair. And later on when she tried it, the comb just broke.
She tried another one, it broke the second time and she was angry. So she told me to go and buy UB, there’s this relaxer called UB and relax my hair.
I felt so sad for one reason or the other. So I had to cut my hair afterwards and she took me to the salonist that helped me afterwards. I wasn’t happy and I felt like this is not my identity.
It’s more like me being an African lady and something else is now trying to divert and change my hair. I said, no, this is not my identity. I’m not going to allow it to go like that. So I cut my hair and this went on for over four years.
When I got admission to the university, I wanted to grow my hair because you know in university, you want to do different styles. So I was interested in those styles. I said, you see this hair, I’m doing it and I want it to grow so fast.
And I was looking for different ways. I tried different products but because I didn’t understand the basics of my hair, I needed to understand it. So it took me time trying different products that do not work with my hair.
It will work for others and they give testimony. But for me, somehow I just find it hard. Fast forward to 2020 during the Corona period, I was in my room reading books. And the Holy Spirit told me, how about you mixing this and this to your hair and let’s see the result and I was like hmm that’s nice.
And I just went to a store very close to us. Those people that do these local herbs so just asked her do you have this specific thing and she said yes. I bought it and I had a little shea but and I said ah this thing is not good enough so I did my personal research and it took me a month for me to now finally understand my hair.
When I did, I created products for my friends while I was resuming back to school. I told them to use it. And in a few weeks, they were coming back to tell me, ah, this your product worked.
This is my receding hairline that is going back, ah, I can see the result. Please help me make another one. They started referring me to other people. My university is not that big, so news easily flew around that was how everybody in the hostel was reaching out to me.
I didn’t know that there was money in this business. I just did it for fun. So before I knew it, I just said, okay, what brand name can I give myself? I have a business name. So I need a brand name and I came to LinkedIn about maybe six years ago and I saw everybody doing their own thing.
And I said, the Bible has already told us, I’m sorry, but I’m a Christian and I carry that influence everywhere. I know the Bible has told us that we should dominate and anybody that is dominating over a sphere of influence is called a queen.
I thought, okay, hair plus queen, that makes sense. So that’s how I started using the name and people were like, oh, ‘Hair Queen’ and even through me people have started using something like that.
I met somebody that said her name is Hair God. I was like, wow, I like the initiatives of people, that is how I came about the name Hair Queen because I feel like I am dominating the hair world, that sphere of influence.
Tell us everything about Royalpriss Hair Hub, your services and products
As a business owner, I do a lot but Royalpriss Hair Hub is basically there to help women and later on, we will diversify. But let me say to help both the women and men to build their confidence, and to also have healthy hair.
Because many people are not interested in you having healthy hair. They are interested in selling their products. They mix different things that in the long run would affect their clients. But for us at Royalpriss, we are particularly interested in how our customer feels, patronizing and working with us.
That’s the major mission and our plan is to be in every state in Nigeria. We want that presence so that we’d be able to serve the African communities. Later on, God can help us to spread into the nations of the world.
“My name is Faith Ariremako… and I’m passionate about haircare.”
But for now, we’re interested in helping African women build their confidence and become a better person. And even look at them and say, ah, “God dey try, you created me with the best hair and I’m proud to flaunt it anywhere, anytime without having to cover it or use any other product that can affect their hair.”
For our services, I offer different services, but one of them is a personalized hair care consultation because everybody has a different hair. Some people have frizzy hair, some people have curly hair.
We just have hairs in diversity. So the products that works for A might not work for B. So before I recommend products to people, I want to know what hair do you have?
Together we would sit down, we would run a test on your hair to see if this product will work. Does your hair absorb water or it repels water? Then this product would work for you, this would not work for you.
So that is what I do. I call it a personalized or a tailored consultation to help them select the best product for them. Aside from that, I also train people that are interested in going into the air business. Those that need guidance, I help them through with that.
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What about your products?
For the products, I have the shampoo, conditioner, and the hair oil. This shampoo was made with love but I would also say was also made with nature. I didn’t just pick any chemical out because I was very specific about what these products will do for them.
So this shampoo was made with herbs and natural soaps that would help people retain their hair oil. Because if you use the random shampoos, it will strain your hair oil and at the end of the day, it will leave your hair dry.
Naturally we have people that have dry hair. So imagine you now use a product that will now still dry your hair in a very weird way. We have our hair oil and it is called the catalyst oil. Maybe for people that are on the go and don’t have time, this one helps.
And it helps to speed up the growth rate of your hair. We have hair cream and they are just in different packages. This one helps your hair to be soft and thick. So some people that have very hard hair, this product was just created out of every one of my struggles.
Anybody that is struggling with very hard hair, I can always recommend this kind of product to them to make their hair soft. And people that also want to grow thick hair, this also works.
My products are not limited to only women. I gave some of my male friends the shampoo and you know the oil. So it’s not limited to the female gender.
You started your business as a student, so how were you able to handle your business and your academics at the same time?
I wouldn’t come here and say, oh, I’m a very organized person as such. When I started the business, I had capital, my dad gave me money to start and I had some little money, so I usually take enough products to school.
When people just come around, I need your product. I just hand it over to them. When it comes to marketing, you know, during classes, during breaks, I just tell them, see your hair, that your bad hair, you need my product.
I was marketing my products in a way that would make them interested. So it wasn’t that I gave my business full-time attention and my academics were suffering. God helped me to be able to balance both of them.
And my business wasn’t time demanding when I started because I just make my products, give it to people when they need consultations, they come in the evening. During my time in school, we didn’t cook so I had enough time in the evening.
What were the challenges that you faced in the beginning of starting your business and how did you overcome them?
That’s a very thick question because contrary to what I studied in school, I studied accounting. But what you study in school many times is different from real life.
So one of the things I struggled with is accounting for my products, accounting for how I spent the money. When the money comes in, you can just say, I’m going to eat without actually having to remove my profits.
So I struggled with spending my profits plus my capital. It was later on that I noticed that my business was suffering and I had to now sit down and understand the business of accounting.
That’s one of the major issues I struggled with. I must say that I struggled with marketing, and I’m still learning on the go and I’m not there yet. But marketing my products immediately after I left school was a struggle for me.
Because like I mentioned earlier, my school wasn’t very big. So we literally knew us and my products were popular. I didn’t have a competition in school. Anybody needs products, I’m their go-to person.
But when I left the school environment and I’m home, nobody bought from me. It’s just my friends, my schoolmates that believe in me. After I graduated, I kept wondering, how can I sustain this business?
I must say that it was for about one year, two years, even after I graduated school, I didn’t get sales. It was that bad. It was just from people that know me. And when I reach out to them, they say, where they are is far, and the money for delivery is much.
Aside from the business of accounting, I struggled with pricing my products because I wanted it to be nice. I didn’t want them to say, oh, your product is expensive. I’m not going to get it from you. So I just wanted to give it out because I want you to see what it does.
It was hurting the business and I learned that in a hard way. I learned that in a hard way. And now I do better with these things.
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What strategy have you used to market your products and to attract and retain your customers?
The strategy is creating an experience for my customers. When somebody reaches out to me and says I want a product. I will not just tell you, get this product. I want to meet with you and I want to understand your problems to recommend the right solutions.
When I do that to them, they’re surprised, oh, you’re having my time. I just wanted to get this product so by giving them that experience, I could have easily sold a product without packing it for them.
But no, each of my products comes with a special package and how-to-use guide. Even this oil, so if anybody is getting it, it comes with a how-to-use guide and a way of appreciating them.
So like I mentioned, the number one thing I do is to give them that experience to come, to keep wanting more. Another thing that I do is use my WhatsApp status a lot to sell because those are people that believe in me.
They know me from school. They’ve used my products, words of mouth. So my WhatsApp status talks about my products every now and then. When losing my hair, I show them how bulky it is. I comb it and show them why they need my products so that they can get that softness.
I’m looking into using ads, but that would be later into the month or next month. I’m looking to expand my business by using ads so that I can get new customers that are actually interested in my products.
How are you able to balance the promise and equally make sure that your products don’t have side effects on the user?
I’ll start with the side effects. My products are purely herbal and natural things from our local materials. Nothing used that is harmful to one’s health.
Now coming back to the part, the question of balancing people’s hair. That’s why before anybody buys my products, and if he/she’s not a returning customer, I want to have a consultation with them because my product is not a product that works for all.
It doesn’t work for everybody. It works for a particular set of people that it was created for. So if somebody comes to me and says I’m struggling with my hair cutting every time. I’ll say at this moment, I don’t have a product, but I can create a product that works for you.
And if they are interested, I go ahead and do that. I know that over time, when God has blessed us, we will now have a range of products that people with different issues can easily walk into the store and pick what works for them.
At the moment, the current product I have does not work for all. So that’s why I’m interested in knowing what you’re currently facing and I’ll help through.
And people that help to redistribute my products, I also encourage them that before you sell the product, have a conversation with them, refer them to me, let me speak to them, then before we sell.
As much as we are trying to sell our products, we are also interested in the experience that they get so that they can become a loyal customer and also a returning customer.
“We do a personalized or a tailored consultation to help our customers select the best product for them.”
Is your business adhering to the compliances of your own industry here in Nigeria?
Yes, my business does and when I’m producing my products, I ensure that everything is done in the right way because I can’t face the law. I can’t.
How has the Nigerian economy impacted your business and your decision as a business owner?
When I started my business, I started with a very little amount of money and that was around 2020. Maybe everything I needed was around N20,000. But I must say that if I want to do the same size of products as I did in 2020, I’m going to be using 10 times that amount.
I went to the market and I wanted to get the same thing I started with and I was spending over 200,000 just for the same thing. So it has really affected the pricing, but I ensure that it never affects the quality that I give to my clients. If you want something good, you pay for it.
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How were you able to build your team or bring people into your business that helps in the smooth running of business?
I would say that having the right cycle of people. Because when I started business, like I said, I started it based on my passion. And in the words of ChatGPT, it will say, you started on vibes.
So I started it because I had passion. I had a passion for hair care. But I had my circle of friends. I had somebody I said then who was a marketing specialist.
And one day, he called me and said, business is not done this way. Do this, do this, and through my friend’s advice, I was able to build my business to where it is at the moment and get the results I’m getting.
First of all, I say have the right circle of people because as a small business owner, you cannot pay everybody. You cannot pay every specialist out there because you don’t have the money.
But when you have the right circle of people that can guide you through every stage, it becomes very easy.
How is your business doing today and what does the future look like?
I would say my business is doing relatively well and in the future, I see it’s turning into a generational business, not just a business that after I die, the business dies.
It becomes a product that everybody wants to associate with just like the Veeky James brand, every bride wants to associate with it because of the name. So I see Royalpriss doing something like that, building a legacy that people can relate to and would want to relate to it.
How do you plan to build the legacy and make it a generational business?
The first is having the right strategy, registering the business in the right way because if you are thinking that you are building a generational business, but you are using a business name, instead of using limited, it would have effects in the future. So registering the business, having strategies that work, and maintaining the quality of the products in the long run.
What are some key things that you have learned in your journey as an entrepreneur?
I think one of them is patience because you cannot grow your business overnight. When you start a business, we always have the intention of, I will blow, have money by the end of this thing.
But running a business, you have to be patient because there are days you are excited, when you sell well, there are days when things are bad, you can go on month after month and you’re just there crying and believing in God.
So one thing that business has taught me is patience and consistency. If you’re not consistent, people will forget about you. Passion is great but structure sustains every business.
You can have passion for business but if you don’t have the right structure for marketing, right structure for the money that comes in, it will fail, it will break.
Also in business, I’ve also learned not to assume. Track numbers, those N10 that banks are deducting, track it because it will have effects in the future.And for you to start as a business owner, don’t wait for everything to be perfect because nothing is ever perfect.
There will always be lapses. So don’t wait for everything to be perfect. And also, like I mentioned, learn to build relationships, I’m very bad with maintaining relationships, to be honest.
Because I’m not really an outspoken person but business has taught me to be a bit flexible, irrespective of my nature. I need to be flexible if I want to stay there, if I want to stay on top of my game. I need to be flexible and maintain relationships, healthy ones.
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What advice would you give to others, especially women who want to start their business?
I will tell them to pause. Before you start that business, pause and ask yourself, this thing that you’re going into, is it as a result of passion or because you just want to make money.
If they say no, I would tell them, okay, start small. You have to stay consistent. If you want to grow and you have to build quality relationships because business is not actually about selling.
We have people that sell but they are not relevant. It’s about being relevant. It’s about staying on top of your game and people knowing you. Imagine the famous people that we know today if they’ve not been consistent, nobody will know them.
We have movie makers. I’m sure you must have heard of this odogwu parara. It’s not his first movie that made him blue. He has been making movies for a while, but because he was consistent, he stayed on it and one day he hit it.
So the same thing is for business. Start small, stay consistent and one day you will hit it. That’s my advice to them.
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