Apprentice Hairdresser

The Bachelor and Selling Sunset made salon stylists look like the people doing fashion shoot blowouts. The reality is closer to a 17-year-old apprentice on a Saturday morning, sweeping the floor between cuts, folding towels, and running coffees out to the waiting clients. The Australian Certificate III in hairdressing runs three years. The apprentice works four days a week at a salon, attends TAFE one day a week, and trains on real clients under supervision. Roughly 78 weeks of structured training plus on the job hours to reach competency. The day in year one is the back of housework that keeps the salon running, greeting and gowning clients, offering tea and coffee, shampooing and applying conditioner treatments at the basin, sweeping clippings between cuts, folding towels, restocking the color bar, mixing color formulations to the senior stylists brief, and applying foils under supervision, once cleared, blow drying, and basic styling under the stylist's eye.