The HONA Podcast - Episode 1 - Intro
The inaugural episode of the HONA podcast hosted by Mike and Charl, detailing the story behind their brand, HONA (Home of Nail Art). They recount their journey from humble beginnings during the COVID-19 lockdown, where they started making press-on nails and various nail art supplies to keep afloat financially, to eventually creating a fully hypoallergenic gel system. The hosts emphasise their commitment to community engagement and visibility as brand owners, sharing insights and tips from their extensive experience in the nail industry. The episode features a new segment, 'Spotlight of the Week,' celebrating notable figures in the nail industry, and 'Community Q&A,' where humorous and unique nail tech horror stories are shared. Upcoming plans, including a post-Christmas party event for nail technicians, are also discussed.
Charl: Hi,
Mike: here we go.
Charl: Welcome to the HONA
Mike: podcast.
Mike: No, HONA podcast with Mike and Charl. Wow, I'm finally glad we're doing this.
Charl: Same. I think it's been a long time coming. Yeah.
Mike: Why are we doing the HONA podcast? Should we go straight into it?. The
Mike: HONA podcast, essentially, I think when we first started off We were always on Instagram live in our kitchen. A
Charl: fun time. Pre baby
Mike: No, Billy was a thing then. We used to have
Charl: a little wine and a whiskey.
Mike: And we always used to get such lovely feedback. We used to get really in touch with the community.
Charl: Yeah,
Mike: and I think it's important as owners of a brand to be visible to be accountable.
Charl: Yeah,
Mike: so I think this is a way for us to start being more visible. It's a way for the community to start seeing us more, to understand who HONA is, who they're buying from, as well as start giving the community and Nail Tech's advice and tips, what we've learned over the years, because I come from a business background.
Mike: You're a Nail Tech of decades. Wow,
Charl: don't make me sound old. Yeah, about 15 years, I'd say.
Mike: So we've got a wealth of experience that we can share.
Charl: Yeah.
Mike: I think it was a real good thing that we're finally getting to do this because I, how many times have we said over the years about, let's just get live more, let's do it more.
Mike: But when, for those who don't know, we had a baby a year and a half ago now. She's going to be now too. And any mums out there trying to find time, in the evenings to do content or to film content or even just doing a podcast, I guess is nigh on impossible.
Charl: Yeah, absolutely. I think, like you say, it brings us back to, it was so much fun doing those lives and it did keep us really engaged with customers and it was just really fun.
Charl: So I think, like you say, it's an
Mike: expectation. I think, now we're probably the only people in the UK who don't have a podcast. First and foremost, there's an expectation that the community should see us. They should know what's going on. They should know who they're purchasing from.
Mike: And
Charl: yeah,
Mike: so that's why we're starting the podcast. But do you want to, do you want to get, I'll tell you what, we'll get straight into it, but we're going to do a new segment every single. start the podcast, so start on a high, we're gonna do a spotlight of the week. And a jingle.
Charl: That's great! So we'd love that.
Mike: So yeah, spotlight of the week is a special mention, a special shout out to somebody from the nail industry. Who's done something notable. It could be an amazing or creative nail art design. It could be something where they've just given back to the community or can just be generally just somebody who needs that little bit of a pick me up.
Charl: Yeah, absolutely. I'm going to start one off. I was about to
Mike: say, with that said, are you having a go?
Charl: Yeah, no, I'm going to start one off because when we mentioned about this. in the office this week straight away all of the girls mentioned the same name and that was our lovely Lynn Hancock. For those who don't know, I
Mike: was
Charl: gonna say it.
Mike: I know it's Lynn's Nails and Beauty.
Charl: With a Z.
Mike: With a Z cause she's hip.
Charl: She's cool. Yeah so Lynn came to everyone's forefront. Basically, Lynn is very local to us and she is so cute because every single time that she knows that we've either had a big sale on or something's gone viral, she offers to come in and help pack, bless her of her own time.
Charl: Oh, that's a nice one to start with. I think this has been like the second or third time now she's to all
Mike: our events as well.
Charl: Yeah. She's, An absolute diamond. So thank you very much. Oh, nice way to start.
Mike: So should we get into the episode?
Charl: Absolutely.
Mike: So this is episode one of the HONOR podcast with Mike and Cheryl.
Mike: And it's going to be about who HONOR is, how we started, our origin story,
Charl: Cheryl's
Mike: background, my background, a little bit of a get to know you, get to know us, so that moving forward, you know what we're about. Because this might be the very first time you've heard of HONOR.
Charl: Yeah. So if anyone is listening or watching for the first time, because I know that we're going to stream it on all different platforms.
Charl: We are HONA originally called Home of Nail Art. Yeah. So HONA
Mike: is actually an acronym for Home of Nail Art. And how Home of Nail Art first got started was down to COVID. We're a lockdown baby.
Charl: You're going to do your tapping.
Mike: Yeah, so Holder is a lockdown baby. So let's cast our minds back to lockdown one and Oh my god, doesn't it feel like
Charl: so yeah, was it
Mike: 2019?
Charl: Yeah.
Mike: Lockdown one, Charlotte, like every other nail tech in the country got shut down. So Charlotte had a successful salon.
Charl: Thanks.
Mike: Charlotte had a successful salon and it got closed. Boris came on the telly and said do not go to work.
Charl: I know.
Mike: And you and every other nail tech in the country was like, What
Charl: do we do now?
Mike: Does his nails work? But as a double whammy, I also was told to stay home. And this was before the the companies were getting paid. What was it called? Furlough. Before furlough. I got made redundant within the first two, three weeks of, lockdown. So we went from being, I would say we were comfortable, we would enjoy, like we only had the house to pay the mortgage a car, a dog, but we gone, we went from being comfortable, enjoying to all of a sudden having to see like absolutely nothing coming back into, income into the house.
Charl: It was scary, wasn't it? Yeah, I think that's the thing obviously, being self employed you, you had that security, with the job, but straight away, like you say, redundancy. When I was made, yeah, when I, and it's just
Mike: In hindsight, I wish I could speak to my old boss now, because he panicked and he just made me redundant before the furlough.
Mike: But I think that happened
Charl: to a lot of people as well. I know so many people that just got made redundant straight away.
Mike: Yeah. So we got made. We were adding household income went to zero and we just panicked. But you know what it was? There was a silver lining and the silver lining was a Mexico holiday.
Mike: that we had a refund for.
Charl: Oh it's sad to say it's a silver lining, because I would have loved to have gone to Mexico. But that silver
Mike: lining gave us 2, 000 to money we didn't think we had. And I remember it vividly you were sat on the bed, you were quite upset. You, I was sat on the bed in the spare room, and you were on the desk, and you, we were like, oh, what can we do?
Mike: What can we do?
Charl: And I was already creating. Just as a creative person, I wanted to just keep doing stuff. Yeah. And one of the things that like a lot of clients actually got in touch with me and said that, would I make press on nails? And I saw loads of people that were doing it online and it was never something that I thought, are people even going to want like nails in lockdown?
Charl: But people did.
Mike: So I think like you and I don't know, a million other nail techs in the UK started making press on nails and you were sourcing your supplies from everywhere. And I was like. I bet you I can make so many supplies to help you increase your profit margin. And so I remember I went, Oh my God.
Mike: I went on the computer and I made decals. So like water transfer decals. And I went to, I bought them on Amazon decal paper. And I made these decals on my computer.
Charl: Go on, tell them the design. It was the very
Mike: first product Kona ever sold. With. pink donut water transfer decals.
Charl: Literally
Mike: and I still have the, I have the very first product framed in the office.
Mike: So yeah, we, it's, we started on making tracks. And I took the piss out of those. Yeah,
Charl: you did
Mike: take the piss. And so we, I started just trying to make supplies for Charlotte to increase their profit amount. And then you were part of a WhatsApp group and you were like, oh, to all the other nail tech girls and guys Mike's making these.
Mike: Yeah did you
Charl: want them? Yeah, and then you were having them. And you
Mike: started telling your friends. And they were like, oh. I asked Mike, can you make these type of ones? Whether it was like Harry Potter ones or flame ones. And I was like yeah. And I was charging a pound of
Charl: decal.
Mike: So they were probably costing me, I don't know, a pound for 10.
Mike: So I was making quite I say I was making quite a lot of profit on it. I didn't factor in the time making them. I didn't factor in having to go to a print shop to get them printed out. I didn't factor any of that in. But in my mind, I'm like, Oh, it's only costing me a pound and I'm making 10 pounds from one.
Mike: HONA was made from necessity. We started off just trying to keep afloat. One thing led to another. Charlotte's friend started asking for more important, well more important stuff, more creative stuff like glitters and we sourced glitters and we were hand pouring them in our kitchen.
Mike: It was
Charl: the pouring of that, the poor dog. So what we did,
Mike: so we, what we got these little glass jars, I think some might be available on the website now, we got these little glass jars, we folded up paper. We folded up paper into a cone and we just poured them in and we had an overflow cardboard box underneath.
Mike: It's the world's worst way to do it. It's so stupid. We were all covered in glitter. But
Charl: it's funny now like to look back at how we started and compare it now to our processes now of how we source, we manufacture, we do a lot of stuff in house that I don't think a lot of
Mike: people realise. The very first step is always the hardest step and I think COVID made us, they pushed us to make that first step because we had nothing else to do.
Mike: We had all the time in the world. We're lucky we had that holiday cash injection refund. So we had time and me left alone with time. Like I go crazy. I have to do something. And so yeah, so HONA is a COVID baby. Our lives got thrown into a washing machine and HONA is what came out.
Charl: Yeah.
Mike: And
Charl: I think what a lot of people don't know.
Charl: Didn't realize as well as obviously. like you say, it was a COVID baby. It happened during lockdown, but then that time that I went back to work when I was allowed to go back to the salon, you were running that on your own.
Mike: So that's how HONA started and how we continued is you've just got to be consistent and HONA, I was consistent with I got made redundant from my job.
Mike: I was picking up like laboring work here and there. I even went knocking people's doors like saying cut the lawn, washing windows, whatever I did just to get more money in the house. And on the side of it, I was selling these decals, these glitters, like anything I needed to do to try and I keep to try and pay our mortgage and stuff.
Mike: I think it's
Charl: quite good as well, the different sort of skills that both of us had. The fact that you were obviously able to create a website then for people to be able to go on and buy these things. And then having Once I was back in the salon, I was able to almost get back into it and tell you, Oh, okay. Now we're gonna need this coming out or we're gonna need like chromes or flakes or foils. And then it was like, it just snowballed from there I think.
Mike: Yeah, so we're a very fortunate team that You had all this experience and skill and I had the know how and the determination basically to go find and do this stuff and together, it's just, I don't think it would ever have worked if COVID didn't happen.
Mike: I don't know if I would have been able to commit the time. I don't know if you would have been able to committed the time with the salon running a busy salon.
Charl: Yeah.
Mike: So yeah, so one thing led to another, we always knew from the beginning that HONA was going to be releasing its own gel system and it was highly important for us.
Mike: Because during this entire time there was the whole talk about allergies and safety and I'm sorry if she doesn't want but Georgina, so the person who's been with us the longest, our very first employee she has a severe allergy and she was working with us before we even had any gels and We knew we, we couldn't even, she can't even be in a room with certain products.
Mike: So from the get go, it was just a, it was a no go that we're going to have to go down this route. And it's it's been forced upon us and while I've been learning and while we learn in the industry as a whole, it's just been such the right decision to make time and time again.
Charl: Yeah. Obviously, again, for any of you that have never heard of us or don't know, we are a fully hypoallergenic gel system.
Mike: Yeah.
Charl: So we didn't, I don't think that was even a conversation when we first started out with, glitters and foils and things like that. Like we never even It
Mike: felt like a mountain away, didn't it? Yeah.
Charl: Yeah. And then, the whole talk of allergies and everything during COVID, it gave us that push.
Charl: And I think you say it perfectly. Like, why would you not want to future proof yourself?
Mike: Yeah. So
Charl: so
Mike: I knew instantly like with Georgina, like we wouldn't have been able to we wouldn't be able to release those type of product. So and I knew Most employees couldn't have had them on. By working with the chemists we do, like we were we are so spoiled with experience from that chemist.
Mike: We've got a UK chemist we work with. We've got a USA chemist we work with. We've got a German chemist we work with. Each of them are fab. Like we're so fortunate that I can literally get them on the phone, have conversations about anything, whether it's about TPO, that's originally in the news, or whether it's about different forms of hemo or whatever.
Mike: I can just have human conversation and they can really explain it to me, like why it's important, why it's not important.
Charl: Yeah.
Mike: So yeah I do think HONA's been on a real big journey up until this point, and I've always said from the beginning it'll get easier, it'll get easier, it'll get easier as we grow, and it just hasn't.
Mike: It's just exploded, hasn't it?
Charl: I think this year in particular, and I don't even really know why. It's just, it seems to have just gone from I
Mike: Strength to strength. Strength
Charl: to strength. And not only that but our actual team has grown
Mike: as
Charl: well.
Mike: I think what our biggest thing is that we are community led.
Mike: HONA, oh my god, our eyes and ears are on our community day in day out. So whenever they're saying XYZ type of design is fab. And if we're not quite able to be able to deliver that type of nail art, we will get it, we will start the process of getting it.
Charl: Yeah, I think maybe people don't know now, but I, very recently actually gave up my salon.
Mike: Go on, tell them your story then, yeah. So I think a lot of people just assume that it's been me and Charlotte. Yeah. From the very beginning.
Charl: And it really hasn't.
Mike: And it hasn't. Like we said earlier, like lockdown made Charlotte close her salon, and then when the salons in the country reopened, Charlotte went back to work.
Charl: Yeah. I
Mike: obviously got made redundant, so I was doing odd jobs and doing that.
Charl: Yeah, so you could like solely focus on that. Yeah but
Mike: HONA then wasn't a 80 hour a week job or whatever, like I was getting one or two likes on a post and I would go in comment to that, comment hey, then I'll go into the DMs, try and strike up the conversation.
Mike: Like I've come
Charl: home from work in the salon and I think you used to panic, didn't you? Thinking that, why would people want to buy from me?
Mike: People
Charl: need to hear your voice. Please voice note them. My
Mike: whole thing was, why do they care about a bloke? Why would they speak to a bloke?
Mike: Why would they speak? Why would they care? But there's
Charl: so many people in this industry
Mike: that are like male
Charl: founders. Yeah.
Mike: Yeah. I know now, but at the time I was like, they don't care. Like they don't I felt like an imposter. And it's come on. But yeah, anyway, come on, your story.
Charl: So I obviously, like you say, went back to the salon, but I had.
Charl: That same salon for a couple of years, then I obviously went in to move into a bigger salon because it was just, I've always been the type of person that I want to look towards that next thing and having the sort of bigger salon with more staff, it was, that was what I envisioned. And it just seemed to be then that once we started going, HONA was taking off more.
Charl: So I then was like okay, do you know what? I'm going to close the salon on a Tuesday and I'm going to work with HONA on a Tuesday. And then. It just didn't really work that way, did it? Because I felt like I was like there for one day a week, back to doing my salon work, then in the evenings we'd come home and we'd do messages and community things.
Charl: Yeah, this year I made the decision to close the salon and I am officially now with HONA full time, which is really exciting. But it's what the end goal was, so my sort of role within the company now, I do a bit of everything, but my main role, is product testing. So yeah, you're definitely
Mike: quality control.
Mike: You're our. You're our in house nail tech if that makes sense. So what I mean by that is Charlotte knows what's popular, what's not popular, what comes in season, what goes out of season, when nail techs are starting to think about buying their Christmas products or when they're thinking about saving their money because it's a quiet time.
Mike: Charlotte goes through all our chemist conversations which we have and say this is what we want tweaked with this product, this is what we want tweaked with this one this product needs a complete reformulation, this is why, this is what we're trying to achieve. You're our in house neotech where we throw everything at you and you tell us from the industry point of view.
Mike: Yeah. This is what this should be. This is what that should be.
Charl: Yeah. I think, again, having so many years in the industry, trialing loads of different things, trialing, what works, what doesn't work. I think that does really give me a little bit of a benefit. You
Mike: come from the background of, A, you used to work in a salon as an employee.
Mike: Then you went self employed in our back bedroom. Then you went into a salon with just you and one other staff. Then you grew to like a super salon with multiple floors. So I feel like you've gone on the journey of a nail tech, even to becoming an educator as well. You've gone on to having your own stu education studio.
Mike: You've gone on the journey that a lot of nail I've done a bit of everything. Yeah. So you have a wealth of experience in all these areas that is just becoming valuable.
Charl: Thanks!
Mike: Ha! You're
Charl: welcome. No I love it. And I love now being able to almost take that next step. I feel like As a nail technician, you've always got to evolve and grow with how you see your career going and obviously I definitely saw this.
Charl: There's definitely
Mike: a whole episode on what success looks like
Charl: for a nail tech which,
Mike: look out for that one in the future. Move on at
Charl: that time. Yeah
Mike: because we thought success looked to you was a super salon, didn't it?
Charl: Yeah.
Mike: I've never called her a super salon in my life. I've said it twice now. One of my clients,
Charl: It was, she was actually a last client of mine, Sarah, shout out to Sarah.
Charl: She always said Charlotte in a super salon and yeah, bless her, loved it. So shall we move on to our next section of the podcast. So
Mike: every week, we're going to have a community question. It can be via email, it can be via our Facebook HONA community. It can be via Instagram. So look out for the question and engage where you can just because it's a nice bit of fun.
Mike: It's a nice bit of engagement for us both. It gives us some nice funny content. So I actually don't know what this is. So
Charl: I've taken a few here. So what's the question?
Mike: So we put a question in the Facebook community, which was.
Charl: It was on, I can't remember what it was. It was
Mike: Nail Tech Horror Stories.
Mike: So I haven't seen the answers here.
Charl: Basically the question that we put in there was What story comes to mind that still haunts you to this day? There you go. And I absolutely loved reading some of these. It was quite disturbing. There were some that I probably couldn't read out.
Mike: Before we start. I'm baffled that there's even this type of horror stories like that.
Mike: Oh
Charl: my god.
Mike: Because I wouldn't go to so I obviously get my nails done by you now, so it's different, but I wouldn't go to a barber's with knowing that, I don't know, like I've got gel in my hair, do you know what I mean? Nevermind, I'm a little bit dubious what horror stories this could be.
Mike: Honestly,
Charl: I think in this industry, I think, because, My background is full beauty as well, so I do everything, and I know a lot of people that may be listening, they maybe, not just nail techs, but lash techs or general beauty therapists, so you see a lot going on, and, oh my gosh. So this is our community
Mike: Q& A question for this week.
Mike: Nail Tech Horror Stories. Nail Tech
Charl: Horror Stories. We're going to keep everyone anonymous. Just in case we don't know whether clients will listen. But yeah, so one of the ones that stood out to me, which is quite rank. Doing a pedi on a new client that had dirty feet. She stuck her dirty foot out to me and said, Nail Tech Horror Stories.
Mike: Lick it. No way.
Charl: Honestly, if that happened now, this client would have been asked to leave. But I was a beginner and I just took it. I'm sure she was joking but it makes me gag to this day thinking about it.
Mike: The fact that they're dirty first and foremost.
Charl: It goes back, would you go Oh my god. If you're getting your feet
Mike: done.
Charl: That's horrific. You'd wash your
Mike: feet first, surely.
Charl: I would and
Mike: or is it like, is there an expectation? No, I'm going to, I'm going to the salon. I want to get my money's worth. They can wash my feet as well. I suppose you get
Charl: two different types of people in this world. Like I can throw one in there.
Charl: I had a waxing client that came straight from a spin class. I personally, could not do that to somebody. I just couldn't. Ladies,
Mike: don't do that. But yeah, honestly,
Charl: there was some in here. Ooh, brother, ooh. So she said lick it, okay.
Mike: So she said lick it. You're a freak, whoever you are. I'm
Charl: glad we're anonymous.
Mike: Client, if you're listening and you've done that, shame on you.
Charl: You've done the dirty though. I had a client that came for the first time. This seems to be a theme, first time clients. Like
Mike: You just go, Oh my
Charl: god. I did her nails. All were sparkly and lovely. She then asked me if she could order takeout to my house.
Charl: And I was like, girl, I have anxiety. I can't say no to you. So I said, sure. You can just eat it on the way home, can't you? And she just smiled. Smiled. She proceeded to eat greasy KFC on my brand new nails. And I didn't even take a picture of yet. And then she asked if she could use the toilet. Then she spent half an hour in the loo with her vape and when I asked her to leave multiple times she just mentioned her bus wasn't here yet.
Charl: And I had another client in my chair staring at me like what the fuck is this girl on? Then she proceeded to leave her rubbish just on my floor next to my sofa hadn't even paid yet and then when it came to paying said oh I haven't left enough money for you.
Mike: No.
Charl: How horrific is that? I've got
Mike: visions of a fresh manicure with KFC chicken and a fape.
Charl: Not leaving your house!
Mike: That's weird, there's some weird people in the world. Whilst
Charl: you've got another client sat
Mike: there. Could you oh, drop in the comments if you've got any weird client stories like that. That's awful. People got no shame.
Charl: Bless her. She suffers with anxiety as well.
Mike: I hope your KFC's nice but
Charl: please leave.
Mike: Go. I hope your your chicken wings are lovely can I have my money please? Nail techs are the funniest people in the world. You get awkward asking to get paid.
Charl: Oh, I know. Oh,
Mike: it's like the amount of people that It's not
Charl: nice.
Mike: Oh, it's How can it not be nice?
Mike: It's They know they gotta pay you. It's
Charl: But you feel like you're charging your besties. And you are
Mike: co op with your father when you're buying your chocolate, like Oh,
Charl: God. Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God. This one's Oh, this is rank. My client took her hand out of the lamp and said her ear was itching.
Charl: Proceeded to stick her finger in her ear, and as you can only imagine, what came out stuck to the inhibition layer. Not a gag, but I still get nightmares. I
Mike: got a vision.
Charl: Oh that's not nice.
Mike: Would the earwax stick to the inhibition layer, yeah?
Charl: Yes.
Mike: Could be a new treatment there, guys.
Charl: Wipe that in efficiently. Oh, I just wouldn't even want to touch it. I hope she used gloves. Ugh. Oh, this poor person. This all happened. Did we have loads? Yeah, we had a few. This happened all in one week. A client took a pregnancy test in my toilet. A client told me she was having an affair. I've had that a few times.
Charl: Not an affair! Just people telling me that!
Mike: Whoa! People telling me that! You ho! What a confession! First
Charl: episode! First
Mike: episode! I've had a few affairs.
Charl: Oh, god no. Clients telling me of affairs. And a client who became one of my best friends got served with a divorce paper mid nails. We sat off our toes and went to the pub.
Mike: Go on, girl. Oh my god. Divorce paper, serve, as in, is that like
Charl: a thing? Oh
Mike: Via email. I had an American where someone just died. Somebody walks in. Somebody's in disguise. You've been sued. Oh,
Charl: They were quite amusing. Quite rank. I'm not going to lie. I think you've got to be careful of first timers.
Charl: First time clients. First time
Mike: clients. Little disclaimer. Wash yourselves.
Charl: Yeah.
Mike: So yeah, that was our customer community Q and a, it's going to be one every episode. So look out for wherever we post it. It'd be either fire our community Instagram, fire that email channel. So make sure you've subscribe to emails or you follow us on Instagram or Facebook and to jump in our community as low as the tips and tricks in here anyway, and help us create content for this podcast.
Charl: Absolutely.
Mike: Get your clients to wash themselves. A
Charl: hundred percent. Yeah. Dirty bastards. So anything that you want to reveal that we've got coming up with HONA soon? Another segment
Mike: is it, what's it gonna be? Behind the scenes with HONA.
Charl: Yeah.
Mike: Insert jingle. Alright Rosie.
Mike: Something like that isn't it?
Charl: Copyright. So yeah, every
Mike: week we'll talk about a little bit of a, something behind the scenes with HONA.
Charl: Keep
Mike: you guys up to date with what's going on. And what is going on? When is this going out? I don't know if I don't know. Anyway, we've just Here we go. We are in full Christmas party planning swing.
Mike: Yeah. Yeah. So As you may or may not know, every year HONA hosts loads of events, but this time we're hosting a Christmas party. It's the After Christmas Party. I came up with the name, don't know if anyone liked it, we just said, yeah, here it is. It's called the After Christmas Party.
Mike: Why have we got an After Christmas Party? In a nutshell, Nail Tags don't really get a Christmas party. No, and we're
Charl: so busy through December. Especially you poor Nail Tags who are sat in their bedroom. You can't have time off. If you're
Mike: listening to us now in your bedroom, and You don't really have any workmates and all, we can be your workmates.
Mike: Yeah. So we're hosting the after Christmas parties in January when it's traditionally a little bit more quiet for you, you can actually let your hair down and celebrate and
Charl: Get that Christmas rush like, done. Yeah,
Mike: so we're in full swing for that. We've actually just hired our entertainment.
Mike: I don't know when this is going out. I don't, I won't reveal. I will steal Georgina's funder, but it's good.
Charl: It's so good. I
Mike: tell you what. I'm
Charl: so excited for it.
Mike: I was a hard no. I was like, I'm way too expensive.
Charl: Yeah. And
Mike: she got 80 percent off. So it makes me think, A, they would even just made a number up at the beginning.
Mike: I think
Charl: they did.
Mike: They must have. They must have. Because G is that good a negotiator.
Charl: I was going to say, it's, yeah.
Mike: But anyway, we've got 80 percent and I think they manipulated me because you can't say no to that price discount.
Charl: It's even,
Mike: it's way more than I would want to pay for any type of entertainment.
Charl: Yeah.
Mike: And because I was like, are we getting a bargain or have they just absolutely hustled us? It's obviously hustle. I
Charl: feel like we're going into this without saying it. So it's very much a tease.
Mike: Yeah.
Charl: But yeah, it's going to be in, I think you say Bristol in January.
Charl: Yeah, so
Mike: we're, HONA is based in South Wales, so we don't want everything to be in Cardiff, Newport, South Wales, so we're venturing into England, so we're going to stay in the South West, but the Christmas party is in Bristol on the 19th of January. Yes. Amazing venue, amazing entertainment. It's 25 plus VAT for the ticket.
Mike: But, you get 30 home store credit, you get a welcome drink, you get two drink token it's virtually free. Yeah. Not, the only reason we got tickets is just to keep track of numbers and stuff like that. Yeah. So it's practically a free event. You get way more back. The entertainment's going to cost more than what we would make on the tickets, aren't we?
Mike: But yeah, stay tuned for that, it's exciting. And if
Charl: anyone has been to any of our parties, before. I say parties, like events. Events, darling. Events, darling. They're not parties,
Mike: they're events.
Charl: But we know how to throw a good party.
Mike: We do. Yeah. We have a lot of fun. I think you guys don't get out much.
Charl: I think because a lot of us are self employed and do work on our own.
Charl: So when it's we get a chance to get together with like minded people. Yeah. And that's a good thing. You're just going to have a good time. The amount
Mike: of groups that are formed, like friendship groups from going to not just HONA fans, but in fans in general. And then they've linked up and become a French solo, now text group, grouping up.
Mike: Oh, yeah, I love seeing the group. Oh, it's the best feeling in the world. It's
Charl: just lush. I feel like proud
Mike: parents.
Charl: Yeah, you don't you? Especially with the younger lads.
Mike: Proud little parents.
Charl: Oh, no, you, Michael is actually doing a heart symbol for our audio listeners, but he's doing the proper old school way of a heart.
Mike: Oh, yeah, there's that way, mate. No, it's,
Charl: I can't even, I Think that's the one more gonna be proud. I think it's that
Mike: whatever. But yeah, so Thank you for listening to us. This is our first ever podcast we've ever done recorded. So rough around the edges? Yes. Real? Yes. Will it get better? Fingers crossed.
Mike: Hopefully. Will it get worse? Likely, but who knows. What should we talk about next week? So next week's episode, why don't we talk about something which we've struggled with when we've learned to get is work life balance. Yeah.
Charl: I laugh because I feel like,
Mike: but we know what not to do.
Charl: Yeah.
Mike: We know what not what to do.
Charl: We've just got to put it into place.
Mike: 100%.
Charl: I think that'll be really
Mike: useful.
Charl: Thank
Mike: you for listening. It's going to be on the usual channel. So subscribe on your streaming platform. Is that what the pros do?
Charl: Yeah. Subscribe,
Mike: and join us next week and we'll be in touch. Peace and love.