Brick Waxing Studio Closes Over Coronavirus Safety Concerns

BRICK, NJ — For Kim Rea, March and April are the time of year when business — like the weather — really heats up.

Bathing suit season beckons, and women want perfect bikini lines, hairless legs, low-maintenance upkeep. So they check in to The Waxing Studio, and in room no larger than a bathroom, get tidied up from head to toe with wax-based hair removal.

"I'm in a small, 6-foot room," Rea said Wednesday, the day before Gov. Phil Murphy ordered personal care salons in New Jersey to shut down in the midst of the outbreak of the new coronavirus, part of additional efforts to enforce creating social distancing to slow the spread.

"Waxing faces, we are in their face, and we're in a very small enclosed space with no windows," Rea said. "In our business we can't socially distance."

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Rea, of Brick, made the decision Tuesday to close her studio at 450 Brick Boulevard temporarily after seeing the developments with rapidly rising cases and deaths from the virus in Italy.

"We had to do the right thing for our community and our staff," she said. "I have two elderly receptionists and a pregnant waxer. I didn't feel it wiould be right if I stayed open and someone had corona."

As of noon Thursday, there were 742 positive tests for COVID-19 in New Jersey, and nine people have died from it, according to the state health department. More than 50 percent of those positives are people who are hospitalized. Ocean County had 16 cases as of Wednesday afternoon, the Ocean County Health Department said, and state officials said there were 25 new cases in the county as of Thursday.

COVID-19 is caused by a member of the coronavirus family that's a close cousin to the SARS and MERS viruses that have caused outbreaks in the past. Read more: NJ Coronavirus Updates: Here's What You Need To Know

At Thursday's news conference, Murphy ordered personal-care businesses to close by 8 p.m., including barber shops, salons, spas and tattoo parlors, along with social clubs. Any business that "cannot comply with social distancing guidelines" is closed until further notice, he said.

The move will have a significant impact for Rea and for her employees. Her studio, which just marked its fourth anniversary, sees as many as 150 clients a day, especially as spring turns to summer.

"I see a client every 15 minutes," she said. Her six waxers who work in two shifts: 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. and 2 p.m. to 8 p.m. "It's about 150 clients a day."

But as the situation continued to deteriorate in Italy, Rea said she warned her waxers last week to be prepared for a shutdown and to not spend money frivolously.

"They work on commission and tips," Rea said. With the studio shut down, they will receive a paycheck under the sick leave law signed by Murphy in 2019, but it's a small amount compared with what they make in a typical week.

The impact on the business is significant as well. "Every week we will lose close to $10,000," Rea said. "My main concern isn't just my business, it's my girls. Can I help them while i'm trying to keep the business afloat?"

Her husband is employed and able to work from home, so the family still will have income coming in. But Rea said she is hoping that talk at the federal level of financial help for small businesses forced to shut down will be forthcoming.

She plans to apply for every program and every form of assistance offered to small businesses to help get through the crisis.

"My job as a small business owner is I have to make sure I have a business to go back to," Rea said.

Her clients have been supportive. She said she emailed and called them to alert them to the closure and said many of them responded with positive messages.

"They told me, 'Kim, don't worry, you're doing the right thing, we'll be there to support you,' " Rea said. She knows she's not alone.

"This affects everyone," she said. "It's everything. It's economic impact. People have had to cancel weddings. Teachers can't wait for school to reopen."

On a more direct level, she said her staff is a second family, and they have developed relationships with clients, too.

"Our clients come to have another woman to talk to," Rea said. "I look forward to seeing my girls and spending time with them."

"Now we're all separated," she said. "You're trying to do the right thing. I have to feel in my heart that we'll be OK."

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