BusinessReport.com

When 20-year-old LSU accounting student Diane Hoang tells others what she does for a living, the reaction is usually the same: “You’re gross. Why would you touch other people’s feet?” The second she offers her services, those sentiments change: “OK. I’ll come right now.”

That attitude is what brings business to Nail Finiti on Siegen Lane—where Hoang works—as well as to the myriad other nail salons across East Baton Rouge Parish. Face it: Feet are the body’s drunken uncle, odd-looking and usually smelly. But they deserve love and attention just the same. Nevertheless, pedicures are something you get, not something you give.

Not so for Hoang, who even after two-and-a-half years as a pedicurist, would rather give than receive. “For me, I do not like getting pedicures at all,” she says. “I like giving the pedicures and making peoples’ feet look better.”

For a standard spa pedicure, her job starts when the client sits down in the spa chair. Their shoes come off, and their feet go directly into the spa water and sea salt to soften skin and kill bacteria. [If their feet are particularly smelly, Hoang says she’ll leave them in the water a bit longer.] Then cuticles are trimmed and nails are too, shaped according to the clients’ desires.

Calluses and dead skin are taken care of next, with a filing and buffing high-speed Dremel tool. [This is when the meat cleaver looking “razor” would have been used, but such practices were banned in Louisiana last year.] Feet are then given a foot mask and wrapped in hot towels. Then there’s lotion, a massage and nail painting.

Her clients are as varied as the feet they have: Men, women, young, old, six toes, webbed toes, well kept and unkempt. Hoang can tell when high heels are the shoes of choice [thick calluses on the bottom of feet] or when tennis is the sport of choice [really short toenails are requested]. Some clients are twice-a-month seasoned regulars; others are newbies and need gentle instruction.

“Sometimes people come in and they warn me,” Hoang says. “They’re like ‘Oh. I’m sorry. I haven’t gotten a pedicure in like six months.’”

On a fall or wintry day, Hoang will typically do six or seven pedicures. Starting around March 1, it’s all feet, all the time with about 13 pedicures performed daily. That’s 130 toes, give or take, and Hoang likes each one.

“This may be weird, but it’s interesting when I do it. I like cutting off the skin and making it clean and stuff,” she says. “That intrigues me.”

Add the salon’s atmosphere [owner Kevin Nguyen insists all employees speak English around customers] to Hoang’s interest, and that’s why she loves her job. “You meet so many different people. They have so many stories to tell you. You never know what you can hear.”

Hoang’s version of a dirty job is working in a hospital. She says that although she loves helping people, there’s something about the smell and the blood that makes it undesirable in her book.

“A pedicure is one of the overlooked jobs,” Nguyen says. “A lot of people like to get it done. They really enjoy it. They appreciate it, but they would not do it. It’s OK. That’s our job. As long as people appreciate it and enjoy it, we’re going to do it.”