Wax to the max at University Town Center

After several business ventures over the years, some still ongoing, Laura and Dante Bloise moved to GreyHawk Landing two years ago and started to enjoy their planned retirement.

"I love it here," Laura Bloise said. "It's like living in paradise."

She enjoyed all the area had to offer for more than a year, and it wasn't paradise enough.

Laura Bloise wanted to work.

"I was enjoying the beach, and the weather, but I am still young (55)," Bloise said. "So I started looking."

She was looking for a new business venture.

On June 7, she held the grand opening of her new business, Waxing the City, at 8475 Cooper Creek Blvd., University Park.

"I came across Waxing the City and I went to their headquarters in Minneapolis," she said. "I liked it."

While waxing might seem like an unusual business to enter, especially since Bloise never had worked in a waxing studio, she had some extra incentive. Growing up, she had very fair skin, and very dark hair.

"It's unfortunate, but kids can be very mean," Bloise said. "When I was younger, I had to go through a bad experience. I had to go through bullying.

"So I thought about how I could help someone."

But did Bloise every think she might own a waxing franchise?

"One hundred percent ... no," she said.

While Bloise hadn't worked in the industry before, she has utilized waxing studios for years, especially due to her dark hair and fair skin. She said one of the big problems has been that she would go home and then "have to finish the job" because they had left hair behind.

When she started a Waxing the City franchise, she told her employees that never was going to happen.

"We say, 'No hair left behind.'"

To that end, Bloise has purchased special magnifying lamps for her cerologists.

She also makes sure the process isn't like an assembly line, like she has experienced elsewhere. She said her cerologists concentrate on smaller areas before moving to the next. It takes more time, but it is more comfortable.

"Some do 'fast waxing,' while we do it in more detail," she said. "Legs could take 50 minutes. But we are not a production service."

While her cerologists, who go through special training at the corporate headquarters in Minneapolis, Minn., handle the actual hair removal, Bloise mans the front desk, making sure she gets feedback from her customers.

"This business is rewarding for me because our customers love our service," she said. "It's the same service they might get somewhere else, but different."

Her main theme for her employees is tried and true ... "We're in the service business, the customer always is right."

Through different businesses over the years, she found that to be key.

The couple owned a 33-room hotel in Mar del Plata, Argentina and she worked in property management in New Jersey for 17 years. Dante Bloise has worked in the construction industry, in textiles and has been a butcher.

They owned a cleaning business and they have owned, and still own, multifamily properties in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. 

"I've worn multiple hats, and learned about juggling my time," said Laura Bloise, who grew up in Chile and laughs while saying even though she lived in New Jersey for 35 years, she still has an accent from her homeland.

She brings all that experience to her new business.

"One of the things is I believe strongly in retaining your employees," she said. "You have to put them first and you have to listen to them."

Her business has done well and about 10% of that has been men. She has been calls from men asking to book a Brazilian wax, but she will not offer that service until the end of July when one of her employees finished specialized training for that service.

"It's more delicate," she said. "But we are getting many requests."

Waxing the City currently offers 50% off for a service. It's a big discount, but Bloise said, "We have to let the world know we are better."