BRYAN BITTICKShas been a
Great Clips customer since
2000, but it wasn’t until
2009 that he and his wife,
Tamara, searching for a
recession-proof side business,
started buying Great Clips
salons. And in 2016, Bitticks,
a former engineer and mar-
keting manager at a semicon-
ductor manufacturer, left his
first career for good to focus
on managing the couple’s
10 locations in Los Angeles
and Portland, Ore.
Coming from the tech indus-
try, Bitticks has a particular
appreciation for what has been
powering Great Clips’ growth—
not to mention its first-ever
spot on our top 10 list: It’s the
brand’s technology. “Online
check-in is the single biggest
thing that’s transformed our
business,” he says. The salon’s
front door has been virtualized;
customers can look at wait
times online or on a mobile
device and be added to a wait-
ing list, enabling Great Clips
owners to better reach young
customers accustomed to a
sleek, digital-first experience.
More than 30 million cus-
tomers across North America
now use the service, and that
number grows between 5 and
6 percent a year.
Great Clips has structured
itself for this kind of innova-
tion. It doesn’t operate any
corporate salons, freeing up
the lean executive team to
focus on improving core prod-
ucts like the online check-in
system and Clip Notes, the
global customer database the
company launched in 2014.
Great Clips
Founded/ 19 82, Minneapolis
Worldwide units/ 4, 300
U.S. units/ 4,1 50
Cost to open a unit/ $136,900 to $258,250PHOTOGRAPHS COURTESY OF GREAT CLIPS
Ranked #1 in Category
Four Years in a Row
In Top 100
on Franchise 500 List
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