Staff writer
New salon owner Tiffany Westney wanted to give back to her community. She wound up giving her business back to her landlord.
Citing what he said was a poor work ethic, building owner Dave Yates said Westney didn’t have what it takes to run a salon. So he carefully packed her belongings, and told her to get out of his building.
Seeing her stuff packed up is how Westney found out she was being evicted.
“He didn’t even have the courtesy to call me,” she said. “Nothing about this situation is right.”
Westney didn’t pay a cent to use the space at 1240 Commercial Dr. in Marion, next to Superior Wine and Liquor, which Yates owns. That is to say, Yates didn’t ask a cent of her.
“I told her I’d give her a couple free weeks,” he said.
No lease agreement was signed. Westney called it a verbal agreement.
“I had papers written up from the start and he refused to sign them,” she said.
Yates said Westney didn’t keep regular hours at her salon, Beauty Bar, opting instead to post a note on the door, which he said instructed potential customers to call her for an appointment. Yates said he had 11 potential customers come and ask him where she was.
“It’s embarrassing to me,” he said. “She very much disappointed me.”
Westney didn’t think she needed to run her business to Yates’ standards.
“I’m renting his building, he shouldn’t have a say in anything I do,” Westney said. “Let alone have someone else move in.”
That someone else would be Chassidy Carlson, who is set to take over the salon once she attains a business license.
Westney had a business license for the salon, but took it with her when she left.
Yates insists the license should belong to the building, and that Carlson should be able to reimburse Westney for the cost of the license and attain it for herself. However, Marion city code prohibits the transfer or reassignment of business licenses to anyone except “the person named therein,” which is Westney.
Yates was impressed with Carlson’s support system, saying she had a lot of people helping her, including her father Mitch, who co-owns Carlsons’ Grocery.
“Her whole family was up here this weekend, they completely redid the salon, stripped the wallpaper,” he said.
While Yates didn’t like Westney’s work ethic, he had nothing bad to say about her talent.
“The hair she did, everybody was happy with,” Yates said. “She’s got the ability as a hairdresser, but that’s just one aspect.”
Westney said she is currently looking for employment.
Editor’s note: A sentence has been added to clarify that Yates’ final quote was about Tiffany Westney, not Chassidy Carlson. Carlson’s name also was misspelled in the original version of the story.