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DALLAS — Thirty years ago, Debbie Bynon was a West Side Tech student with her heart set on a diamond-and-sapphire class ring.
“My mom said, if I wanted that ring I had to get a job,” Bynon said, recalling how she became a “shampoo girl” at Mary Taylor’s Hair and Skin Care Centers, working after school at the various locations. “I was really fortunate that Mary Taylor took me under her wing.”
Taylor feels she, too, was fortunate, finding a protegee who proved to be “a standout employee with a strong work ethic.”
On Friday, Taylor, 65, and Bynon, 44, styled hair side by side at Mary Taylor’s Hair and Skin Care Center on the Memorial Highway. Longtime customers know that’s the day they’ll find Taylor in Dallas. The rest of the week, she works at the skin care centers’ other locations in Hanover Township, Kingston and Mountain Top.
The two women have worked together just about every Friday since 1988, but now there’s a shift in the relationship.
Earlier this year Bynon purchased the Dallas location from Taylor in what the women consider a win-win situation.
Bynon gets to be her own boss, and Taylor has less responsibility — while continuing to work at the business she founded and nurtured.
When a recent hospital stay put her out of commission for several weeks, Taylor decided it was time to make some adjustments.
“I said to myself, ‘Self, it’s time for a new phase,’ ” Taylor said, a musical laugh bubbling from her throat.
“I want people I care about to take care of the business,” Taylor said. “People who put their heart and souls into it.”
Recognizing that Bynon has done that for the past three decades, Taylor offered her a deal both women describe as generous. “She deserves it,” Taylor said. “I feel like she’s a daughter to me.”
“It’s a passing of the torch,” Bynon said, adding she looks at the salon as “a sanctuary” where the problems of the outside world don’t intrude.
That’s how client Shirley Osborne, of Dallas, sees it, too.
“I feel more relaxed than anything here,” she said as Taylor combed out her hair. “I’ve been coming for 40 years, and if I can’t come to her, Mary comes to me.”
“Everyone here is so friendly,” added client Susan Stockage, of Sweet Valley.
“Debbie is the best,” said Lori Saxe, also of Sweet Valley, who had come in for a cut and color as well as a pedicure.
“Hey!” Taylor said, showing she had heard that last comment.
But she was only pretending to be annoyed. She’s glad Saxe appreciates Bynon’s work.
“We’re like family,” Taylor said.
And, sometimes, entire families come as customers.
“You’ll have a grandmother, a teenager, a mother and daughter come here,” Taylor said. “Four generations of families come here. We’re all about great hair.”
“What I like is, they ask what I want,” said client Wendy Blight. “That’s important.”
Over the past 40 years, Taylor estimates, she’s had about 100 employees, 20 to 25 at a time.
If others are ready to be their own boss, as Bynon was, she’s willing to sell them the other locations, which would retain the Mary Taylor name, and Taylor herself on the staff.
She still enjoys helping clients look their best, she said.
“We’re all about great hair here.”