Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
Wednesday, October 19, 2016
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WOMEN IN BUSINESS
Sisters create haven at Charlotte Rouge By Nancy Tarnai FOR THE NEWS-MINER
Charlotte Rouge Hair Spa is an oasis of peace in Fairbanks. Owned by three sisters, the business offers a quiet haven from life’s hectic pace, a place where people show up for a haircut and color and leave with a sense of having been well cared for. Natalie Kimberlin, Laurelie Denning and Galilee Halbert were born and raised in Interior Alaska. “Growing up on a ranch, we were all well established in what it meant to work, from bucking hay bales, mucking and ice chipping frozen horse manure to assisting in the fencing projects, or just the regular 15 acreage upkeep,” Kimberlin said. Ranch life had its perks, especially since the girls could ride horses as often as they wished. The three women grew up with two brothers and were home-schooled. After discovering a mutual love of
styling hair as teenagers, all three worked as coffee cart baristas to earn pocket money to get through beauty school. Halbert went to beauty school first in 1999 when she was 17. “Because Laurelie and I were inseparable, I asked her to go to beauty school with me,” Kimberlin said. “You could say I was selfish, but I still wanted my best friend to be with me through a new and exciting adventure.” Kimberlin was 17 and Denning 16 when they went to beauty school in 2007. They opened Charlotte Rouge in 2009. “One of us blurted out the idea of owning a shop together,” Kimberlin said. At the time the idea sprouted, the two younger women were still in beauty school. “I think like anything else you do together, like a friendship, like a marriage, we all have our opinions, we all have our differences, but we all share one reality which is God loves on us
abundantly and that is what we desire to share with each person that sits in our chair, his love,” she added. The sisters’ philosophy is that business owners get out of their company what they put in. “We give our whole selves into what we do,” Kimberlin said. “And because of that our clients are not just clients, they are our dear friends. “The best part of operating our business is not only working together as biological sisters but also having the pleasure of running a business with our unique, beautiful and irreplaceable group of women who we hold dear enough to call sisters,” she said. “At Charlotte Rouge, our goal is sharing Christ’s love in everything, because we believe friendships truly matter.” Charlotte Rouge is located at 3550 From left to right sisters Laurelie Airport Way in the Caribou Building. Denning, Galilee Halbert and Natalie The phone number is 451-4772. Kimberlin ham it up in front of their Nancy Tarnai, a former News-Miner reporter, is shop, Charlotte Rouge Hair Spa. a freelance writer living in Fairbanks. She can be reached at njtarnai@gmail.com.
(PHOTO BY TAKENYA GRACE PHOTOGRAPHY)
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For reservations, call 458-0636
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