Hairstyling 101: Winter Is So Much Better When You Have Good Hair

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Going through change this winter, or maybe you’re desperate for a transformation? They say that change is as good as a holiday, but we believe all you need is a new hairstyle.

Your hair is a defining characteristic, with the power to transform and command. Your mane is your crowning glory and an expression of your personality, style, mood, age and attitude. Whether you’re looking to shake things up this winter or give your hair a break from summer damage, check out these easy winter hairstyling trends.

Natural and Effortless Curls

Winter is the season to give your hair a break from weaving, heating and curling. That means if you have wash-and-go hair, consider yourself lucky. Fortunately, if the pandemic taught us one thing, natural is beautiful and dark roots are acceptable. Dark roots are even trending right now, so give your hair a break from peroxide and colouring and sport your natural curls this winter.

The Shaggy Bob

While the short bob will remain popular this winter, soft and choppy layers in the front and side coupled with a solid baseline in the back are mainstreaming. The shag is a styling trend that gives hair instant texture and a cool factor. Face-framing, shaggy and liberated, the shaggy bob coupled with lowlights will keep your hair and face looking healthy throughout the cold months—and you get to give your hair a break from product and heat.

The Fringe

Of all the winter hairstyling trends, many keep coming back and back, like the fringe. Almost every woman debates cutting bangs above their brows – until she does it and loves it. Whether Cleopatra, blunt, curtain, choppy, French, wispy or side-swept-inspired, a fringe is a marvel way to hide forehead wrinkles and frown lines. They are fun, cute, sassy, and versatile, demanding minimal maintenance. That makes this style perfect for every woman.

How to Apply Makeup for Women in Their 40s and Over

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You just turned 40—Congratulations. They say that life begins at 21, but we believe 40 is when the magic happens.

You’ve reached an age where you’re comfortable in your skin. But no matter how positive you stay, you can’t help but stress about those fine lines and wrinkles. To help you enhance, define, cover, and alter fine lines and pigmentation, we’ve put together a few tips on applying makeup for over 40. So grab your makeup products and brushes—and give yourself an instant face-lift.

• Swap Black Eyeliner for Brown: Eyeliner defines the eyes, but only if you use it properly. First, swap black for brown, and buy eyeliner with a Q-Tip to smudge the line. That will give your eyes a softer look.

• Fill the Brows: Eyebrows thin as we age, revealing our age. Hide your age by filling in the gaps, adding volume and definition.

• Avoid the Apples and Focus on the upper Cheekbones: After 40, skin drops and the cheekbones reveal themselves. Instead of applying blush to the apples, use upper sweeps along the upper part of your cheekbones.

• Go Light with Eye Shadow: Avoiding dark tones and using light shadow tones as it opens the eyes and lids, apply your eye shadow using small, circular motions instead of swipes. Pro Tip: Using a darker tone than the shadow tone, make a backward seven-shape at the outer area of the eye. That gives the eyes an instant lift.

• Apply Foundation with a Soft Buffing Brush: Fine lines and wrinkles absorb foundation, but you can avoid this by investing in liquid foundation and by dispersing it with a buffer brush.

As we age, our skin dries. While the above expert makeup tips will take years off your face, the key to staying young is staying hydrated. That means drinking plenty of water each day.

4 Cost Factors SMMEs Must Consider Before Hiring Office Furniture Removal Companies

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Just read a frightening article where a business paid up to 250K to move their office—and it was only up a floor in the same building. Today’s SMEs face many new challenges than a decade ago. Then along comes COVID in 2020, destroying businesses in South Africa. 98% of South African businesses are SMEs, and in just the first quarter of 2020, 40% of small business were already reducing capacity and retrenching. Six months later, 90% of SMMEs were in crisis, either laying off employees or closing shop.

Problems Facing SMMEs

SMMEs play an essential role in our economy—but consumer spending, lockdown laws, rising petrol and food costs, and meeting salary demands decreases the chances of survival. It is hard building a business from the ground up and then watching it fall to the ground in a matter of months. That is happening with many small and large SMMEs throughout South Africa. For instance, a busy lawnmower sales and repair shop in Johannesburg suddenly lost its value over a fort-overnight. Retail, management, admin and support, real estate, and many other businesses throughout SA are in the same boat.

Digital transformation is disrupting existing business operating models—and adapting is now a matter of survival rather than choice. For years, economists have been telling SMMEs to get online. COVID arrived, and in the first quarter of 2020, online sales grew by around 40%. Surviving businesses are those that listened and went digital. Many others simplified by retrenching employees, selling off assets, going remote, or moving to smaller office spaces.

Businesses Are Down-scaling

Renting a fancy office space in a Big Tech high-rise is now a tremendous expense for many businesses. As South Africa’s economy sinks to its lowest since the Great Depression, retailers and service providers—regardless of size, location or financial support, move towards the suburbs. Aside from paying cheaper rentals in the suburbs—without being tied to fixed city building leases, taking up smaller offices in the suburbs not only benefits employees, suppliers and customers. It betters a company’s bottom line. As a result, moving office has led to a demand for furniture removal companies and cost enquiries.

If you’re one of the few surviving South African SMMEs, you know that the only way you will survive is to downscale and reduce your monthly overheads, but that means forking big money on moving expenses. Moving heavy-duty office furnishings like tables, chairs, technology, servers, and more is a lot more complex than moving kitchenware and bathroom, bedroom and living room furnishings. You’re dealing with priceless contemporary art, fragile furnishings, and technology – and that’s why you pay more. However, that cost will triple if you hire amateurs.

Why Hire ONLY Professionals

At Elliott Mobility, we have witnessed many nightmare stories of how a cash-strapped business, desperate to move within a tight timeline, lost everything in a pre-mediated hijacking. Sure, they caught the guys from the cheap fly-by-night moving company they hired. They even retrieved most of the stolen valuables—but it took weeks. In the interim, the business took a huge knock and had no choice but to shut its doors and go into liquidation. South Africa is red zones for criminals, and this is the type of scenario to expect when you hire cheap office movers with zero experience. So is it worth putting your investment in the hands of strangers, just because their furniture removal cost was dead-cheap?

Moving home is simple because not every second or minute costs you money. However, in business, time is currency and delays, theft, or damage can be the difference between staying afloat and closing shop. But moving an office is one of the most stressful events for any entrepreneur, as not only are there concerns about downtime, but what happens if valuables arrive damaged or do not arrive at all? You won’t have to worry about not meeting deadlines, hijacking or robbery when working with professionals.

Moving office is not a quick, cheap furniture removal job. It is a complex project that can add up in cost. When moving to new office space, there are several costs that you need to consider. Besides your office rental and deposit, building and reception area signage, and office security systems and more, the following factors will affect your overall office furniture removal cost.

1. Volume and Vehicle Rental: You are paying for the cost of labour, vehicle rental, time, and volume of furnishings—which the removal company will measure in cubic meters. In addition, the overall cost also depends on the distance of travel. As a result, moving cross-country relocations will cost far more than relocating to another neighbourhood.

2. Removal Service: Although the cost of furniture removal varies from one company to the next, most removal companies provide a full package that includes the entire move—from pickup to delivery. That includes professionally packing your furnishings, like assembling, boxing, loading, delivery, and unloading to dissembling furnishings. You pay for the service you get. That means if you want a company to just load and drop-off, you pay for that cost. Alike, if you want a removal company to provide the whole removal package, while you sit back and relax, you pay for that cost too.

3. Packing Materials and Equipment: Moving office furniture is a lot different from moving household furniture. You are moving heavy glass, metal and wooden tables, cubicles, computers, servers, desks, cabinets, and other bulky valuables requiring assembling and dissembling. Often, moving such furnishings demand unique equipment to lift without damaging items. As a result, the cost of moving will include boxes, packing tape, and equipment and tools.

4. Additional Services and Insurance: Professional movers have more than one job. Not only must they get your valuables from A to B without delays or damage, but they must assemble and install your furnishings at your new premises. You will need an engineer and IT and security professionals. Professional moving companies work closely with sub-contractors. That means once dissembling your technology and furnishings, they send in sub-contractors to install lights, equipment, wiring, servers and computers. Further, you also get insurance, which is another expense that will add in cost—regardless of size, location or financial support, but worth every cent.

Get a Transparent Quote—with Zero Hidden Costs

The ongoing COVID-19 impact tests business owners operationally, financially and mentally. As a result, this is not a time to let one’s guard down. It is time to think smart. Unlike moving residential furnishings, moving an office is a full-on project that requires proper planning, coordination, and execution to meet disruption deadlines. However, office furniture removal companies are a dime a dozen and hiring the first company you find in the classifieds will cost you. Do your due diligence and get a transparent cost estimate—regardless of size, location or financial support, laying out every expense from labour to coordination to execution with zero hidden costs.

How Elliott Mobility Can Save You Money and Your Sanity

Although South Africa seems like it’s slowly heading out of lockdown, it is essential to remember that we are only entering autumn—which means winter is on its way. Can we expect another lockdown like the UK, Europe and the USA over their recent winter months, or will business stay open? The future is uncertain, but what we know is that we move hundreds of offices each month throughout Johannesburg and South Africa without a hitch.

At Elliott Mobility, we are leaders in local and international relocations. Besides our extensive, countrywide network, we bring experience and capability to the business sector and view each move as a project rather than a job—from pickup to delivery. To get a free furniture removal quote, chat with one of our project managers.