Lice Aunties

Location

Norwood, MA

Business Broker

Molly Hanson

Situation

Naomi Golden built her career in corporate retail for more than three decades. In her last position, she was in a Senior Director role for a prominent women’s retailer when she was laid off in a reduction in force. In her mid-fifties, she had no intention of starting her career over. She knew she was done working in corporate America and was interested in shifting into healthcare. She decided to get her Masters in Public Health and was in the midst of applying to programs when an unexpected opportunity presented itself.

Background

While connecting with friends shortly after being laid off, she shared the stress of being laid off and figuring out what she wanted to do next. One of her friends asked if she had ever considered owning her own business and offered to share a business listing that she thought would be a perfect opportunity for Naomi.

The Unexpected Opportunity – Buying her Next Career and Growing a Business

As Naomi learned more about the business opportunity, the more she was she was “smitten”. There were so many elements that spoke to her: being a local business, working with children (whom she adores) and a health-care related business that she would run on her own.

To help her evaluate the feasibility of the opportunity, Naomi surrounded herself with her team to help evaluate Lice Aunties: her husband, a business executive with an MBA, their financial advisor, a good friend who is a corporate attorney and another who is a business consultant.

BayState Business Brokers

Business Broker Molly Hanson was the listing broker and she and Naomi connected on many levels including their mutual attention to detail, being data-driven and valuing transparency.

Molly quarterbacked the sale from the seller who had initially launched the business as a mobile clinic doing head checks to eventually being a franchisee and part of the larger Lice Clinics of America organization. The seller had decided to sell to retire.

Results

Naomi closed on Lice Aunties and took over the keys of two clinics and two territories on January 6, 2020. She had the benefit of the manager staying on for a month for transition and in the meantime hired additional on-call employees to add to her staff.

Her initial fourteen weeks of running the business were phenomenal, and while never having run a small business, Naomi tapped into her core capabilities of embracing technology and being process-oriented to start laying the foundation to scale and grow.

Then March 2020 happened and Naomi was in for the challenge of her lifetime as Massachusetts, along with the rest of the world, shut down due to the pandemic. In hindsight, Naomi reflects that being part of Lice Clinics of America was monumental in her ability to persevere, pivot and survive the next 24 months. She and her colleagues in the network met weekly via Zoom meetings, sharing ideas and supporting each other.

“I have never worked harder in my life than I did during these 24 months. I buckled down and hung on as I refused to go down with the ship,” shares Naomi. She reduced overhead and staff through natural attrition, secured PPP loans and was actively involved with the corporate entity which contributed to her franchise being well-positioned for success post pandemic.

Running her own small business was completely foreign to Naomi so she focused on providing the best customer service to differentiate herself from any competition. She developed kits that could be left at a customer’s doorstep to accommodate social distancing and offered virtual appointments to help families needing guidance, including providing treatments while being safe.

In May 2022, it was like a light switch went on as people were back together, and her business took off. She doubled the Lice Aunties’ best historical month ever and she has never looked back. At the end of 2025, her revenue was four times the best year the prior owner had.