Dear Reader

Since the 1970s, aestheticians have been treating the largest organ of the human body, while rubbing shoulders with cosmetologists on one side and doctors on the other. It took 20 years to establish separate licensing for aesthetics for the purpose of national recognition of our profession. Yet many aestheticians are hitting the streets with 300 hours of training while others get 600. We are working in more critical areas and with more powerful tools than ever before, while cosmetologists continue to be given aesthetics license privileges without even meeting the minimum standards of skin care training in their state.
While we have thousands of well educated skin care professionals, we have many thousands more who lack fundamentals. Without consistency in our basic knowledge, we continue to seek the credibility necessary to effectively practice our trade. And, while the commercial side of the industry has grown, response to the educational needs have not evolved accordingly. New products, machines, magazines, shows, and associations have exploited this trend, only to further dilute the industry resources and the professional’s development. More and more products are available, but there is no clear direction for the professional.
Professionals have become baffled in a saturated, fragmented, and confusing marketplace. While aestheticians now have many places to find commerce, they have no satisfaction for their education and networking needs. While our industry has experienced growth from consumer demand, this education dilemma along with saturation has brought us to a crossroad. This is a stage that every “professional” industry goes through in its evolution; the necessity to define itself.
AIA began in 1972 as the first organization in America to gather under the aesthetics banner for this purpose. So much of the progress we all enjoy today is largely due to hundreds of visionaries who carried that banner while carving the path upon which we tread. I come to you today to announce my commitment to take up the AIA banner and follow in the footsteps of those pioneers.
Pat and I have spent the past two years planning for the future. With our children grown and now working with us in the family business, we have turned our attention to the long-term growth needs and what AIA can do to influence that growth. Having spent our lives in aesthetics, we feel an obligation and a call to this cause. In response, we have developed new programs with AIA to unite the hundreds of educators, industry leaders, and dignitaries toward one common cause; to help us unite all professionals to define ourselves though a National Certification Program. Our long-term goal is to establish a (self-imposed) higher standard of education that can over time be adopted by each state, resulting in a National Licensing Standard.
To achieve this, we must unite under one banner so our voices can be heard. AIA has an Ambassador program inviting past, present, and future industry leaders to come forward and join the cause.
We will use our common voice to gather the masses through State Chapters. DERMASCOPE Magazine has opened its pages to AIA to join this cause, and the International Congress of Esthetics and Spa (ICES) has opened its doors to AIA to facilitate the National Certification Program. AIA will provide our first Preparatory Classes and Certification Exams at the ICES Southwest in Dallas, April of 2008. I call on you today to contact AIA and join the cause for taking our industry forward with this unified effort. Contact AIA and get involved.

Sincerely Yours,

Will Strunk