City Nails

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I'm in my mid-20's and had never had my nails professionally done, until this past Valentine's Day 2015 when I decided to change that and my significant other paid for me to get a full acrylic set as my gift. I chose City Nails based on a friend's suggestion and unfortunately I was incredibly unhappy with my experience.

Immediately upon arrival I was told I'd be taken care of in about 10 minutes, only to have another customer waiting pipe up that she was there first. The male employee acknowledged her and apologized but ignored me for the next 20 minutes. Finally he looked at me again and told me about another 10. Eventually he told me which table to go to and an elderly man who spoke very little English met me and proceeded to attempt to turn on the UV lamp at the booth which obviously had a short in the wire. He reached inside and wiggled the wire back and forth all the while mumbling in another language. After a few awkward minutes the lamp popped on.

The man then filed down my nails while not once making eye contact until the very end when he looked at me and put his hands up and said "STAY." as if I was a dog.

He got up and began cleaning the store while to continuing to mumble without any kind of explanation from anyone as to why I was sitting there. Again, I had never done this before and wasn't sure if I was supposed to have my nails directly under the lamp and felt foolish trying to position myself "correctly" without even knowing what correctly was.

After ANOTHER 15 MINUTES, I was close to leaving when the elderly man motioned for me to go to a different table where a different younger male than the one who had greeted me sat. I was already frustrated, but this man's unfriendliness and lack of professionalism was the icing on the cake. The other young man had been chatting away with his customers and even made jokes with me every now and then, but the one doing my nails stayed stone-faced and never cracked a smile.

I arrived at the nail salon around 4:30p.m. They closed at 7p.m. that day so I didn't think that was too horribly late of me to show up, yet the man doing my nails constantly looked at the clock above the door. He missed a lot of spots with the acrylic and put more glue on one hand than the other, and those nails came off sooner. The paint job was alright but not great. It was very apparent he was in a hurry. When I tipped him he mumbled a thank you, and when I left and told everyone to have a great night I was completely ignored as they chatted up the people who obviously were their "regulars".

I made the mistake of telling the employees of City Nails upon my arrival that I had never had this done and I definitely feel I was taken advantage of because of this. All of the employees spoke in a foreign language to each other and you obviously never knew what was being said. I am not racist but I do not enjoy not being aware of everything going on in the customer area of a business that I am paying for services.

I would not recommend this place unless you go with someone who is a regular there as I definitely feel their attitudes and quality of work are biased based upon who you are. I will never return to City Nails.