After decades behind the chair and years running salons, I can tell you one of the simplest truths in this business: the services clients remember most are rarely the big transformations. They’re the little extras. The small, thoughtful touches that make a client feel like you built the service around her — her habits, her lifestyle, the way she actually wears her hair on a Tuesday.
Here’s one of my favorites, and it takes only a few minutes: the ponytail highlight.
Who This Is For
Think about your clients who live with their hair up. The gym regulars. The nurses and teachers. The moms who have exactly ninety seconds to get out the door. The clients who love a sleek pony for summer. For these women, a beautiful highlight can partially disappear the moment the hair goes up — and what shows instead is the perimeter: the hairline around the face, the temples, the nape.
That perimeter is exactly where the ponytail highlight lives. It’s a targeted pass of brightness around the hairline so the color shows off precisely when the hair is pulled back. And with 2026’s whole “quiet luxury” mood — low-maintenance, dimensional, expensive-looking color that grows out gracefully — this little service fits the moment perfectly.
How I Do It
The method is simple, and the order of operations is the trick:
Step one: Before you section for the main service, put the client’s hair up in a moderately tight ponytail. Don’t crank it too tight — you want it secure enough to expose the hairline cleanly, but comfortable, and you don’t want tension marks in the sections you’re about to weave.
Step two: Work your way around the perimeter hairline and take small, fine weaves — the same delicate sections you’d use for babylights. This is where the shells earn their keep. Because ColorShells grip the hair firmly when they snap closed, you can get those weaves right up close to the scalp around the hairline, which is exactly where this look lives or dies. Around the face and temples there’s no room for a gap at the root.
Step three: Once the perimeter weaves are processing, let the ponytail down and proceed with your partial highlight as usual. The perimeter pieces keep working while you do the rest of the service — no added processing time, no juggling. And since the shells are clear, you can watch those fine hairline sections develop in real time without disturbing them. Fine weaves lift fast; being able to see them is the difference between “sun-kissed” and “oops.”
That’s it. In my experience the whole addition takes just a few minutes and about four extra shells.
The Business Side
Now let’s talk about why this belongs on your menu and not just in your bag of tricks. A little extra like this deserves a little extra charge — and clients happily pay it, because the value is obvious the first time they pull their hair up and see brightness framing their face instead of a solid band of base color.
Run the math on your side of the chair. A few minutes of work. Four shells — and since ColorShells are reusable dozens and dozens of times, the material cost of those four shells is pennies. No foil torn off a roll and thrown in the trash. Just a small add-on fee that’s nearly pure margin, on a service that makes you look like the stylist who thinks of everything.
Multiply that across every hair-up client on your books and this five-minute extra quietly becomes real money over a year — the kind of service-menu math that makes salon owners pay attention, too.
Make It Yours
Offer it by name. “Want me to add a ponytail highlight? It’s a little extra I do so your color shows when your hair’s up.” Naming it makes it feel intentional and premium rather than an upcharge. It also plants a seed: clients tell their friends about services that have names.
And here’s the part I love most — the result. The client leaves, throws her hair up two days later, and her color is right there, framing her face like it was designed for the ponytail. Because it was. That’s the moment that builds loyalty. A happy client, a few extra dollars for you, and one more reason she tells her friends her stylist doesn’t miss a detail.
If you want to try the ponytail highlight in your own salon, you can pick up ColorShells at colorshells.com/shop — the Starter Kit has both sizes, and the smaller shells are perfect for those fine perimeter weaves.
Do you offer a “little extra” your clients ask for by name? What’s the small add-on that gets the biggest reaction in your chair? Tell me in the comments — I’d love to hear it.