It all started 40 years ago thanks to a Hollywood actress. After the fall of Saigon in 1975, Tippi Hedren, an actress famous for starring in Alfred Hitchcock’s movies in the 1960s, visited a Vietnamese refugee camp in Sacramento.
When she noticed the women there admired her long, polished nails, she recognized an opportunity to teach them a new trade: manicure.
It made a lot of sense: a manicure business demands very little capital to start, and good English communication isn’t a required skill for manicurists.