Tl Nails

Elite '08

49

88

Renae C.

Fremont, CA

me and my cousin were at elephant bar taking shots of chilled grey goose celebrating peruvian independence day, when we decided to get our nails done. what the heck it's peruvian independence day you ask? the day peruvia became free! (just kidding). so i get there and it's the quietest nail salon i ever heard, or not heard. i had to pee really bad so i ran to the bathroom and some guy is cleaning the toilet.

me: can i pee here?
guy: *no answer* just slowly walks away.

after peeing he was setting up the chair for my pedicure. he was wearing gloves when he was cleaning, but i was still taken back that the dood cleaning the toilet, was the same guy giving me a pedicure. he was very very precise about getting every last detail done. but he took sooooo long i became sober again. and the massage was hella weak.

the great thing about this place is that they don't talk shit about you in vietnamese.

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4

10

Amanda P.

Fremont, CA

OK, so I had been coming here fairly regularly when the first opened a few years ago because it was clean and very affordable.  I must say I am now never going back.  The last few times I have been in there, they seemed to rush me, tell me to wait 5 minutes (which turned into about 30), and they never cleaned anything in between customers (GROSS).  Not to mention the  smell of food while they are heating up their lunch (not what I want in a nail salon).  It has gotten really run down since they first opened, and they are more concerned with the quantity of customers they have compared to the quality of work they do. My best friend also refuses to go back because the last time she went the owner and another employee were yelling at each other in Vietnamese to the point where the employee started crying (can anyone say uncomfortable) and her pedicure got cut short (no lotion or massage).

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60

125

Ralph C.

Oakland, CA

Recent talk of do men get manicure/pedicures got me thinking that it has been way too long since my last manicure. But one too many, ABC 20/20 scare the bejesus out of you stories about lack of sterility and fungi galore had put me off, so my mani/pedi days were limited to the times I went with my female friends, who had basically by being a return customer allayed my fears about the possibility of going home with some nasty nail fungus.

It has been 2.5  years since my last manicure and I have never had a pedicure.  The irony being I haven't had a pedicure because of the beating my toes have taken from running, yet it that very beating for why I should be getting a pedicure.  So Saturday, having walked past TL Nails for over a year on my way to BART and never seeing their name in the news, I stopped using my female friends as guinea pigs and ventured in of my own accord for the mani/pedi treatment.

Though they had about 4 stations for each, they only had 3.5 people working - a fourth person came in half way through my pedicure.   They asked if I could either come back in 30 or wait; I waited.  Note to self and to you - in the future make an appointment.  Finally, the one woman doing pedicures finished up the young woman and her two school aged daughters and it was my turn.

For the life of me, I can not understand why I had not done this earlier.  She hooked my feet up proppa.  And the foot massage, she had her technique down.  She asked me what color polish I wanted - the woman next to me suggested I go with purple but I opted for the clear and two coats.  Also, did a good job on the manicure, but I only got one coat.  Prior experience tells me that two coats is heavy, but after only two days, I am noticing some serious chipping, which i abhor.

I like this place.  It is owned and operated by Vietnamese clan, which is only important in that at times, for me, the accent made it difficult to understand what they were saying.  Also, in an effort to maintain business and keep customers happy they had a tendency to mislead individuals on the wait time. At one point both I and the woman who was about to receive a pedicure thought she had been told it was going to be a few minutes.  It was more like 10 so the woman left.  Understandable, but what was not understandable - the 3 of the 4 employees, including the one on my feet, racing down the street behind her to tell her they are ready, please come back, sit, we do you now.

One final note, guys, they will gladly hook you up.  But on this particular day, the fourth lady brought her older relatives into the shop.  While I couldn't make out a word they were saying, I definitely felt like Frank Costanza.  If you do the walk-in, I suggest you have your own Soduko or NYT Crossword to keep you preoccupied

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