What: Farouk Systems’ Be Safe Be Beautiful International Conference. The two-day conference included speeches from founder and chairman, Farouk Shami and newly-appointed president Gregg Emery and amazingly diverse presentations from creative teams from the Middle East, North America, Latin America, Asia and Australia. The conference concluded on Sunday night with a formal dinner and awards gala.

Who: More than 5,000 stylists, educators and distributors, plus celebrities including keynote speaker, Mario Lopez, and former Miss USA, Rima Fakih, along with Miss Teen USA, Miss Texas and other pageant titleholders.

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When: August 27 & 28

Where: Cancun, Mexico

Soundbite: “Farouk has a history of bringing opposing sides together for peace and love,” says senior vice president of International Sales Scott Emery. “Our last conference was the first time Palestinian and Israeli hairdressers shared a stage. This year it’s friendly competitive volleyball [between distributing rivals BSG and Salon Centric.]”