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Safe Shops

We help ensure small businesses in Boston, like auto shops and nail salons, are safe places to work through outreach and trainings.

Local businesses often face barriers to promoting worker and environmental health. We partner with these businesses to provide training and education to their owners and workers. We help address issues like toxic and hazardous materials, personal protective equipment, disinfection, and more.

We have worked to reduce chemical exposure and provide trainings for workers in auto shops, hair salons, and nail salons. We are working to expand our offerings and invite requests from other industries. If you want to see worker safety trainings and reduction in chemical exposure, reach out by emailing EHoutreach@bphc.org or by calling 617-534-5965.

Business We Work With

Auto Shops

Learn more about auto shop best practices for health and safety.

Nail Salons

Learn more about nail salon best practices for health and safety, as well as BPHC regulatory requirements.

Green and Clean Program

The Green and Clean Program recognizes Safe Shops affiliated small businesses in Boston that exceed regulatory requirements. These businesses go the extra mile to protect the health and safety of their employees, their customers, and the environment.

Benefits of being Green and Clean
  • Attract more customers by showing the community that you care about providing services that are safer for them and for the environment
  • Save money by using less energy, fewer raw material, and less water
  • Get free advertising. BPHC promotes all Green & Clean businesses, and you get a window decal to help advertise to customers and passersby
  • Keep your workers and customers safer by using fewer toxic chemicals

Learn More

About the Program

About the Safe Shops Program

Small businesses often face barriers to environmental and occupational health compliance. The Safe Shops Program provides outreach to these businesses. It promotes safe work practices with:

  • Inspections
  • Worker training
  • Technical assistance
  • Health care and business resource referrals

Program staff provide training, education, and other resources. They promote health and safety best practices for workers and the environment. Some of the health and safety issues addressed include:

  • Toxic solvent air emissions
  • Worker contact with hazardous chemicals
  • Flammable chemical and solid waste storage and disposal
  • Spills and soil/groundwater contamination
  • Worker injury risks
  • Personal protective equipment
  • Housekeeping
  • Disinfection
  • Environmentally friendly practices
  • Regulatory compliance (for nail salons)

Boston's auto shops and nail salons show the ways that health inequities play out in Boston. There are approximately 200 nail salons throughout the city. They are primarily owned and staffed by Vietnamese women. There are hundreds of automotive shops, located in primarily low-income communities of color and staffed by majority Latino men. These industries are a source of both well-paying jobs and potential hazardous exposures for employees and community members, placing a disproportionate number of men and women of color at risk.

2004: ​​The Safe Shops Program Begins

We became aware of the need for outreach to auto shops through community members’ concerns about auto shop practices and subsequent investigation by enforcement partners. The Safe Shops Program was developed as a way to educate auto shop workers about safe work practices. The Program used long standing relationships with enforcement and community partners, combined with public health outreach, to form and sustain relationships with auto shop owners and workers, who helped us identify the ways we could best support their needs.

2007: Expansion to Nail Salons

Just as with auto shops, we became aware of the need for outreach to nail salons through community members’ concerns over nail salon odors. Investigation into these odors indicated that nail salon products contain hazardous chemicals.With nail salon owner and worker input, we developed trainings and resources to support their health and safety. 

2011: Nail Salon Regulation Passes

Boston Public Health Commission’s Environmental and Occupational Health Division began to regulate and permit nail salons, increasing the Safe Shops Program’s utility in nail salons. Today, the Safe Shops Program continues to provide outreach to nail salons, to ensure regulatory compliance and the use of best practices to support health and safety.

2012: Green and Clean Program Launches

With support from a grant from the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA),  the program launched the Green and Clean business recognition program. This recognition program supports businesses that go beyond basic environmental and sanitary standards. To qualify, businesses need to demonstrate their work to incorporate practices like recycling and energy use reduction, following the Boston City Climate Action Plan.

2017: Expansion to Hair Salons

With support from another grant from the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the program expanded outreach to hair salons. We focused on salons providing services to women of color. Due to embedded racism, black women and girls are pressured to straighten or "relax” their hair through the use of products that contain a mix of chemicals that can be harmful to health. These products are even more harmful for those using them daily as part of their job.

Now: Expansion to New Industries 

The Safe Shops Program is actively supporting the 200+ nail salons in the City of Boston. While we continue this important work for the health and safety of workers in Boston, we are looking to expand our offerings. If you are an owner or worker at a small business in Boston and are looking to improve safety practices, please reach out to EHoutreach@bphc.org. 

Brandeis University's Black Hair Salon Study

Click here to learn more about Brandeis University's Black Hair Salon Study. Brandeis University students conducted this study to explore workplace chemical exposures in salons serving Black women. Along with other partners, BPHC helped Brandeis students to understand their findings and identify recommendations to salon workers.

Damage Report Magazine​

As a result of the Safe Shop Tool Box press release, the Damage Report featured the program in its December 2005 issue. You can read it here.

American Public Health Association 

Click here to read about the Safe Shops Model published in the American Journal of Public Health.  

Improving Indoor Air Quality with Safe Shops and Public Health Regulation 

Click here to learn how efforts from the Safe Shops Program have improved indoor air quality within Boston’s nail salons.  

 

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