Threading her way to the top
Ziba Ahmadi’s eyebrow salon is where resilience, art and ambition meet
January 9, 2026 | story by Savannah Rude
photos by Kat Tran
Ziba Ahmadi greets her client with a warm smile. Her black bouncy curls occupy space as she moves through the small salon into a room with two coal-colored leather chairs that look like they would be in a hair salon. But Ahmadi isn’t a hair stylist; she’s an eyebrow threader.
It isn’t just her coils that fill the otherwise quiet space — it’s the conversation and catching up with every client Ahmadi knows on a first-name basis.
Decor is limited besides her proudest accomplishments, displayed in small frames in the entryway. The room is personable, but it gives the sense that 46-year-old Ahmadi is not here to play.
Ahmadi takes the white floss-like thread in her teeth and wraps it so tightly around her fingers that it looks like she’s stopping blood flow. Two minutes feel like 30 seconds as she quickly moves the strings back and forth over the brows.
Before the moment even starts, it’s over, and Ahmadi hands the client a small mirror so they can observe the work done. Not even a droplet of sweat on Ahmadi from the work is visible; she is unfazed like a magician casting a spell.
But Ahmadi, who is originally from Iran, is no magician. The drive and energy that make her clients feel like they’re under a spell go back 6,000 miles and 15 years to when Ahmadi immigrated to the United States, not yet speaking English and unsure how she would make a living.
While her clients may call it a magic spell or a potion, Ahmadi said it’s just the energy she carries with her.
“It’s so crazy because I have so much energy. I know I have so much energy, and this energy has to be shared with others,” Ahmadi said. “If not, I can fly; you cannot find me on the ground because that energy is so much.”
Ahmadi said she’s known she has this positive energy since she was 17, and sharing it with people gives her a purpose.
“I feel good because I know they come here not just to do their eyebrows, because they want that two and a half minutes of energy,” Ahmadi said. “Anything could be in their life, when they leave this salon with the biggest smile, it’s a response to my energy.”
Many of Ahmadi’s over 2,000 Google reviews mention her positive energy and different types of magic. Ahmadi claims her magic can affect her clients in three different ways.
“The first will help you find a future husband, the second one will help you to get engaged and the third one will make you pregnant,” Ahmadi said. “People ask me how about if you put magic on my eyebrows for the lottery, and I said no, if that works, I throw away my eyebrows.”
One client who experienced Ahmadi’s magic firsthand is 34-year-old Hailey Smith. Smith became a regular client around seven years ago and attributes her engagement to Ahmadi.
“At the time, I was in a relationship, but neither one of us had intentions on getting married; that was something that we agreed upon when we got into the relationship,” Smith said.
“I told Ziba that exact thing, and she’s like, “Oh no… I’m going to put my magic on your eyebrows, we are going to get you a ring; you’re going to get married.”’
Smith said around three years later, the unbelievable happened.
“I don’t know what she did to these eyebrows, but she’s convinced me and him to get married, and there’s now a ring on my finger,” Smith said.
Smith makes an hour-long trip to Gainesville for every eyebrow threading appointment. This isn’t just because of Ahmadi’s magic but also because of her ability to connect with her clients.
“We have built this relationship, she remembers things that I say, it just blows my mind that she remembers,” Smith said. “She’s just very personable, and she truly cares about her clients, aside from the amazing job that she does.”
Smith said her mother and three younger sisters now all go to Ahmadi when they need their eyebrows threaded because of Ahmadi’s engaging nature.
“When my oldest little sister started going there, she was in a long-term relationship, not engaged,” Smith said. “She is now currently engaged, and they are getting married on Nov. 2 of this year, so the magic works. It’s real.”
Smith is not the only client who has built a personal relationship with Ahmadi. Ahmadi said she often sees clients’ families and aims to create a connection with each client who walks through her doors.
“People see that I care, that I remember. It’s not just they come to do their eyebrows and then leave,” Ahmadi said. “I put myself in their situation, in their place when they talk to me about their life. I try to put myself there to give them the best advice, so that’s why they trust me.”
Ahmadi made her way to Gainesville in 2009 when she immigrated to the U.S. from Turkey. She enrolled in Santa Fe’s nursing school and stuck with what she knew for a part-time job: eyebrow threading.
Eyebrow threading is a centuries-old technique that originated in the Middle East, where Ahmadi is from. Ahmadi said the practice is often used instead of waxing because the results last longer and the process causes no damage to the skin.
“With that hard life that I had over there, I learned how to work harder to earn what I want,” Ahmadi said.
Ahmadi worked to connect with her clients and keep them returning to her. After building up her clientele at The Oaks Mall, she moved to renting her own chair in 2010 and then on to purchasing her first location: Ziba De Beaute at the Shoppes at Thornebrook.
“I didn’t know English, but I tried to learn some words. I can feel when people were sad, or they were mad at something,” Ahmadi said. “I tried to use broken English just to tell them that I feel their sadness or madness or give them so much positive energy.”
Ahmadi also gained many clients through sororities at the University of Florida. In 2011, she started visiting various sorority houses near campus to thread eyebrows. She said her sorority and UF student clients ultimately led her to purchase her second location. Ahmadi recognized the wealth of clientele near downtown Gainesville, Shands and sorority row, ultimately deciding to purchase her second location close to UF.
Ahmadi said that after the past year of being open, her second location has already become busier than her first.
But it wasn’t just where her clientele was that pushed Ahmadi to open her second location; it was also an increase in clientele after Ahmadi broke the Guinness World Record for most eyebrows threaded in an hour that led Ahmadi to expand.
Ahmadi said that she felt she needed to turn her life around and keep striving for more after a very dark period in her life. In January 2020, her ex-husband and father of her children filed for divorce. Three months later, her business had to close due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Three months after that, her sister was killed in Iran.
Ahmadi said that in December 2020, she decided to take action for herself and her career. One night, she decided to check online and find the fastest threader in the world. Ahmadi broke the world record of 62 pairs of eyebrows for the first time in 2021 when she threaded 90 pairs of eyebrows in an hour.
After breaking her first record in 2021, Ahmadi was not finished. She decided to break her own record in 2022.
“Then a year after, as soon as I received the title from Guinness, I filled out the application again,” Ahmadi said. “Before they even confirmed, I broke my own record with 102 people in 45 minutes.”
Breaking a world record and then breaking it again helped Ahmadi gain more publicity in Gainesville and the surrounding areas.
“People know me and know me by my name more,” Ahmadi said. “But people already knew I’m fast; this one just helped confirm that Ziba is fast.”
Ahmadi said she’s naturally driven and competitive, which is just part of who she is. Ahmadi’s drive inspires Talia Kaye, a UF alumna who got her eyebrows threaded by Ahmadi for three years while she was a student.
“She is inspiring to the community with her world record,” Kaye said. “She always has a great outgoing attitude and makes you excited for your next appointment.”
Ahmadi said she encourages all her clients to reach their goals, even if they seem unattainable. She draws inspiration from her own struggles as an immigrant and having to work hard to accomplish her dreams.
“If you just keep focusing on losing, you stop in the place you are,” Ahmadi said. “You have to use that loss as learning, then you can do something else, especially in the United States, it’s a country of dreams. American dream means you learn.”
Ahmadi has more dreams of her own. She said she hopes to expand her business once her daughters grow up and can learn the craft.
“I’m the only one, so maybe I can have three [locations] until my girls grow a little bit and I teach them this technique, and they can follow my path,” she said.
Ahmadi’s goals don’t stop with expanding her business.
“The next 10-year goal is I told everyone I’m going to run as a future Florida governor,” Ahmadi said. “What is going to happen at the end? I’m going to lose. What is going to happen? I’m going to learn, that’s it.”
