It took 27-year-old Beth Gillie a year of saving but now the classic cream-coloured site on the corner of Raglan Parade and Liebig Street is home to Grayce the Salon.

Bridal and formal dress store Dubois Boutique left the site last year for a new Kepler Street location but Ms Gillie said the site's themes of beauty would endure.

"I looked at it and thought it would make the most beautiful salon," she said.

The business is Ms Gillie's first since entering hairdressing six years ago and follows in the entrepreneurial footsteps of her brother, who also owned a Warrnambool business at a young age.

"I feel like I had that to look up to; if you work hard then you can do it," she said.

"I worked my butt off last year and by January I had enough money to renovate it. It was perfect."

It's not only a passion for beauty that has driven her to open the business but a desire to "work smarter, not harder".

"I know a couple of hairdressers who have done the same thing, if you have the business mind for it COVID has been quite helpful," Ms Gillie said.

She plans for a backroom to welcome parents with their children, while renting out an apartment upstairs as an Airbnb. The salon employs one senior hairdresser and an apprentice, offering makeup too.

"When it comes to hairdressing, it's all about how you make people feel," Ms Gillie said.

"I just want to be known as an honest hairdresser ... that's the most important thing to me, anything can be changed, there's nothing we can't do to swift up or maneuver."

Ray White Warrnambool's Hayley Shannon said the building had once been a compounding pharmacy store and still retained some features from that past.

"It's great to see someone in there who's loving it and bringing it back to the standard it deserves," Ms Shannon said.

The salon opened in July and is among a string of new businesses that have reduced the amount of vacancies in Liebig Street to just four, despite coronavirus lockdowns causing uncertainty. Another beauty salon opened just doors away over winter too.

"I think COVID held a lot of people back from securing anything commercial. But we have seen a lot of commercial stuff has now taken off," Ms Shannon said.

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