UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

┐ JAMIE GAVIN; JHAMYA WINTERS; TIFFANIE WOLF; │ MELISSA SPEAKER; JAMIE LINDQUIST; CHLOE │ KERTESZ; KIM BURNS, │ Plaintiffs-Appellants, │ > No. 24-1509 │ v. │ │ LADY JANE’S HAIRCUTS FOR MEN HOLDING COMPANY, │ LLC; LADY JANE’S CLEARWATER FL, LLC; LADY │ JANE’S MOORE OK, LLC; LADY JANE’S SUNSET HILLS │ MO, LLC; CHAD JOHNSON; TIM MCCOLLUM; JESSE │ DHILLON; ALICIA BUNCH; JOHN DOES 1–10; DOE │ CORPORATIONS 1–10, │ Defendants-Appellees. │ ┘

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan at Detroit. No. 2:23-cv-12602—Stephen J. Murphy III, District Judge.

Decided and Filed: April 23, 2025

Before: SUTTON, Chief Judge; SILER and WHITE, Circuit Judges. _________________

COUNSEL ON BRIEF: Jessica Garland, GUPTA WESSLER LLP, San Francisco, California, Matthew W.H. Wessler, GUPTA WESSLER LLP, Washington, D.C., Andy Biller, BILLER & KIMBLE LLC, Columbus, Ohio, Laura Farmwald, Emily Hubbard, Andrew Kimble, BILLER & KIMBLE LLC, Cincinnati, Ohio, for Appellants. Nicole S. LeFave, Neil B. Pioch, Andrew Klaben- Finegold, LITTLER MENDELSON, P.C., Detroit, Michigan, for Appellees. No. 24-1509 Gavin, et al. v. Lady Jane’s Haircuts for Page 2 Men Holding Co., LLC, et al.

_________________

OPINION _________________

SUTTON, Chief Judge. Several hair stylists filed this lawsuit on the ground that their employer underpaid them by misclassifying them as independent contractors instead of employees. But an arbitration agreement stands in the way. The district court dismissed the claim in favor of arbitration. We affirm.

I.

Lady Jane’s Haircuts for Men is a hair salon. Each stylist, the salon claims, is her own boss, an independent contractor in legal parlance. That relationship, the salon says, allows it to avoid the obligations of the Fair Labor Standards Act’s minimum-wage and overtime-pay requirements, which apply to employees, not independent contractors.

Several stylists disagreed. They filed a class action complaint against the salon in federal court under the Act and several state laws.

Lady Jane’s moved to dismiss the lawsuit. Invoking the arbitration clause in the Independent Contractor Agreement with each stylist, Lady Jane’s argued that the claims must proceed before the AAA, formally known as the American Arbitration Association. Under that arbitration clause, “arbitration proceedings shall be administered by the [AAA] under its Commercial Arbitration Rules.” R.31-2 at 9. The AAA’s Commercial Arbitration Rules, in turn, “require the parties to split the costs of arbitration.” R.55 at 10. The stylists responded that the arbitration agreement was unenforceable because it was unconscionably costly and would require them to pay arbitration costs tha