Whether you’re an independent barber or a barbershop owner, keeping your pricing competitive is one of the most important things you can do to grow your business. But there’s no one-size-fits-all way to tell whether your prices are helping your business or holding you back from earning the salary you want. 

Let’s jump into some of the top things you need to consider when setting the price of a haircut and other services to make sure you’re not pricing yourself out of business. 

5 Ways to Make Sure the Price is Right—For Your Shop

1. Track all your costs

First and foremost, the money you bring in has to cover all of your costs to run the business. That includes the big expenses like rent and payroll. It also includes utilities (electricity, water, internet), supplies (tools, hair products, etc.), and all the other little things that add up (promo items, pens and pencils, etc.).

Barbers and shop owners need to track all of their fixed expenses and variable expenses carefully. A big electricity bill in the summer from blasting the AC all month can quickly eat into your profits unexpectedly. And even small price increases in inexpensive items you use daily (combs, capes, neck strips, cleaners, shaving cream, etc.) can make your current haircut prices unsustainable in the long run. 

2. Understand your target clients

For the most part, barbershops are hyper-local businesses. Even still, there can be a lot of diversity within each town or city. You have to understand the makeup of your community and the different needs they have if you want to stay competitive. 

What kind of client do your prices, branding, and marketing appeal to? Would changing your prices change the kind of client coming in? If you raise your prices, for example, do you need to update the shop’s atmosphere to fit the expectations of your clients?

When you understand your audience, their needs, and expectations from a barbershop, it’s a lot easier to tailor your brand and prices, helping ensure your shop is a top choice for prospective clients. 

3. Know how your prices compare to others locally

Thanks to Yelp and Google Reviews, customers are always searching for and comparing shops. You need to know how your shop and services stack up against the competition–especially if you’re targeting similar clientele. 

You probably don’t have the time to scope out the price of a haircut at every barbershop in your area. Luckily, SQUIRE’s got your back. If you’re in the US, you can use our pricing comparison tool to see how your prices stack up against other shops in your area, with insights into how your current prices might be affecting your business. 

>>>Compare your prices now<<<

4. Check your performance with reports

When your goal is to keep your shop competitive and grow your revenue, you can’t rely on gut feelings and handwritten notes to get a clear picture of your performance. You need to know how much money you’re pulling in, how much money is going out, and the reasons those things are going up or going down.

With SQUIRE, you can stay on top of your business with helpful reports. See at a glance how busy your shop is, how much money you’re bringing in, track your retail sales and more. If your goal is to stay competitive, you need the in-depth reporting that ties together barber activity and financial performance. That’s why so many shop owners love SQUIRE’s unique barbershop business management system. 

5. Adjust your prices (the right way)

Pricing is a touchy subject. There are so many factors to consider including the clientele you serve, rising costs and inflation, and your increased experience as a barber. When you’re looking at your haircut prices, you first need to make sure your prices can keep you in business by covering your expenses and income needs.

When prices change, be sure to communicate the new pricing clearly and consider rewarding loyal customers with a temporary discount to cushion the blow. 

There isn’t one “right” way to change your prices, though. To help you out, we dug deeper into the question of how to raise your prices in this recent blog post here if you want to learn more. 

Are your business habits your greatest competition?

Staying competitive isn’t always about the other shops in the area. When barbers and barbershop owners don’t have control and insights into every part of the business, everything from setting the right price for a haircut to managing booth rental payments is going to be a struggle. 

SQUIRE makes managing your shop easier than ever to let you focus on the things that matter to you. And with our tool to compare prices, we can help you keep an eye on the local competition in your area. 

If you want to learn more about how SQUIRE helps barbers and barbershops crush their goals, you can sign up for a demo today.

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