How much must a hair salon invoice to take home €2,000 a month?
The honest answer: it depends on what it costs you to stay open, far more than on what the products cost. In a salon, what you buy to deliver the service weighs little on the price of the service. What weighs is time — and time is paid for even when the chair is empty. The count can be done, and it is done in four steps.
In your trade the margin is high, and that is not enough
On a service, what you buy to deliver it counts for little: that is why a salon's margin is among the highest there is. But your real cost is not the goods, it is being open — rent, utilities, the people on the floor, contributions. Those run the same on a full Saturday and an empty Tuesday. A high margin on revenue that does not cover the fixed costs leaves nothing in your pocket.
The count is done backwards
Almost everyone starts from revenue and hopes something is left at the end. Instead you start from what you need and work back up: the net you want in hand; plus tax and contributions, because what you need net is not what you must earn gross; plus the fixed costs, the ones you pay with the shutters down too; all divided by the margin left to you on every euro taken.
The number to know is not revenue
It is how many heads a day you need to break even. You can count that while you work, without opening anything. Once you know it, the empty Tuesday stops being a feeling and becomes a figure — and decisions about prices, opening hours and the second chair get made on a number instead of a hunch.
The count, with your figures
Enter what it costs you to stay open and what you take on average from a client: out comes the revenue you need, the threshold below which you are losing money, and what actually stays with you after tax and contributions.
Run it on your own figuresQuestions that always come up
How much should a hair salon take per day?
It depends on your fixed costs far more than on your price list. Two salons with the same prices and different rents have different thresholds. You find it by dividing the month's costs by the days you are open, and then by what you take on average from a client.
Is a cut or a colour worth more?
The right question is not what you take per service, it is what you take per hour of chair. A service worth twice as much that takes three times as long earns less than a quick one, and you only see that by putting time into the count.
Why do I earn little even though I always work?
Almost always because fixed costs have grown and the price list stayed where it was. Month by month you do not notice: you see it only by doing the count backwards, from the net you need up to the revenue that produces it.
The same count, trade by trade
How much do I need to turn over to take home €2,000 a month?