Your Prices Haven't Changed in Two Years. Your Costs Have.

Your Prices Haven't Changed in Two Years. Your Costs Have.

Quick question. When was the last time you raised your prices?

If you had to think about it for more than two seconds, it's been too long.

I ask this question to every salon owner who joins my Level Up Academy. The average answer is somewhere between 18 months and 3 years. Some haven't raised prices in five years. One owner in Jacksonville told me she hadn't changed her prices since she opened in 2019.

2019.

Her rent has gone up three times since then. Color costs are up 22%. Her insurance doubled. Supply chain issues pushed backbar product up by 15-20%. She gave two stylists raises. And her prices are exactly where they were before all of that happened.

She's not running the same business she was in 2019. But she's charging like she is.

The Slow Bleed

Price erosion doesn't happen all at once. It's not dramatic. It's the opposite. It's so gradual that you don't notice it until you're underwater.

Your landlord raises rent by $200 a month. Your color manufacturer increases prices by 8%. Your software adds $30 a month for a new feature you need. Your insurance company bumps your premium $150 a month at renewal.

Use the Weekly Salon Profit Calculator to see your actual weekly profit and where expenses are eating your revenue.

Use the Salon CEO Scorecard to measure how well your business runs across all five forces.

Each one feels small. Manageable. Not worth raising prices over. So you absorb it. And you absorb the next one. And the next.

Over two years, those small increases compound. A salon doing $40,000 a month that absorbs $1,500 in monthly cost increases without adjusting prices just lost $18,000 a year in profit. That's real money. That's a vacation you didn't take, a repair you couldn't afford, a savings account that's still at zero.

What Your Costs Have Done Since 2023

Let me give you some real numbers I've tracked across salons in my program:

• Commercial rent: Up 8-15% in most markets since 2023
• Professional color lines: Most major brands have raised prices 10-20% in the last two years
• Insurance (liability + property): Up 12-25% depending on your state
• Utilities: Up 8-12% on average
• Credit card processing fees: Slight increases across most processors
• Minimum wage increases: Affects your front desk, assistants, and entry-level positions

If your prices haven't moved and all of those costs have, your profit margin is thinner than it was two years ago. Period. There's no way around that math.

Want to see exactly how much your floor price has changed? Run your current numbers through the Ultimate Pricing Calculator and compare to what you would have gotten with your 2023 costs. The gap is your price erosion.

Why Salon Owners Avoid Raising Prices

I know why you haven't done it. I've heard every reason.

"My clients will leave." Some might. But data from my coaching program shows the average salon loses 2-5% of clients after a reasonable price increase. The revenue from properly priced services more than makes up for it. Every single time.

"The salon down the street is cheaper." They might also be going broke. Matching someone else's unsustainable prices doesn't make yours sustainable. It makes both of you unprofitable.

"I'll do it next quarter." You said that last quarter. And the quarter before that. Meanwhile your costs went up again and the gap got wider.

"I just feel bad." I understand the feeling. But you know what feels worse? Not being able to pay yourself. Not being able to give your team raises. Closing your doors because you ran out of margin.

The Annual Price Review Framework

Here's what I teach in my coaching program. It's simple and it works.

Every January, do a full cost review. Pull your overhead for the prior year. Calculate your current chair cost per minute. Recalculate your floor prices for every service on your menu.

Every July, do a mid-year check. Did anything major change? New lease terms? Product price increases? New hires? If your costs shifted, your prices need to follow.

Raise prices at least once per year. Even if it's a small increase, 3-5%. You're offsetting inflation and cost increases. If you haven't raised in two or more years, you probably need a larger adjustment to catch up.

Communicate it clearly. Give clients 30 days notice. Post it in the salon. Put it in your booking confirmation emails. Don't apologize for it. Costs go up everywhere, every year. Your clients' employers raise their prices too. This is normal business.

A Salon That Got It Right

I worked with a salon owner in Raleigh who committed to annual price reviews after joining my program. First year, she raised prices an average of 8% across the board. She'd been underpriced for three years so it was a bigger jump.

She lost 6 clients out of about 350. Revenue went up $4,200 in the first month.

Second year, she raised 4%. Lost 2 clients. Revenue went up another $1,800 per month.

In two years, she added over $72,000 in annual revenue without seeing a single additional client. Same team. Same hours. Just prices that actually reflected her costs.

She also started paying herself consistently for the first time in her five years as an owner. That's what happens when you stop absorbing cost increases and start passing them through to your pricing.

The Right Way to Calculate a Price Increase

Don't just pick a number that feels right. Do the math.

Step 1: Calculate your current floor prices using today's costs. The pricing calculator does this in minutes.

Step 2: Compare floor prices to what you're currently charging. Any service where your current price is at or below the floor needs an immediate increase.

Step 3: For services that are above the floor but barely, add your target profit margin (I recommend 15-20% minimum) and experience premiums.

Step 4: Compare your new calculated prices to your current prices. The difference is your needed increase.

This isn't arbitrary. It's not "raise everything $10." It's specific, service-by-service, based on actual costs. Some services might only need a $5 bump. Others might need $25. The math tells you.

The Cost of Waiting

Every month you delay a needed price increase costs you money. If your prices should be 8% higher across the board and you're doing $40,000 a month, that's $3,200 a month you're not collecting. Wait six months to "find the right time" and you've left $19,200 on the table.

There is no right time. There's just the time you decide to stop losing money.

Want to Go Deeper?

Watch my breakdown on how much salon owners should actually be making: How Much Money Should a Salon Owner Make in 2026?

Get the full pricing system and profit framework in The Mastery Bundle.

Stop Putting It Off

If your prices haven't changed in over a year and your costs have, you're losing money every single day. Let's figure out exactly how much and build a plan to fix it.

Book your free salon assessment here.

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