How to price your nail services

Copying the salon down the street means inheriting their rent, their product costs and their mistakes. Price from your own numbers instead. It takes an afternoon and it usually reveals that at least one service is losing you money.

Step 1: know your real service time

Not the time in your booking system — the time it actually takes, including setup, consultation, and cleanup between clients. Time five of each service honestly. Most techs discover their "90 minute" set is 110 minutes, which quietly destroys the day's schedule and the day's margin.

Step 2: work out your cost per hour

• Add up monthly fixed costs: rent or suite fee, software, insurance, licences, utilities, marketing.
• Divide by the number of service hours you realistically work in a month (be honest — not every hour is bookable).
• That's your fixed cost per service hour. Add product cost per service on top.

Step 3: set your target hourly rate

Decide what you want to earn per service hour after costs, then price each service as: (fixed cost per hour + target hourly) × real service hours + product cost. Round to something clean. If the number shocks you, that's the point — you were subsidising the service.

Charge for nail art properly

Art is the most commonly under-charged work in the industry because it's quoted per-nail and estimated optimistically. Either price it in tiers (simple / detailed / intricate) with a stated time allowance, or charge a per-15-minute art rate booked as its own add-on so the calendar reflects reality.

Raising prices without losing your book

• Give four to six weeks notice, in writing, once — not repeatedly and apologetically.
• Raise by a meaningful amount ($10–15), not $2. Small increases mean doing this again in six months.
• Never justify it with your personal expenses. "Prices are updating on October 1" is a complete sentence.
• Expect to lose a small number of clients. If you lose none, you were too cheap; if you lose many, your increase was too large or too sudden.
• Pair the increase with something visible: a better finish, aftercare included, a nicer booking experience.

Review quarterly, not yearly

Product costs move, your speed improves, and your skill level changes. Check revenue per service hour by service every quarter and cut or reprice anything consistently below your target.

How Rervva handles this

A built-in session timer records how long services really take, and reporting shows revenue by service, average ticket and revenue per hour so you can see exactly which services are carrying the business and which are draining it.