At the end of last year you moved your legacy clients from $1,500 up to $2,000. Two people left. That's it. You've already run this experiment once — and it went fine.
An install is six hours, not four.Four in the chair, plus about two at home making bonds. So every client is really six hours of your day. That's the number we're going to use for everything from here.
Which means you're at $250 an hour.A $2,000 install minus $500 of hair is $1,500, across six hours. Not the $333 we said on the call — the prep hours count too. You built something that genuinely works. It's just still priced from before you were this good at it.
About three quarters of your book is still at $2,000.Roughly 75% at $2,000, about 15% at $3,500, the rest in between. And you already told me where you actually land: "my starting should really be $2,500." You're not wrong. Your book just hasn't caught up with you yet.
Every appointment you do is a full-price appointment.No move-ups, no maintenance rate — the hair comes out, new hair goes in, full ticket, every time. That's a really clean model. It also means a client on a three-month cycle is worth about $9,100 a year to you. That's the number we're actually pricing.
Worth checking: 165 is records, not people.That's how many entries are in your system, which isn't the same as how many humans are cycling through. Based on your revenue I'd guess the real number is closer to 50 — and if I'm right, fifty people are generating around $450K a year. That's remarkable. Let's find out for sure.
You're booked to mid-October, and still opening days off.About three times a month you take someone on a Sunday so they don't have to wait. That's generous, and it's also the reason the four-day week hasn't really happened yet. Nothing to feel bad about — it's just the thing we get to fix first.
$35–40K in, about $20K out.And some of that $20K is Amazon and Uber Eats running through the business account — so the business is leaner than the number makes it look. You just converted to an S-corp and payroll is being set up right now, which is really good timing for all of this.
The hair on the shelf.At around 17 clients a month, roughly $8,500 of hair is genuinely spoken for. You're spending $10–15K. Some of that is real — the rare curly textures you can't find on demand, and you're right to grab those when you see them. Some of it is the 7pm text that a shipment landed. This month is just about finding out which is which.
We don't know what demand looks like yet.Two to three inquiries a month and you book nearly all of them — but since the locator went away in January they arrive in waves instead of steadily. We can't set a price without knowing what's actually coming in the door, which is why that's your first assignment.
You have a whole brand kit ready to go.Fonts, colors, the full theology, a photo shoot, and a website that already uses all of it. Your home care isn't branded yet — because it doesn't exist on paper yet. Which honestly is the fun version of this problem: we get to build it right the first time.
All-inclusive stays. We're not going à la carte.No separate encapsulation charge, no separate hair deposit. You price at the top of what you'd ever use and keep the difference when you use less — that's exactly how I teach it. We're not changing the structure. We're changing the number.
One increase across the whole ladder.Not add-ons stacked on top. The ladder you built — fine hair, curly, colored-to-match — is genuinely well thought out. It's just anchored low at the bottom.
No price decision today, on purpose.We get the data first. I don't want you picking a number out of a feeling when we can pick one out of evidence in seven days.
Deposits, not contracts.You're not chasing signatures and I'm not going to make you. The deposit is what actually holds your time and filters out the people who were never really coming. That's where we'll put the effort.
Where the ladder lands, and when.I'll bring the full math. You bring the two numbers. We decide together on Wednesday.
When the $2,000 tier ends.Right now it's open-ended, which means it quietly renews itself every year. That's not a mistake — it's just a decision nobody's made yet. Grandfathering works best when it has an end date on it.
Four days or three.You said four feels good. I think three is better and I'll show you why in the numbers — but this one's yours to call, not mine.
What the time is actually for.You told me you don't know what you'd do with it, and that all your friends are hairdressers who are busy. That was the most honest thing you said all call. We don't have to answer it this week — but empty space is usually how the next thing gets in.
Your payroll number.Your accountant suggested around $1,300 every two weeks and you said it seemed low. I think you're right to wonder. He knows your numbers better than I do — but it's a fair question to ask him.
The 300 color clients in Gloss Genius.They're the reason your extension filter comes back with two people and your email campaign fell apart. You don't have to know why you're hanging onto them — but they are quietly breaking your list, so let's deal with them.
Which education thing comes first.Shadow days, a low-ticket download, or a class down the line. Not this month — you said it yourself, nothing has to happen all at once. We'll dial in the back end and then build one properly.
Click any step to check it off — your progress saves automatically.
Voice memo these to me. Try to push past three minutes — deeper, not more emotional.
01 · How do you actually know you did your job right?You said it's the client who goes "yeah, this is great, let's go" — no fluff needed. Perfect. Now take it one layer further out. What does it look like six months later? What's true about her hair, and about her, that tells you you got it right? That's the answer that teaches Claude who you really are.
02 · Ask yourself a better question."When is the other shoe going to drop?" isn't serving you. So try the other one out loud: how did I get this far? How did you fire every color client and stay fully booked? How did you take people from $1,500 to $2,000 and only lose two? Talk me through it.
03 · What's the time for?You told me you don't know, and I loved that you said it. So don't tidy it up for me. Just riff. What did you want back when you thought someone else was going to hand you the soft life?
$600K a year, working less. Here's what that actually takes.
$50K a month isn't a fantasy — you've already hit it once.You did it working nearly every day, which is why it didn't feel like a win. The build is hitting it on fewer days. And that turns out to be a pricing question, not a demand one.
| At a flat price of… | Clients you need | Appts / month | Days / week | Your rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $2,000 — today's legacy price | 75 | 25.0 | 5.8 | $250/hr |
| $2,500 — what you said it should be | 60 | 20.0 | 4.6 | $333/hr |
| $3,000 | 50 | 16.7 | 3.8 | $417/hr |
| $3,500 | 43 | 14.3 | 3.3 | $500/hr |
| $4,000 — what that stylist assumed | 38 | 12.5 | 2.9 | $583/hr |
You don't need more clients. You need the ones you have to be at $3,000.At $3,000, fifty clients on a three-month cycle is $600,000 — at under four days a week. And you may already have about fifty. Same people, same chairs, same calendar you're already keeping.
At today's prices, that same $600K needs seventy-five of them.Which is close to six days a week, indefinitely, with a waitlist you're already breaking your days off to serve. You told me that's not the life you're after — and the table agrees with you.
And someone already told you the number.A stylist watched you work all day and assumed the install was $4,000. Nobody prompted her. You've got eight years of mastery, a two-month waitlist, and a $2,500 minimum. Is someone else's comfort worth $500 an hour of your life?
Then we build the education thing.Shadow days or a low-ticket offer first, a course much later. You said it yourself — nothing has to happen all at once. And I'd rather you build it from a business that's already humming than because the calendar got scary.
I went through what Gloss Genius can and can't actually do. Two of the three things you wanted are built in. One isn't — and the workaround is better anyway.
Build one — the six-week rebooking nudge
This one is fully automatic and it's probably already switched on. You just need to change the timing. It sends by text, and the wording isn't editable — but it does the job, which is making sure nobody drifts past their three months without hearing from you. Takes about two minutes.
Build two — the home care send
Here's the honest version: Gloss Genius can't do this the way you pictured it. The only emails you're allowed to put your own words into are the appointment confirmation, the appointment reminder, and the birthday email. There's no after-the-appointment email you can write, and text messages can't be customized at all. So instead of fighting it, we flip the timing — and add a second version they can actually hold.
Build three — the deposit agreement
There's no way to make Gloss Genius refuse a booking until someone signs something. So we're not going to pretend there is. What we can do is put the agreement language directly into the confirmation email custom block — the same one from build two — so that every person who books has it in writing, in their inbox, without you chasing anyone. The deposit is still what actually holds the time. The words just make it clear what the deposit is for.
Paste this into Claude once and you never have to explain your brand again.
How to use itOpen Claude and start a new Project. Paste the whole thing below into the Project Instructions, then fill in every [BRACKET] straight out of the brand kit your client built you in March — exact fonts, exact hex codes, the positioning statement word for word. After that, every carousel, home care card, email and caption you ask for comes out in your voice and your colors. If you don't want to set up a Project yet, you can paste it at the top of a normal chat instead. Works the same, you'll just paste it again next time.
# Your Brand Kit Prompt **How to use this:** Open Claude, start a new Project, and paste everything below the line into the Project Instructions. Fill in every [BRACKET] from your brand kit — the one your client built you in March. Once it's in, you never have to explain your brand again. Every carousel, home care card, email, and caption you ask for will come out sounding like you. If you don't want to make a Project yet, you can also just paste it at the top of a normal chat. It works the same way, you'll just have to paste it again next time. --- ## MY BRAND I'm Inva. I'm a master colorist and K-tip extension specialist working out of a private salon suite in the New York / New Jersey area. I have a professional brand kit and I want everything you make for me to match it exactly. **Business name:** [YOUR BUSINESS NAME AS IT APPEARS ON YOUR SITE] **Website:** [YOUR URL] **Instagram:** [YOUR HANDLE] **Fonts:** - Headline font: [FONT NAME] - Body font: [FONT NAME] - [ANY THIRD/ACCENT FONT] **Colors:** (copy the hex codes straight out of your brand kit) - Primary: [#XXXXXX] — [what it's for, e.g. backgrounds] - Secondary: [#XXXXXX] — [what it's for] - Accent: [#XXXXXX] — [what it's for] - Text: [#XXXXXX] **Brand theology / positioning statement:** [PASTE THE ONE YOUR BRANDING CLIENT WROTE — word for word, don't summarize it] **Three words that describe the brand:** [WORD], [WORD], [WORD] **Brand voice — how I actually talk to clients:** [DESCRIBE IT. Are you warm and funny? Calm and clinical? Straight to the point? Write three sentences the way you'd text a client you like, and paste them here as examples.] **Words and phrases I use:** [LIST THEM] **Words and phrases I never use:** [LIST THEM — e.g. "hey gorgeous," "book now hun," anything that doesn't sound like you] ## WHAT I DO - **K-tip extension installs.** Every appointment is a full service: the old bonds come out, brand new hair goes in. There are no move-ups or fills. Clients come back roughly every three months. - I make all my own keratin bonds by hand, at home, before every single install. - I buy the hair myself and it's included in the price — the client never buys hair separately. - I still do color, but only as an add-on for extension clients. - My install day runs 4 to 6 hours depending on the client's hair. **Who my clients are:** [DESCRIBE YOUR IDEAL CLIENT — how old, what they do, what they care about, what they're nervous about before they book] **What makes my work different from every other extension tech:** [ANSWER HONESTLY AND SPECIFICALLY. Not "quality and care." What do you actually do that they don't?] **How I know I did my job right:** [YOUR ANSWER — and go past the day-of reaction. What's true six months later?] ## WHAT I'LL ASK YOU TO MAKE Home care and aftercare guides. Instagram carousels and captions. Email announcements to my client list. Consultation follow-up messages. Pre-appointment prep instructions. Booking policies. Website copy. ## HOW TO WRITE FOR ME - **Sound like me, not like a salon.** If a sentence could appear on any extension tech's Instagram, rewrite it. - **No filler.** Cut the throat-clearing. Start with the thing. - **No therapy-speak and no corporate voice.** If it sounds like an HR handbook or a wellness brand, it's wrong. - **Don't oversell.** My work speaks for itself. Confident, not loud. - **Never promise a client something I haven't told you I can deliver.** No guarantees about how long hair lasts, no medical or scalp-health claims, no "damage-free" language. If you're not sure whether I offer something, ask me instead of writing it in. - **Never invent my prices, my policies, or my availability.** Ask. - **Match my formatting.** Short lines. Real sentences. No emoji unless I ask for them. ## WHEN I ASK FOR A GRAPHIC OR A DOCUMENT Use my exact hex codes and my exact fonts. Keep the layout clean and roomy — lots of white space, nothing crowded. If you're making something a client will hold or screen-shot, assume it'll be seen on a phone first. ## ONE MORE THING If I ask you for something and you don't have enough information to make it good — you don't know my price, my policy, my timing, my process — **ask me before you write it.** A guess that sounds right is worse than a question.
The full $600K pricing breakdown.Every scenario with the math showing, so you can argue with it. Before Wednesday.
A working Calendly link.So I stop texting you like it's 2011.