How to price mobile beauty services, including travel time

"I don't pay rent, so I can charge less." This sentence is a big reason so many mobile stylists burn out.

You might not pay rent to a landlord, but you pay a time cost that salon stylists don't. If you drive 30 minutes to a client, do a $40 blowout, and drive 30 minutes back, you just spent two hours for $40. After fuel and product, you are close to minimum wage.

This guide gives you a simple formula for pricing home visits, a fair way to work out your travel fee, and a worked example you can copy with your own numbers.

The mobile pricing formula

You are selling convenience, and convenience costs extra. Think about food delivery. Does the burger cost less because it came to your house? No. It costs more.

Your price formula: (Hourly goal) + (Product) + (Travel fee) + (Convenience premium)

Set your hourly goal

Do not base this on what you think people will pay. Base it on what you need to live.

How to find your real number:

1. Add up what you need each month: your own pay, plus the business costs (phone, kit, product restocks, insurance, booking tools, car costs).
2. Work out how many hours you can actually spend on clients. Not hours you're "working," hours with your hands in someone's hair.
3. Divide the first by the second.

Say you need $3,000 a month and you can do 60 client hours. That's $3,000 ÷ 60 = $50 an hour. Notice it's client hours, not driving hours. Driving gets its own line.

Work out your travel fee

Your time in the car is still time spent on that client, so charge for it.

• Flat fee: "$20 travel fee for anywhere within 10 miles."
• Time-based: if it takes 30 minutes to get there, charge $25 (half your hourly rate).

The full travel fee formula: (round-trip minutes ÷ 60 × your hourly goal) + fuel and parking.

For a 20-minute drive each way at $50 an hour, with $5 in fuel: 40 ÷ 60 × $50 = $33.33, plus $5 = $38.33. Round it to $40.

You don't have to charge all of it as a fee. Some stylists charge part of it as a travel fee and build the rest into a higher service price. Just make sure the total covers it.

Add a convenience premium

Clients are paying to stay in their pyjamas. That is a premium service. A common rule of thumb is to add around 20% to your base salon price. If a salon blowout is $50, yours is $60 (plus travel).

A worked example: a day of silk presses

Assumptions, so you can swap in your own:

• Silk press takes 90 minutes, uses about $8 of product.
• Hourly goal: $50.
• Salon price for the same service: $85 (90 minutes at $50 is $75, plus $8 product, rounded up).
• Mobile clients are a 20-minute drive each way, $5 fuel per trip. (Real days mix short and long drives. This keeps the maths simple.)
• An 8-hour day (480 minutes).
• The salon stylist pays $50 a day in chair rent.

The salon stylist: 90-minute appointments back to back. Five fit in a day (450 minutes). 5 × $85 = $425, minus $50 rent = $375.

The mobile stylist at salon prices, no travel fee: each appointment takes 90 minutes plus 40 minutes of driving, so 130 minutes. Three fit in a day (390 minutes). Four would need 520. 3 × $85 = $255, minus $15 fuel = $240.

That's the "I don't pay rent so I can charge less" trap. You earned $135 less than the stylist paying rent.

The mobile stylist with a $40 travel fee: 3 × ($85 + $40) = $375, minus $15 fuel = $360.

The mobile stylist with the travel fee and a 20% convenience premium: $85 × 1.2 = $102, call it $100. So each client pays $100 + $40 = $140. 3 × $140 = $420, minus $15 fuel = $405.

Now you're ahead of the salon stylist, doing fewer appointments, and getting paid for every minute you spend in the car.

Run your own services through the pricing calculator. It works out a price from your hourly rate, service time, and product cost, and adds a share for overhead and profit on top. Use that as your base price, then add your travel fee.

Setting up home-visit pricing on your booking page

In Miali you can add a travel fee to each home-visit service. Clients see the fee on the service, and it's added to their total when they book, so nobody gets a surprise at the door.

A few things to know:

• The travel fee is set per service, not per distance. Base it on your typical trip. If you also travel further out, create a separate listing for it (for example, "Silk press, home visit, outer suburbs") with a higher fee, or ask those clients to message you for a quote.
• Pad your durations. Build setup and pack-down into the service time. If a silk press takes 90 minutes in the chair and 15 minutes to set up and pack away, list it at 1 hour 45 minutes. That way the next booking doesn't land on top of your drive.
• Say where you go. Add the towns or areas you cover to each home-visit service. Clients see them on your booking page before they book.
• Take a deposit. A no-show at a salon wastes an hour. A no-show at a client's house wastes the hour and the drive. Miali lets you ask for a deposit as a fixed amount or a percentage of the service price, paid straight to you. Here's how deposits help cut no-shows.

How to handle clients who push back on price

Some will, and that's fine. The clients who complain about a $10 difference are usually not the clients a mobile business is built for. Your best clients are the busy lawyer, the new parent, the manager who values their time more than $10.

If someone pushes back on the travel fee, don't apologise for it:

"The fee covers my travel time to you, so I can keep my service prices the same for everyone. If it's easier, I'm happy to book you on a day I'm already working in your area."

How to raise prices without losing clients

Send your clients a short email. Miali lets you email a group of clients at once:

"To keep providing the mobile service you love, my prices are changing on [Date] to reflect higher travel and product costs. Thank you for valuing my time and work!"

Don't ask for permission. Inform them.

Give at least two to four weeks' notice. Clients who book before the date get the old price. That rewards your regulars and fills your calendar at the same time.

Common pricing mistakes

• Pricing from what the salon down the road charges. They have different costs and more appointments a day. Price from your own numbers.
• Not counting drive time as work time. If you're in the car for a client, you're working for that client.
• Waiving the travel fee "just this once." It becomes the new price very quickly.
• Forgetting parking, tolls, and ride fares. If you use rides instead of your own car, the fare is your fuel line.

FAQ

Should I charge travel by the mile or kilometre? You can, but a flat fee is easier for clients to understand and easier for you to list. Use one fee for your usual area and a separate listing or a quote for longer trips.

Should the travel fee show separately or be built into the price? Showing it separately is more transparent and makes your service prices comparable to a salon's. Clients can see exactly what the convenience costs.

Should I have a minimum booking amount for home visits? Many mobile stylists do. Driving 40 minutes for a $15 service rarely makes sense. Say it in your service descriptions, for example "home visits from $60."

How do I get more mobile clients once my prices are right? Start with your booking link everywhere you're found. Here's a full guide for mobile hairstylists.

Key takeaways

• Price from what you need to earn per client hour, not from what others charge.
• Charge for drive time with a travel fee: round-trip minutes at your hourly rate, plus fuel and parking.
• A convenience premium of around 20% over salon prices is a common starting point.
• Pad durations, list the areas you cover and take deposits on home visits.
• Give two to four weeks' notice when you raise prices, and don't apologise for them.