From 1st July 2022, we are changing how we communicate and offer guidance around our prices. Please see the above image for a table of suggested prices for our services and a ‘what should I pay’ guide. (also featured in this googledoc and on our new website pricing page for screenreaders.)
Since day one of founding Open Barbers, we have offered services on a ‘sliding scale’ principle. We wish to remain welcoming and affordable to everyone in our community, and we don’t want anyone to feel priced out of our services, however we need to introduce clearer guidelines to our sliding scale prices, to ensure that we can cover the costs of our community business.
Why have we had to make this change?
- We haven’t provided much structure to our sliding scale price range before, and we have realised that we have been making an overall loss on all our services for the past few years.
- Thanks to a few grants during the lockdown periods of the pandemic we were able to plug those losses and subsidise all our services and keep prices low, but those grants have now ended.
- Business costs continue to rise since the start of the pandemic, including staff wage rises, products costs, energy bills and other overheads.
- We have noticed that average client payments on the sliding scale have dropped in the past year.
- This news report gives a really helpful context to the pricing challenges the hair industry is facing in general.
- We hope that by providing clearer guidance on our costs, clients can make informed choices about what to pay, balancing their own means with our needs as a business to survive and thrive. We hope that those who can afford to pay more, or sign up to our Patreon, will do so to enable those in our community who are struggling to continue to access our services.
We hope this answers any questions you may have, but if you have any further queries at all please don’t hesitate to reach out at openbarbers@gmail.com