Loyalty Cards & discounts - what do you offer??

[lilmizzbest]

Hi folks

I started my own home salon about 18 months ago offering Lash Extensions/Shellac/Minx/Massage & Waxing. I think for a home salon I offer fairly top end treatments using excellent products at a fairly high cost to me and would say my prices are middle of the road (where I live there is a Spa hotel (top end prices), Beauty Salon (fairly expensive) and local salon whom undercut everybody on price - their main way of getting clients.

When I started, I was happy to offer discounts and loyalty schemes in order to build my client base, compete with the local salons and still considered myself to be practising and so needed guinea pigs.

However, I am now regretting the discounts and loyalty scheme I use as sometimes it's hardly worth doing some of the treatments. The scheme I currently offer is :-

Friends - 20% off all treatments
Loyalty Scheme - get 10 stamps (1 per visit) and after all 10 are completed get £20 off (for example infills are £20 for fortnightly visits so this means an hours work for nothing!).

Yes, I can hear some of you saying 'this is far too generous' and believe me I am now regretting it. My customer base is building up steadily (I only do school hours mainly), but I do have a loyal customer following and 95% of my business comes from recommendations.

What do I do in order not to upset my friends and make the clients feel like I'm being greedy by removing or reducing the loyalty scheme???.

I'm happy to still do either special offers or some kind of loyalty system and offer friends a small discount but as you get busier it's the full paying customers you need the most.

I love my job and the flexibility and customer satisfaction it brings but at the end of the day its got to be worthwhile.

Can anyone suggest a better/fairer system that you may use?????

Suggestions and honest opinions very welcome and appreciated.

Julie
xxxxxxx

 

[Redduck]

Hiya
Why don't you tell your clients that you're stopping the reward scheme but have decided to keep it going for 6 months/12 months for existing clients.

Or, you're reducing the reward scheme (£10 off for 10 stamps) but you're not putting your prices up in January (they don't need to know that maybe you weren't going to put the prices up anyway!).

You definitely need to change it because it is very generous but give a little something back when you take away.

I was exactly the same when I started out and I gave more people discounts than I charged full price! I did gradually sort myself out though and now give very few people discounts.

Let us know what you decide to do.

 

[lilmizzbest]

Hiya
Why don't you tell your clients that you're stopping the reward scheme but have decided to keep it going for 6 months/12 months for existing clients.

Or, you're reducing the reward scheme (£10 off for 10 stamps) but you're not putting your prices up in January (they don't need to know that maybe you weren't going to put the prices up anyway!).

You definitely need to change it because it is very generous but give a little something back when you take away.

I was exactly the same when I started out and I gave more people discounts than I charged full price! I did gradually sort myself out though and now give very few people discounts.

Let us know what you decide to do.

Hi Redduck
Thanks for your reply and advice.
You really hit the nail on the head when you said about giving people more discounts than charging full price, because that is how I feel at the moment.

At the beginning, I think I was finding it hard to get out of 'student mode' and realising that I was a professional, good at what I do and deserve to be paid for it.

However, constant bills for high end products and bills from the revenue have made me realise that I cannot afford to keep it up!!!.

The £10 for 10 stamps is a good idea and would mean that I am getting paid for part of a job (i.e. lash extensions) without giving the whole treatment away free but then fading the loyalty card out altogether and maybe doing seasonal specials might be good as well.

I know that there is a very good nail technician in my area who charges more than the local salons and she doesn't give any discounts/loyalty but has a regular client base (although she has been in business a number of years now). To be honest, I think I would rather have less clients paying full price than lots coming to me because of the discount.

The letting clients know of no price increase whilst reducing the discount they receive is a great idea too.

Will keep you posted.

thanks

Julie
xxx