Gift vouchers for hairdressers and beauty salons

Hairdressers, beauty salons and barbershops are ideally placed to offer gift vouchers. Your clients visit you regularly, they trust you, and their loved ones often know that ‘she enjoys going to the salon’. Yet in many salons, vouchers are only sold on request, from a pad of paper at the till. In this article, you’ll find out which vouchers work best in salons and how to offer them to clients without having to ‘sell’ anything.

Why gift vouchers work in salons

• A beauty treatment as a gift is personal, yet risk-free. The giver doesn’t need to get the size or taste right – all they need to know is that the recipient enjoys going to the hairdresser’s or the beauty salon.
• They bring in new clients. The recipient is often visiting for the first time. If they enjoy their experience with you, they’ll return on their own.
• Revenue in advance. You’ll have the money in your account in December, whilst the service is often only used in January and February, when salons are less busy.

Which vouchers sell best in salons

Experience has shown that a combination of one fixed-value voucher and two to three vouchers for a specific service works well:

• a gift voucher for 500, 1,000 or 1,500 CZK – a versatile and most common choice for gift-givers,
• a haircut and blow-dry – a clear service with a clear price,
• hair care and regeneration or a facial – a ‘pampering’ gift that people are less likely to buy for themselves,
• a package, such as a haircut with a conditioning treatment or a manicure with a pedicure,
• a haircut and beard trim at a barbershop – a popular gift for partners, dads and granddads.

A gift voucher or a service voucher?

With hairdressing services, the price often varies depending on hair length, the complexity of the treatment or the products used. Therefore, do not include colouring, highlights or extensions on a voucher for a specific service – the giver does not know the exact scope and you would have to deal with additional charges. A gift voucher is better in this case: the client can choose what they need and pay any difference.

A voucher for a specific service is suitable where the price is fixed: a men’s haircut, a blow-dry, a manicure, or a skincare treatment of a fixed duration. Describe the service precisely on the voucher, for example, ‘skincare treatment, 60 minutes’.

With value-based vouchers, it’s worth allowing them to be used in instalments. In Vouchermat, when the voucher is redeemed, you enter the amount and the app keeps track of how much of the voucher remains.

How to offer vouchers to clients

Your best sales opportunity is right there in the salon. Clients spend tens of minutes in your salon and often talk about gifts for their loved ones themselves. All you need to do is let them know that vouchers are available:

• a sign by the mirror or at reception with a QR code that takes them straight to the voucher purchase page,
• a mention at the till during the festive season: “If you’re looking for a present, we also have gift vouchers – they’ll be sent by email”,
• a link in your Instagram bio – that’s where your clients follow you most often,
• a link in the booking confirmation or appointment reminder,
• a link in your business’s Google profile – people searching for your salon on the map will see it straight away.

If you have a WordPress website, you can add the voucher form using a plugin; for other websites, you’ll need to use code. If you don’t have a website, all you need is a sales page with its own URL, which you can link to from Instagram.

Seasons to prepare for

Salon vouchers are mainly purchased for the following occasions:

• Christmas – by far the busiest period; start preparing as early as November (see the Christmas checklist),
• Valentine’s Day – vouchers for partners,
• Mother’s Day – the second Sunday in May, an ideal occasion for beauty and skincare,
• Birthdays and public holidays – these are sold all year round, so it’s important to have the form available at all times,
• school-leaving exams, weddings and proms – vouchers for hairstyling and make-up.

Two to three weeks before each occasion, publicise the gift vouchers on social media. A short post with a link is usually enough.

Redeeming vouchers without paperwork

A client arrives with a voucher on their phone or as a printout. In the Vouchermat mobile app, you scan the QR code and immediately see what the voucher is for, whether it’s valid and how much credit remains. You redeem it with a single tap and the transaction is recorded in the history, so it cannot be used twice. No ledgers, stamps or trawling through spreadsheets.

Don’t forget about expiry dates. Some vouchers will always end up in a drawer. Vouchermat automatically reminds the recipient that their voucher is about to expire – 7 or 30 days in advance. For the salon, this means fully booked appointments; for the client, a pleasant service rather than disappointment.

How to get started

1. Choose one value-based voucher and one or two fixed-price services.
2. Set the validity period, typically 6 to 12 months.
3. Embed the form on your website or add a link to your Instagram and Google profile.
4. Print the QR code at reception.
5. Agree within your team how you’ll redeem the vouchers – ideally by scanning them on a mobile.

The Free plan costs nothing and covers up to two services, which is enough to get your salon off the ground. You can find out more about how Vouchermat works in hairdressing salons on the Gift Vouchers for Hairdressing Salons page.