Introducing TimeToBook for Hair Salons
We're building booking software that does less, costs less, and just works. Here's why we think the salon industry deserves better.
Jack Cruden
Founder
A salon needs three things from booking software. A calendar the team can read at a glance. A page where clients can book without phoning. Reminders that stop people forgetting they had a 10am cut.
That's the job. So why does a five-chair salon end up paying north of $200 a month for it?
Where the money goes
I spent a few months last year talking to salon owners around NZ before writing a line of code. The complaints rhymed.
A salon in Hamilton was paying $280 a month for Timely. The owner used the calendar, the SMS reminders, and the online booking page. Nothing else. She'd never opened the payroll module. The "marketing suite" was a tab she actively avoided. She was paying for a Ferrari to drive to the dairy.
Per-seat pricing is the worst of it. Hire a junior, your software bill goes up. Take on a rent-a-chair stylist for two days a week, your software bill goes up. The maths punishes you for growing.
What we're building
TimeToBook does three things, and we're going to keep it that way.
- A calendar that doesn't make you squint. Day view, week view, drag bookings to move them. That's the whole thing.
- An online booking page. Lives at
timetobook.com/your-name. Branded with your logo and your colours. Clients pick a service, pick a time, done. - SMS and email reminders. A text 24 hours out cuts no-shows roughly in half. Mundane reason: people forget.
No payroll. No gift cards. No loyalty point engine. No marketplace where we put you next to fifty other salons and skim a fee off whoever clicks first.
If you need an inventory management system, we are not it. I think that's fine. Most of you don't.
Pricing, the whole thing
First staff member is free. Forever, not as a trial-with-a-twist.
After that it's $15 NZD per extra person per month in New Zealand, $10 internationally, £10 in the UK. SMS comes out of a prepaid credit pack that doesn't expire. A solo barber pays nothing. A five-person salon pays $60 a month. A ten-chair salon pays $135.
No contract. No commission on bookings. No per-transaction fee. The price you see is the price.
Where we are
We're a few months in. Our first paying salon is Maiden Hair in Oakura, run by Rachel — five stylists, mostly extensions and colour work. She's been on the platform since the early prototype and most of the rough edges have been sanded off because she told us where they were.
We're shipping changes weekly. Anything you'd want fixed in the first week of using it, the chances are someone else has already asked and it's either done or on the list.
If you run a salon
Have a look around the booking page demo or just tell us what you're using now and what's broken about it. Both are useful.
The pitch isn't complicated. Cheaper than what you're on, does the three things you actually use, built by someone who'll pick up the phone.
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