Has Pre-Booking Made A Comeback In 2026?

All right, guys. Buckle up for this conversation, because you may have heard in the past couple years the controversy of pre-booking and whether it's still relevant, whether it's not, whether it's fake st- uh, stability, or whether it actually is real stability, whatever it may be. Pre-booking has been a historic, uh, strategy that has been told to us to be able to create, quote-unquote, "predictable income for ourselves in the future," right? And post-pandemic, a lot of the concept of pre-booking was challenged by myself and by other, you know, industry influencers and even hairstylists all alike, right?

And I think that was for many different reasons that we will kind of go into, and I'll share my own reasons why I have shared that we should rethink pre-booking, and I still think that we should. We should have a more nuanced conversation about pre-booking and whether it's a strategy that you should really be intentional about implementing or not. But I do think that I wanna make my stance clear that in 2026, pre-booking is absolutely something that we should all at least consider again if you have stopped pre-booking or if you just don't really do it often, and this is maybe even your first time hearing about it. So, I'm gonna kind of make my case for all sides.

I'm gonna be sharing with us why we may have, in the past couple years, re-thought pre-booking or challenged pre-booking, but then I'm also going to share with you why I'm here today, telling you what the T is about pre-booking and why I think it may be something to pay attention to. And then at the end, if you are interested in making pre-booking a priority, then I'm gonna be sharing with you how you can actually increase your pre-booking rate, um, and give you some really easy, nice strategies that you can actually apply tomorrow to your clientele. But we have Jodi Brown on the podcast today to facilitate as per usual and share her beautiful brain and knowledge and experience with us. So, thank you so much for being here, Jodi.

Where do you think we should start off with this conversation I love this conversation. So I went to hair school, like, 20-plus years ago, and so when I was in hair school and at all of my jobs out of hair school, it was, like, pre-booking was the law, basically. Like, it was the number one thing, 'cause I feel like it used to be harder to book appointments. And so I've kind of seen the whole evolution of this, and, um, I think we should talk about kind of, like, why pre-booking was reconsidered.

So, like, what were the factors that actually led to, as an industry, us thinking about this completely differently? Yeah. So I think one of the main reasons, particularly from, like, a time perspective, 'cause, like, time and how things e- evolve and change, like, really affects all of this stuff and normally births it all, right? I think that we have seen such a huge evolution in the way that our services are desired and which services are taking place, and particularly, we of course have seen a massive shift towards the low-maintenance clientele and the low-maintenance services.

And I think when pre-booking was law, like you share, Jodi, I think when pre-booking was law, I mean, the bread and butter of the salon was the four-to-six-weekers, right? And the four-to-six-weekers, we really normally can thrive very well with a pre-booked schedule for those people, because they are predictably gonna need their gray touched up. They are coming on that consistent basis. They expect to, they need to, they want to, and they are likely to show up to those appointments because it's not that far away.

But when it- when it comes to particularly the low-maintenance services, but also for the stylists out there who are a little bit more niched-down into specialties where the majority of the clientele is on a more low-maintenance schedule, that's when we're looking at having to start to pre-book people out if we want pre-booking to be a part of our strategy to, like, three months, six months, eh, some of the time. And that causes some issues, or potential issues, that we hadn't really seen or thought about before, and we didn't really even connect pre-booking to them at all, eh, because it's just something that we've always done, and we really liked to f- have that feeling, that sense of security, that we have gaps filled in the future, right? And so, um, I think that that's something that really pushed the rethinking pre-booking conversation. Um, another thing, too, I s- especially post-pandemic, I think, as we've kind of revolutionized as an industry, become much more business oriented, but then also wanting to kind of reclaim some more work/life balance as, uh, as stylists, right?

I think that we wanted to create more flexibility in our lives as well, too. When you are booking your clients out for an entire year ahead, it's really difficult to book yourself a vacation without having to move an entire week of cl- weeks' worth of clientele to God knows where else, 'cause you're already solidly booked elsewhere, right? And so that makes things a little bit more difficult. I mean, even, I know for me, like, whenever I was sick or something like that, and having to take off any days and being booked for four months ahead or even more, where the fuck are these people going without me sacrificing all of my life and my time, right Yeah.

So, I mean, at least, if I'm not pre-booking as far out, right, then I can make it so I am going to have at least a little bit more flexibility, even if it's not next week, you know what I mean? Yeah. And so I think that a lot of people, they did not... A lot of stylists didn't know what was going on in their lives two-plus months from that day.

Your clients didn't know what was going on in two-plus months from that day, and you wanted to have more flexibility in your life s- where you didn't have to reschedule a whole week's worth of clients to be able to make it to something or schedule a vacation or whatever it may be. I know for me, I had to say no to my dad's Christmas party that's always the Sunday before Christmas, because I was already fully pre-booked with clients four months out, before it even happened, and that was really shitty, and I just absolutely felt like I had nowhere to move these people to.You know, it just- f- I felt very locked in. And so, that's why it really appealed to me to stop pre-booking, or at least rethink pre-booking.

And then, like I alluded to, for the client side, the clients have no idea what's going on in three months from today, and so you're asking somebody, especially if you're kind of pushing pre-booking, right, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but if you are p- pushing pre-booking, then you are asking somebody to loosely commit to a date and a time that they have not really intentionally thought out and know for a fact that they can make. And so, then you would see some last-minute cancellations at a high rate that we would very much like to avoid, and that is due to the fact that they all of a sudden get their 72-hour reminder and they're like, "I booked this months ago. I- I didn't even re- remember that I booked this, and now all of a sudden it's here, and I have my son's basketball game that I have to go to." Right?

And so then they would cancel it last minute, and so we wanted to start to maybe avoid those last-minute cancellations and create more predictability in our schedule. Um, and also from a consumer behavior perspective, we run a survey every year for clients who visit boutique salons across the United States, and we asked them what their feelings were about pre-booking. And I don't have the exact numbers on me right now, but I do remember the majority of clients preferred to not pre-book and book their appointments when they were ready to. So that way, they could more reliably show up to them, right?

Yeah. So, from a consumer behavior perspective, from a general public perspective, it just kind of felt as if we should maybe start to reconsider this. Is this even doing good for us if they are ending up canceling the appointments anyway? Right.

And from a stylist's perspective, we wanted more work/life balance and more predictability in our schedule, I think, and I think that pre-booking actually did the opposite sometimes and actually locked us in too much. Yeah. Instead of creating more predictability, it actually created some unsure-ed-ness and we created more last-minute cancellations, and also created some more stress for us. Well- So I think that that's what's got us here.

Yeah, and I think, too, like, technology now has evolved to the point where there are other options. Like, it used to be so much harder, 'cause you had to, like, call and then you had to, like, wait, and- You know what I mean? Th- It was such a manual process to book an appointment, and now there's so many other ways that are so much easier. And so, like, I do think it's good to evaluate historical things on a regular basis so that we can see, you know, w- is this serving us right now versus just doing it 'cause it's always the way it's been done?

Yeah, absolutely, in all case scenarios. And it's a really, really good point that I didn't think about, too. Yeah, it's a- I mean, we wanted to remove a lot of, like, the labor that we had- Right. of, like, having to, like, reschedule and schedule appointments, but in my opinion, in reality, like, we're gonna get the same amount of that anyway, and- Totally.

we do have those tools to make all of that stuff so much easier for both ends, for both the stylist and for the client to be able to schedule and reschedule things. Um, and so when I was teaching, like, Pre Visit Pathway, like, way back in the day, which was, like, how to streamline and automate things, I was very much encouraging to rethink the pre-booking, and I was helping you put systems in place that still made it so you had a booked and busy schedule, right? And I wasn't saying never pre-book anybody. That's never what I've said.

I've just said there should be more nuance to this conversation, and for every individual with the type of business that you have, the type of clientele that you have, there are different things that you should consider when you are thinking about pre-booking, or specifically not pre-booking certain people or services or whatever it may be. And so now, I just want to m- to kind of revisit that strategy, and I want to break down what I've been able to discover and notice recently, and make a good case for why you may want to think about pre-booking as a viable strategy for you in 2026 if you want to have more predictability in your schedule. So, here's why I'm coming to you today and I'm sharing with you this situation. Number one, I do believe that we are very far out of the pandemic, and I think that even in my friends I'm seeing more go-back-to-office policies more and more and more, slowly but surely.

I think that people have a lot more packed and busy and consistent schedules now, and I think because of that, people are looking for even more predictability around that busy schedule, and they want to ensure that they have an appointment booked ahead of time because they can't- they don't have time or energy to think about it or remember it or anything else, right? Or they don't have the flexibility to be able to move things around to be able to make it into that appointment last minute if they wanna book an appointment last minute. And so I think that consumers are kind of bouncing back to that kind of wish, and I would say that's even the case if they are a low-maintenance client as well, too. But that's where a big part of this conversation gets a little bit touchy or risky, and so what I've had the pleasure of doing is working more intimately with stylists recently, and a big yellow flag that kind of pops up for me, whenever I see a s- a really successful stylist who's making good money, they are getting a bunch of new client requests, and they also, when we run their new client retention rate, it's actually pretty damn high.

Like, it's above 50%, but they still have gaps. It doesn't make sense to me. It, like, doesn't click for me. It's like, if you have new clients who are coming in, if the numbers are saying that they're coming back, then why are we not fully booked, right?

And when w- you have a high performer who is making good money regardless, it's awesome. There's not necessarily any problems even if you do have the gaps, but because there's gaps, you have opportunities. So it's like, we can make so much more money if those gaps are filled, so it'd be really nice to see you fully solidly booked, because you'll literally probably double your income, right? So with this person, we had put in every single thing that we possibly can put into place to be able to increase our utilization rate, we call it.

So our utilization rate...... is, uh, the amount of hours that you're available versus the amount of hours that you're actually booked with appointments, and so we wanted to increase that number. We've done everything that we knew that we could. We had newsletters.

We had doing everything in the appointment that would increase that retention rate. This person has a little bit more of a low maintenance clientele, so that's like a more uphill battle for people to climb as far as staying fully booked and busy. And it also adds some risk to pre-booking, because you're booking people a little bit further out. We're looking at the three-month, four-month, five-month range.

But I said we should consider it as an experiment. This person had not pre-booked people for a very long time. They had a limited booking range, and they're- w- in which they're only open for two months at a time, and I was like, "We should just try this. We should try it with a small portion of your clientele, and we should run an experiment, and we should see how this works for you."

Because what'll end up happening is if, is if, if, if we just went full throttle on pre-booking, right? We're like, "Okay, we're just gonna throw it back in there and we're gonna see what happens," then again, we could cause a lot more harm than good if everybody just ends up canceling anyway, right? So we wanted to make sure that if we pushed pre-booking for a small portion of people, would they show up? And we would track it all diligently.

Did they cancel, did they not? And we decided if the cancellation rate is above X percent, then we will not make this a strategy that we focus on and we try to increase. But if p- these people show up and if everything's all good and great and dandy and this makes sure that we're more booked, then why not really amp up the pre-booking? And for this person, it ended up actually being really, really successful.

I do believe that, of course, for your unique business, your unique clientele, I think an experiment like this is important to see if this is a, a strategy that's worth you putting a lot of time into, especially when it comes to the lower maintenance niches out there, because this person's lower maintenance niche isn't like the two times a year. It could be more of like a three to four times a year situation, right Right. So the nuances really matter here, and pre-booking may work for all circumstances, but I, I, I... Business is not a one-size-fits-all.

Most strategies aren't a one-size-fits-all, and that's why I love working intimately with stylists in my mastermind, because we get to together come up with these strategies, do long-term experiments that create a lot of stability in the long term, and that's definitely what this person is doing now. And it's been really exciting to see, and that's why I'm coming to you guys today with really considering this as a strategy to look at again, because it is making a big difference and it has proven, at least with this person, to be viable and not cause more harm than good. So I recommend that if you stopped pre-booking in the past, I'd recommend that you maybe start to slightly ramp it up with a small portion of your clientele, and I would run an experiment and track all of them, and if it's a successful experiment, and it'll take you a while to track. You know, this was like a four to five month situation for us.

Then if that's successful, then you full-send the pre-booking and you try to go as hard as possible with it. And then you track again. Is that then now that you're going 100% five months later, is this causing you more harm, more harm than good? Are you getting more last minute cancellations, right?

So just track, track, track. This is where KPIs, numbers, and specific experiments become very important, and when you're at an advanced level especially, that's the type of stuff that makes the biggest difference and that you get to now start doing. Which, I'm a nerd, so I think it's kind of fun. I love, I love- But- ...

the data. Yeah. We love the data, and I think that that's when you g- when you get to a certain level where you're a high performer, that is truly like... I think that the smallest things make the biggest difference, because- Yeah.

it's no longer about like quadrupling your income anymore, you know? It's not about hitting the big six figures. It's about small, sustainable growth, and those smallest things will make that biggest difference. And I think a sustainable growth is so much sexier to somebody who has already made the money that where you don't have to worry about the paycheck coming in tomorrow or everything starting to slowly die, versus you having unpredictability and such volatile months and sometimes going super up and sometimes going super down.

So that's my tea. And I love the idea of doing this on an experimental basis too before you, like, fully roll out a whole new, like, thing to your clientele that may or may not have the result that you want. So I love that, like, experimental idea so that you can really figure out whether or not it's gonna work first. I agree.

And, you know, I just really wanna, like... One of the concepts I really hope that you take home from, for, from this episode, my friend, who's listening to this, is again, like this is not a one-size-fits-all thing, and nothing is in business. Yeah. And it's really a struggle for me, and me and Jodi talk about it all the time.

It's such a struggle for me to come onto a podcast episode and give a clear message, because I think about how you listening to this, my friend, may live in this city with this type of clientele doing these types of services. But then I have another person listening to this episode who is doing completely separate, different things, and I want to try to just come on here and be like, "This is exactly what you do to be successful," and boom, there you go. But it's just not reality. And so we need to have more nuanced conversations, and you need to be in spaces and rooms where that is facilitated for you so you can see the things that you can't see, so that way you can be shown the things that you can't see specific to you and your unique business and the people that you serve and the services that you do.

And so run your own experiments, follow your own data to make your decisions that will help solve problems and help you reach your goals is just an overarching theme that I would like to send you home with today.The next thing that we're gonna get into, because you may now be thinking, "Hmm, pre-booking might be the tea for me." And after you run your experiment, you may be like, "Okay. I wanna ramp this up and I wanna be pre-booking as much as possible."

I'm gonna give you a quick little master class on how you can improve your pre-booking. I will tell you, in my salons as an employee and, of course, by myself, my pre-booking rate was insane, okay? Like, to me, this should be the easiest thing. It should be the easiest thing.

Because you're not asking for the s- the money, right? Unless maybe you, like, require deposits or whatever. I mean, I'm obviously not talking about that here, right? You're not asking for money, you know?

Like, there's ... Y- with, with, with retail, right, like that, like trying to, like, increase the retail or the add-ons, your average ticket, you, it's a little bit scarier because you're literally selling something to somebody, right? This, of course you're still selling, but they're ... you're not asking for money.

You're just asking for a date on a calendar. Right. And so this should be easy for you too, my friend, okay? And so here's what I normally do.

Here's, this is how I approach my pre-booking, okay? I'll try to keep this, like, concise and give you, like, the, the top three most important things. The first thing, and this goes with anything in the client experience and numbers that you want to make better, is start talking about this from the very beginning. So at the very beginning of the appointment, that's when we talk about when they're gonna come see you next.

And then that way, you are set up for success at the middle or the end of the appointment to be able to get them pre-booked for that time, and it's already something that was talked about out of the way, and you had that person's full attention. You also have their permission now to bring it up and actually do the action later. Another thing that this person actually started doing that was really helpful for her, because she felt as if it was a little bit difficult to fit pre-booking and the conversation into the end of the appointment, because she felt like it was taking up a bit of time and she felt like she was rushing to the next person, so she would skip over it. Again, starting to talk about it in the consultation, but also, can we actually do the action of pre-booking them while their color is processing?

Or can we do it during the appointment at some point, right? So I'd recommend trying to do the pre-booking if you're nervous about the time that it may take you with the back and forth and the conversation before the checkout actually happens. Right. And then, the third thing is in s- if you really wanna, like, implement, like, actual good sales strategy, okay, I would say, first, make sure that they know what's in it for them, okay?

And you should be able to authentically, like from a actual, true self standpoint, right, like a, like a, you a- like a actual ... you actually care about your client's standpoint, you should be able to list out the benefits for them. So if you come back to see me every four weeks for a trim, then your hair will actually grow X amount more than if you were gonna see me every three months, because you won't have split ends that we need to cut, right? Um, or, if you were gonna come see me for a toner or a mini-highlight every six weeks, then that would make it so we don't have to do a huge transformation service for you every three months, and that will save you money in the long run, or your hair will look great all the time.

Something that I would say to my lower maintenance clients, I would say, "Uh, my goal as your hairstylist is to make it so when you have an appointment with me, your hair still looks awesome and you never get to the point where you're saying, 'Oh my God, I need my hair done and I hate my hair.'" I want every single one of my clients to come back and still be getting compliments on their hair to that day. And that would be a huge game-changer and a mindset shift for my clients, and it would work really, really well. Um, my last thing, and this is kind of a classic one.

You guys may have heard this from brands before, is don't ask. Just assume that they're gonna pre-book- Mm-hmm. with you, okay? Now, again, this may be, uh, this ...

You have to experiment here, okay? This may be contradictive to maybe setting yourself up for more risk than not, but I know that it works for pre-booking, so I'll throw it out there, is instead of saying, "So do you wanna set up your next appointment?" you say, "Okay. So as we talked about, coming to see me every six months, or I'm sorry, six weeks for a, for a toner or a mini-highlight would probably be the best idea.

So six weeks brings us to whatever date. The days I have available are these days. Do any of those work for you?" Right?

Yeah. So we don't ask. We just tell. And we allow the client to say no if that's what they want to do, but we, as the professionals, are gonna follow through strongly with our recommendations if we truly think that this is the best fit for our client, because that is our fucking job.

Yeah. And those, my friends, are the things that you can do, the most important, most impactful things that you can do to increase your pre-booking rate. Absolutely. I love that, and I just wanna add, as, like, a consumer, when someone takes the cognitive load off of me, that is always a relief.

I never feel annoyed by it. If my stylist's like, "Oh, okay. I know this day works best for you, and this is ... Like, how long does that work?"

I'm like, "Absolutely. Book me in." Like, any decision I can skip and I can just say yes or no to, I am happy. Hell yeah, dude.

Absolutely. And if you're providing a great service and if you've laid out the benefits enough, then some- then this person should be on board, right? Yeah. Um, so my friend, thank you so much for tuning in to the podcast.

DM me or leave a comment wherever you're listening to this. I think on Spotify, you guys can just leave comments instead of, like, full-blown reviews. If you're gonna leave me a review, make sure it's a five-star one and then leave the comment, all right? Uh, thank you so much for tuning in to the Modern Hairstylist Podcast.

DM me your thoughts about this and pre-booking and what you think you're gonna be doing moving forward, um, or leave it in the comments or in your five-star review. So much love. Peace out, girl scout. Bye-bye.

End of transcript. © 2026 Hunter Donia LLC.