Digital loyalty card for beauty salons
Fill your empty treatment rooms without discounting your services.
Count in points as soon as facials, waxing and packages coexist: their prices are too far apart for a single stamp. The QR code is presented at payment, once dressed, not in the treatment room. Win-back messages are part of Pro and Business, not the Free plan.
Free plan: up to 50 customers, no credit card.
The short answer
What kind of loyalty program works for a beauty salon?
In a beauty salon, the real cost of a reward is treatment-room time, not a product. Giving away a 90-minute treatment means blocking a room. Giving a short service (hand care, an express treatment) delivers high perceived value for a slot you can squeeze in.
The rhythm resembles a hair salon’s: four to eight weeks depending on the protocols. A ten-visit threshold is too far. Five or six, or points if waxing and facials don’t carry the same ticket.
The QR code is offered at checkout, never during the treatment. The client has their phone to pay. Nothing to download: Apple Wallet or Google Wallet.
The problem
Reinforce your salon’s upscale image
A Tuesday at 2 p.m., the treatment room runs empty. You have two hundred client files and no way to let anyone know two slots are open. That’s the gap Cartia closes with Pro: a message written at 11 a.m., read by noon — with no app to get installed in the treatment room.
At checkout
The scan happens at payment, once they’re dressed — not lying down in the treatment room — while the bank card comes out.
Between two protocols
Six weeks. The card stays in the Wallet. The paper card stayed in another bag.
For the salon
Six to eight weeks without a rebooking, and they’ve already booked elsewhere. A push notification on their phone (Pro plan) — not a text message, not the schedule. In esthetics, a client who leaves doesn’t tell you: they stop replying.
The paper card
Old-fashioned paper cards break the look of the treatment room. Between two treatments, six weeks: the card has time to disappear.
With Cartia
A digital pass in your own colors. Contact details are collected cleanly at sign-up.
Setting up
Set up your loyalty card at your beauty salon
Choose visits or points
Visits if your treatments are priced alike. Points if waxing and facials have nothing in common.
A threshold you can reach within the year
Five to six visits, not ten. Start from the real rhythm of your protocols, not from the coffee shop model.
QR code at payment, never in the treatment room
On the reception desk. During a treatment, hands are busy and it’s not the time to sell a tool.
Record it at the end of the appointment
One scan from Cartia Counter. They see their progress before booking their next slot.
Quick check-in at reception
At the counter
The scan happens before booking the next appointment, without interrupting the treatment room.
In the Wallet, not in an app
The card sits next to the bank card, in Apple Wallet or Google Wallet. The customer scans the QR code, fills in a short form, and adds it — there is no app to install.
In your business, concretely
An empty treatment-room slot can’t be made up the next day
The beauty salon’s economic particularity isn’t the basket, it’s time. An occupied room is a room that produces; an empty room at 3 p.m. on a Tuesday is lost for good, unlike a product that stays on the shelf. That’s what makes the client who stopped booking costlier here than elsewhere.
The digital card makes that absence visible, which a paper card taken home by the client never will. What you do about it stays a choice: from Pro, you can write to a segment of clients who haven’t been in for a while. It’s neither a text message nor an automatic appointment reminder — it’s a message you write and decide to send.
- The scan momentAt payment, once dressed, while the bank card comes out. Never in the treatment room: neither the phone nor the moment suits it.
- A reward on a short serviceOffer a short treatment rather than a discount on a long package: you control the treatment-room time committed, and the perceived value stays that of the listed price.
- What the Free plan doesn’t doThe full loyalty program is included up to 50 clients, no credit card. Segments and phone notifications start at Pro.
The calculation
How many extra treatments would cover the subscription?
With the assumptions below — €50 ticket, 70% gross margin — a single extra treatment per month would cover the monthly cost of the Pro plan.
Adjust my assumptions
If 10% of visits repeat one more time thanks to the card · €35 margin per treatment
With these assumptions, the break-even point is
1 treatment / month
Beyond this threshold, the margin generated would cover the cost of the Pro plan. Formula: plan price ÷ (average basket × gross margin) = €29.90 ÷ €35.
- +230treatments over the year
- €960more revenue each month, with this assumption
- €0.98per day for the Pro subscription
Illustrative estimate, not a revenue promise. Starting assumptions at your beauty salon: average ticket €50, 70% gross margin, 24 days open per month. Cartia measures neither your revenue nor your return on investment: replace these values with your own.
Frequently asked questions
Replacing the paper card at your beauty salon
How do I set up a loyalty card at a beauty salon?
You create a program in visits or points, place a QR code at reception, and validate each visit at checkout. Your clients install no app.
What reward should a beauty salon offer?
A short service you control: hand care, an express treatment, a facial massage. Avoid giving away your longest protocol: it costs you a whole treatment room.
Can I win back a client who hasn’t rebooked?
From the Pro plan, you send a push notification to their phone. Not a text message, not a WhatsApp: no message credits to top up. Typically after two cycles without an appointment, or to fill a treatment-room gap in the afternoon. It isn’t a scheduling tool: you write it, you target it, you send it.
Do my customers have to download an app?
No. They scan the QR code at the counter, join the program from their browser, then add their card to Apple Wallet or Google Wallet. No app to install.
How much does a loyalty card for a beauty salon cost?
Cartia is free up to 50 customers at one location, no credit card required. Beyond that, the Pro plan is €29.90/month, tax included, with unlimited customers and a 14-day free trial (credit card required to start it), with no setup fees and no per-volume billing.
Related businesses
The same tool, set up for another kind of business
Guides
Set up the program, not just the tool
- Scanning without a networkMarket, food truck, basement shop or Wi-Fi outage: keep scanning digital loyalty cards offline. Included in Cartia Pro at €29.90 a month.
- Drive-to-store: 7 campaignsWin-back, weather, previews, product of the day, reviews, events, rewards: 7 drive-to-store campaigns to bring customers in with a digital loyalty card.
- From paper card to WalletA stamp card in Apple Wallet or Google Wallet: what changes for you and your customers, five steps to switch from paper, and what France’s CNIL expects.
- Apple Wallet and Google Wallet in your shopNo app to install, a card that updates at every visit, messages on the lock screen: what Apple Wallet and Google Wallet change for a local shop.
- Increase the average basketThe average basket + 20% rule, progressive tiers and impulse purchases: how to use loyalty tiers to lift what customers spend per visit in your shop.
- Bring back occasional customersFrictionless sign-up, a 30-day win-back, a date-of-birth message, off-peak offers and Google reviews: 5 ways to turn one-time visitors into regulars.
- Profitable loyalty programMargin math, points rules and reward costs: a step-by-step method for designing a profitable loyalty program for your shop.
- Paper vs digital loyalty cardHidden costs, lost cards, win-back notifications: compare the paper stamp card with a digital loyalty card in Apple Wallet and Google Wallet.
Compare
Cartia compared with other solutions
Pricing, free plan, setup fees and customer journey: the comparisons are detailed solution by solution.
Beauty salon loyalty card
The program described above, set up and ready to scan, in five minutes.
Free plan: €0, up to 50 customers, no credit card · Pro and Business: 14-day trial, credit card required to start