Pet Grooming Price List Template: Price by Size and Coat, Not by Breed and Memory

Ask three groomers what a medium doodle costs and you may get three different prices, quoted by the same shop, in the same week. That is what pricing by breed and memory does. Breeds come in too many sizes, coats change from one visit to the next, and memory prices the last dog instead of the one standing on the table. The customer hears a different number than last time, and the groomer cannot explain why, because there was never a system behind either number.

A price list fixes this only if it is built on things you can measure at check-in. Weight can be measured. Coat condition can be seen and touched. Breed cannot tell you either one reliably. Build the menu on size and coat, print it on one page, and the quote at the counter becomes a lookup instead of a negotiation.

Size tiers come first

Divide your grooming prices into four size tiers by weight: Small, Medium, Large, and Extra Large. Set the weight bands yourself, based on the dogs you actually groom and the time each band takes on your table. A tier is a promise about time. A dog that takes twice as long to wash, dry, and finish should not sit in the same price tier as a dog that takes half the time, whatever either breed is called.

Each tier gets a base price for the standard groom in a normal coat. That base price is the anchor for the whole menu. When your costs move, you reprice the four base numbers and the rest of the menu follows, instead of repricing every breed you have ever groomed from memory.

Coat condition is the multiplier

Size alone still misses half the job. Two dogs in the same weight tier can be forty minutes apart because one coat is kept up and the other is packed, long, or matted. So the second half of the method is a coat condition multiplier: a set of coat states, from short and maintained up to heavy or matted work, each with a multiplier that applies to the tier base price.

This does two things memory cannot. First, it makes the price change explainable. When a regular dog arrives in rough coat, the price moves for a stated reason the customer can see on the menu. Second, it prices the hard work honestly instead of spreading it across every customer. The well kept coats stop subsidizing the neglected ones.

Matted coats need one extra line of protection: an authorization, signed before work starts, that covers shaving or working out the matting and the extra charge. Coat pricing is fair only if the customer agrees to the condition call before the groom, not after it.

A worked quote, with sample numbers

Here is the math, using sample numbers only. Replace them with your own rates before you quote anyone.

Say your Large tier base price is 60, in whatever currency unit you use for planning, and the dog on the table has a heavy coat that carries a multiplier of 1.5. The groom price is the base times the multiplier: 60 times 1.5 equals 90. Then add any add-ons the customer picks from the menu below, each priced flat. The quote is three lines: tier base, coat multiplier, add-ons. Any groomer in the shop can rebuild that quote and land on the same number, and the customer can see how it was built.

The formula is the point, not the sample numbers. Your base prices come from your own time and costs: what an hour on your table has to earn after wages, rent, product, and laundry. Set them once, write them down, and review them when your costs move.

The add-on menu is priced flat

Add-ons should never be multipliers and never be invented at the counter. List them as flat prices on the same menu: nail work beyond the standard, teeth, de-shedding treatment, flea bath, special shampoo, tidy work between full grooms. A flat list does three jobs. It makes add-ons easy to offer, because the groomer is reading a price, not setting one. It makes them easy to accept, because the customer sees the same price every visit. And it stops the slow discounting that happens when a busy groomer rounds an add-on down to keep the line moving.

Review the add-on list against time, the same as the tiers. An add-on that takes twenty minutes and is priced like five is not a courtesy. It is a leak, repeated daily.

One printed page

The finished price list has to fit on one printed page: the four size tiers, the coat multipliers, the add-on menu, and the basic policies that affect price, such as no-show and late pickup terms. One page goes on the wall, one at the counter, and the same page answers the phone quote. If the list runs to three pages, customers will not read it and staff will not use it. The discipline of one page forces the menu to stay simple enough to run a shop on.

Then the list has to live somewhere it gets used. Quote from the page, not around it. When a price changes, reprint the page the same day, so the wall, the counter, and the phone are never quoting different shops.

The list only works if the dogs come back

A fair price on a dog that never rebooks is still lost revenue. Grooming runs on cycles, most dogs on a four, six, or eight week rhythm, and the price conversation goes best when the next appointment is booked before the dog leaves. Track the cycle per client, flag the dogs that run overdue, and the price list gets a steady book of work to price instead of a week of surprises.

The Pet Grooming Starter 3-Pack is built around this price list: a price menu builder with size tiers by weight and coat condition multipliers, an add-on menu, and a worked quote example that prints as a one page price sheet, plus the rebook tracker for four, six, and eight week cycles, message scripts, and the intake and policy pack.