Walk-ins only or appointment book? Stuck between two ways to run my chair

I've been cutting for 6 years now, mostly in a shop near Charlotte. Started with pure walk-ins because that's how my old boss ran things, but the downtime killed me some weeks, maybe 15 hours of just sitting around. So I switched to a full appointment book 4 months ago, booked up 2 days out pretty regular now. The tradeoff is real though, I get flaky no-shows about 3 times a month and walk-ins who used to stop by just go elsewhere now. Which setup do you all run, and how do you handle the slow gaps or the empty slots?

2 comments

2 Comments

bell.jessica17h ago

The walk-in downtime is brutal, that's why I went hybrid. I keep like 3-4 slots open a day for walk-ins and book the rest, way less dead time but you still get that drop-in traffic.

faithpatel16h ago

Does your system handle the walk-in chaos better than full open door? I tried hybrid for a bit but my regulars got weird about times getting bumped, so I feel your pain on managing that balance. Still, batching walk-ins to certain hours sounds way smarter than staring at an empty chair all afternoon. Props for figuring out what actually works for you, that trial and error phase is the worst part.