No Shows

No shows, the bane of small businesses.

I've been lucky enough that I haven't had too many, but still enough to affect my income, so I thought I would talk about them and hopefully show people how no shows affect people both personally and in the business.

My aim from this is to help people understand that it's better to cancel or be honest and upfront. I would also like to point out that I have no problems with cancellations, and won't charge a cancellation fee. Life happens and I want to be understanding and would like my clients to treat me the same way should I have to cancel e.g the time I locked myself in the house and had to wait for Graham to come from Bangor with the keys. He's a good egg.

My first no show was in my first week! I was gutted. I thought it would take a while before the no shows started. I was still figuring out my timings and had an hour between clients. I busied myself for an hour, then waited and waited and no one showed up. This person claimed to have not known they had an appointment, while in the same breath saying they seen my remind messages and just simply forgot. That day I could have either booked more people in, as the week was fully booked, or been at home with my family by 2.30 instead of twiddling my thumbs in the salon and getting home around 4, upset with my first no show.

I was also gutted with my second no show. This person rang for an appointment, I booked them in, they seemed really nice and we had a good conversation on the phone. I was REALLY looking forward to meeting this dog. The appointment time comes, and tumbleweeds. No answer to the phone and I've never heard from them since. This was the first appointment that particular day at 9am, and my next dog wasn't in until 11am. The salon was cleaned and prepped from the day before so I just had to sit around for two hours. Not ideal.

The next no show really bugged me. Two dogs booked in from the same family. They seems really anxious to get in, they messaged me enquiring and rang me a few minutes later to book the appointment and I got them booked for a couple of days later. The appointment was for 12 and no one turned up. I rang and told them if they could be down for 1, I would have time to the dogs and was told no problem, they will be there. They still didn't show up. I couldn't believe it. I sat for over an hour waiting for nothing.

My next no show was also a double no show. I blocked out four hours for them to not arrive and I had dogs in after them, so once again, four hours sitting around the salon, waiting for nothing. They said they would try and get someone to bring them down, and I never heard from them again.

I then had a no show that was originally booked for another day. Really good communication with this client. They cancelled, moved the appointment and they never bothered coming. Just cancel please, you don't need to pretend your going to turn up.

And that's been it so far. Only a few but the circumstances around all the no shows really bothered me personally. They took up time that another paying client could have had, or time that I could have been home with my family. I think people forget dog groomers are people sometimes.

In total my no shows cost me £237 and I've only been open for 8 weeks. Maybe that doesn't seem like a lot of money, but that would cover a weeks salon bills. Also taking into account that most weeks I can't even afford to pay myself minimum wage (my first week open, I was able to pay myself £26 for working 11 hour days five days a week)

Small business get hit hard with no shows. At least with cancellations, I can either try and fill the spot, or go home and spend time with my fiancé. So please if you are considering not showing up to an appointment, just send a quick message to say so.

From the start, my no show fee is the full price of the groom before another appointment can be made. Now that I've been open a while, and due the the attitude I've received, I won't waste my time and energy chasing no shows. They are instantly blacklisted unless they reach out to me first and pay the fee.

Thank you to all my clients who have arrived for their appointments and thank you to those who are now regulars.

I would also just like to point out that sometimes no shows happen because of emergencies, and of course I will be understanding of that. I am just not tolerant of people lying to me about being on the way and ghosting me!

Thanks for reading!

Leigh-Ann xoxoxo