About Chairside

Every formula, every kid's name, every regular who's overdue.

Why it exists

A stylist's income depends on regulars coming back on a rhythm (5-8 weeks), but the rhythm lives in the stylist's memory. Past roughly 40-50 clients, memory fails silently: nobody cancels, they just drift, and the stylist notices only as a thin week three months later. The formula and the personal details (kid's name, the wedding, the allergy to bleach) are scattered across index cards, Notes, and Instagram DMs, so even a returning client gets a slower, less personal visit.

Who it is for

Chairside's ideal customer is a self-employed US hair stylist, colorist, or barber who rents a booth or owns a solo suite and manages 60–300 repeat clients entirely from their phone. They live in the gap between a paper notebook and a full booking platform: too many regulars to track in their head, but not willing to migrate their calendar and money into a $30–50/month system. They want their regulars to come back on rhythm, hate chasing clients manually, and already text from their personal number — they just need to know who to text and what to say.

When my chair is full and I'm holding 140 regulars in my head plus a spreadsheet I never open, I want to know exactly who is overdue for their next appointment and have the right thing to say already written, so I can fill next week's holes with a two-second text instead of waiting for people to remember me.

What it does

• The Book (paste your spreadsheet, get a client list)
• Formula card, life notes and visit log
• The Due Board (one-tap text from your own number)
• Your words, saved (text templates with merge fields)
• Chair Check-in email and rebook numbers

What makes it different

Booking platforms (GlossGenius, Vagaro, Square Appointments) make you move your calendar and your money before you get any value, charge $24-50/month plus card fees, and send their reminders from a shortcode that reads like marketing. Chairside touches neither the calendar nor the money. It is a phone-sized client book that knows who is overdue, writes the text in the stylist's own words, and hands it to the stylist's own Messages app so the client sees a personal text from the person who cuts their hair. Setup is pasting a spreadsheet, not migrating a business.

Who runs it

Chairside is operated by Matias Szarfer.