What a barbershop website needs (notes from building Othman's)

A barbershop website needs five things: a booking button you can't miss, your prices, your hours and location, real photos of real cuts, and pages that load fast on a phone. Good barbershop website design is mostly about getting those right and keeping everything else out of the way.

These notes come from the list we work from on barbershop builds, including Othman's Barbershop, a multi-location shop in Kitchener-Waterloo and Guelph, where we've handled the CRM, website, content and ads since 2023. Most of it applies to any walk-in or appointment-based shop.

Who is actually visiting a barbershop website?

Picture the typical visitor: on a phone, with one of three questions: can I get in today, how much is it, and where are you. Some are regulars who just want the booking link. Others found you on Google Maps or an Instagram post and are deciding between you and the shop down the street.

That shapes the whole site. The visitor isn't there to read. They want to tap something and be done.

What should be on the homepage?

Keep the homepage short and in this order:

• Book now, at the top, and again lower down. It should open your booking tool in one tap.
• Call or text, as a tap-to-call link, for people who'd rather ask a question.
• Address and hours, with a map link. If you take walk-ins, say so, and say when.
• A few photos of cuts, ideally your barbers' own work, not stock images.
• Services and prices, or a clear link to them.

A slow-motion hero video of clippers looks nice in a pitch meeting. On a phone with two bars of signal, it makes people give up.

Should you list your prices?

Yes. People compare shops on price before they book, and a missing price list sends them to a shop that has one.

List the core services with "from" prices if cuts vary. Fades, beard trims, kids' cuts, hot towel shaves, line-ups: whatever you actually offer. If a barber charges more, say so plainly rather than letting it surprise someone at the chair.

Does each barber need a profile?

If clients book a specific barber, yes. A short profile with a photo, the cuts they're known for, and a direct booking link helps a new client pick someone. It also gives barbers one link to share on Instagram.

If your shop is first-available, a single team photo and a short line about the shop is enough.

How does the site connect to booking?

Most shops already use a booking tool. The website's job is to send people into it cleanly, not to replace it.

• Link straight to the booking page, not to a page that then links to booking.
• Use the same booking link on the site, your Google Business Profile and Instagram bio.
• If your tool allows booking by barber or service, deep-link those from the matching sections of the site.

We set up GA4 analytics so you can see how many people tap Book, Call and Directions. Those taps are the closest thing a barbershop site has to a sales report.

What about Google Maps and reviews?

For a barbershop, your Google Business Profile can do as much work as the website. Some people never visit the site at all; they read reviews and tap directions from the map listing.

The site and the profile should agree on name, address, phone and hours, and each should link to the other. We cover the split in more detail in Google Business Profile vs a website.

AI assistants also lean on brand websites. In one analysis of where answers get their sources, brand websites made up 68.8% of ChatGPT citations (Analyze AI). A clean site with your services, prices, hours and area spelled out gives those tools something accurate to quote.

What slows barbershop sites down?

• Huge, uncompressed photos straight from a phone.
• Instagram feed widgets that load dozens of images on every visit.
• Autoplay video backgrounds.
• Page builders that load scripts for features you don't use.

We hand-build sites, compress images and host on Cloudflare, so there's no monthly platform fee and the pages stay light. Every build also goes through our 20-item pre-launch checklist, which covers image compression, mobile responsiveness, a page-speed check and one clear call to action.

What can you leave out?

• A long "our story" page. One good paragraph on the homepage is enough.
• Blog posts nobody will write after month two.
• Pop-ups asking for an email address before someone can see your prices.
• An online store, unless you actually sell product and want to ship it.

Where Papaya fits

We custom-design barbershop sites from a blank page around booking, prices and location, hosted on Cloudflare with the client owning the domain and files. A one-page site starts from $950, a business site of up to 10 pages is $3,000–$5,000, and a multi-location site with location pages is $6,000–$10,000, plus HST. See what's included on our websites page, our Kitchener web design page and the full list on pricing, or request a quote. If ads are next, we cover that in Meta ads for barbershops.

Common questions

What is the most important thing on a barbershop website?

A booking button that works in one tap from a phone. Prices, hours and location come next, because those are the questions people ask before they book.

Should a barbershop website show prices?

Yes. Clients compare shops on price before booking, so a clear list of services with "from" prices helps them choose you instead of a shop that does show prices.

Does a barbershop need a website if it has a Google Business Profile?

The profile handles a lot of discovery, but a website gives you a place to list services, prices and barbers in full, and it is what AI assistants and search engines quote. The two work best when their details match and link to each other.