Highlights
- Every week, 11.0% of gross sales goes to the franchisor before rent, food or labor: royalty 6% of your Gross Sales, advertising 5% of your Gross Sales.p.20
- Opening one unit is estimated at $187,800 to $419,900, including a $20,000 initial fee.p.23
- Great Clips discloses unit performance in Item 19.p.58
- The system went from 4,427 outlets at the start of 2023 to 4,441 at the end of 2025, a net gain of 14.p.68
- In 2025, closures of all kinds equalled 2.4% of the outlets open at the start of the year.
- Item 3 discloses 0 matters.
Tools, from this filing's numbers
What Great Clips takes off the top
Royalty 6% of your Gross Sales plus advertising 5% of your Gross Sales, applied to your own sales estimate. The rates are the filing's; the sales are yours.
Preset to the filing's Item 19 figure, $410,783 a year.p.61
Cash you would need to open
The filing's Item 7 range, $187,800 to $419,900, is an estimate for one unit including only its first months. Slide between the low and high cases and add the months of runway you want beyond that.
Monthly operating cash is taken as one-twelfth of your weekly-sales figure above times 52, a placeholder for rent, labor and food until you have your own budget.
Where the units went in 2025
Every outlet that opened, and every one that left, drawn from Item 20 Table 3 to scale.p.76
Total outlets, 2022 to 2025
Compare Great Clips with another brand
Side by side, every figure cited.
Fees (Items 5 and 6)
| Initial franchise fee, standard | $20,000 | p.17 |
| Royalty | 6% of your Gross Sales | p.20 |
| Advertising fund | 5% of your Gross Sales | p.20 |
| Technology fee | Currently $750 per year per salon | p.21 |
The filing lists every recurring and conditional fee in Item 6.
Estimated initial investment (Item 7)
| Expenditure | Low | High | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Initial Franchise Fee | $20,000 | $35,000 | p.23 |
| Initial Advertising Contribution to the MDAF | $5,000 | $5,000 | p.23 |
| Travel and Expenses While Training | $1,500 | $2,500 | p.23 |
| Architecture Fees | $100 | $3,800 | p.23 |
| Leasehold Improvements, including Labor | $70,000 | $200,000 | p.23 |
| Rent and Security Deposits | $1,000 | $10,000 | p.23 |
| Fixtures, Signage and Furnishings, including Salon Technology Hardware | $40,000 | $55,000 | p.23 |
| Freight | $4,000 | $7,000 | p.23 |
| Sales Tax on Fixtures, Signage and Furnishings | $0 | $3,200 | p.23 |
| Opening Inventory and Supplies | $4,700 | $6,400 | p.23 |
| Grand Opening Advertising | $20,000 | $25,000 | p.23 |
| Insurance | $1,500 | $3,000 | p.23 |
| Lease Liability Fee and Lease Review Fee | $0 | $4,000 | p.23 |
| Additional Funds (3-6 Months) | $20,000 | $60,000 | p.23 |
| Total | $187,800 | $419,900 | p.23 |
Revenue (Item 19)
Great Clips reports a financial performance figure of $410,783 across 4158 outlets for January 1, 2025 to December 31, 2025.p.61 What the figure measures, which units were excluded and what it leaves out are in the report.
Units (Item 20)
| Type | Year | Start | End | Net | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| franchised | 2023 | 4,427 | 4,427 | 0 | p.68 |
| company owned | 2023 | 0 | 0 | 0 | p.68 |
| total | 2023 | 4,427 | 4,427 | 0 | p.68 |
| franchised | 2024 | 4,427 | 4,439 | 12 | p.68 |
| company owned | 2024 | 0 | 0 | 0 | p.68 |
| total | 2024 | 4,427 | 4,439 | 12 | p.68 |
| franchised | 2025 | 4,439 | 4,441 | 2 | p.68 |
| company owned | 2025 | 0 | 0 | 0 | p.68 |
| total | 2025 | 4,439 | 4,441 | 2 | p.68 |
Openings and closures, system totals (Table 3)
| Year | Start | Opened | Terminated | Non-renewed | Reacquired | Ceased, other | End | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 4,427 | 98 | 3 | 6 | 0 | 89 | 4,427 | p.76 |
| 2024 | 4,427 | 115 | 4 | 1 | 0 | 98 | 4,439 | p.76 |
| 2025 | 4,439 | 110 | 3 | 2 | 0 | 103 | 4,441 | p.76 |
Litigation (Item 3)
The filing states no litigation is required to be disclosed.p.16
Scorecard
Rank among the brands on this site that report the figure, on each list's own direction. No blended grade. How the lists work.
| Cost to open | $187,800 | 8 of 51 |
| Royalty plus ad fund | 11.0% | 33 of 43 |
| Three-year unit growth | 0.3% | 40 of 54 |
| Closure rate, 2025 | 2.4% | 26 of 51, 1 = most |
| Discloses unit revenue | yes | |
| Litigation disclosed | 0 | 19 of 26, 1 = most |
Source
Wisconsin Department of Financial Institutions franchise filing 640577, effective 3/30/2026, expires 3/30/2027. Extracted 2026-09-03 by two independent readers; only figures both agreed on, whose quoted words appear on the cited page, are shown. 4 fields held for review. How this works.