Occupation / job
Shampooers
Median annual pay. Half earn less than this.
Hourly at a standard 2,080-hour year. We do not yet have unpaid-time or cost data for this, so this is not an adjusted figure.
The middle half. A quarter earn below this range.
Source: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 · view
What this figure cannot tell you
It covers people EMPLOYED in this occupation. Anyone who trained for it and was never hired is not in the median above, and neither is anyone doing the work self-employed. No verified count of qualified people exists for this occupation, so this page shows none rather than an estimate. Why that matters · The occupations where we could source it
Who this suits
Shampooers pays a median $32,600 against a $50,020 national midpoint: 35% below what the typical American job pays, or $17,420 a year of difference. That gap compounds — it is also the pension contribution you are not making.
Nationally 8,070 people do this. That is a real occupation with a thin local presence — enough that Shampooers is a career, not enough that you can assume a second employer down the road.
Personal appearance work suits people who build a book of regular clients and keep them for years — the skill gets you hired once, the relationship is what pays.
We carry no verified training length for Shampooers — BLS reports pay, not preparation, and we will not estimate it.
Who should not do this
$7,000 separates the bottom quarter at $28,550 from the top quarter at $35,550, a ratio of 1.2x. In a band that tight, moving up inside Shampooers pays less than moving out of it would.
The bottom quarter of Shampooers earns under $28,550 — $21,470 below the $50,020 national midpoint, or $13.72 an hour. A floor that low means the occupation cannot be judged on its median alone; a quarter of the people in it are somewhere else entirely.
Avoid it if you cannot stand all day, or if you would not enjoy the client-building side, which is most of the income.
No failure rate is shown, and the absence is deliberate: the 8,070 figure counts people already working as Shampooers, not everyone who trained and never got hired. Without a licensing register to divide by, a rate here would be an invented denominator.
What the spread tells you
A 1.2x ratio from $28,550 to $35,550 makes $32,600 a dependable planning number. Dependable is the whole offer here — there is not much room above it.
Put in money rather than ratios: $28,550 at the 25th percentile, $32,600 at the midpoint, $35,550 at the 75th. $7,000 separates the quarter of Shampooers at the bottom from the quarter at the top.
Between $28,550 and $35,550 — the two ends of the middle half — sits $32,600. Moving from the midpoint to the upper quarter is worth $2,950; the whole climb from the lower quarter is $7,000.
Getting from $28,550 to the $32,600 midpoint is $4,050; getting from there to $35,550 is only $2,950. The hard part of the range is the lower half, which is also the half a newcomer starts in.
Per hour at a standard full-time year that is $15.67 at the midpoint for Shampooers, $13.72 at the 25th percentile and $17.09 at the 75th, against $24.04 for the typical American job.
What these figures are, and what they are not
This is payroll data: it comes from employers, about people they employ. Anyone doing the work of Shampooers for themselves is not in it, and there is no reason to assume $32,600 describes them.
With no unpaid-hours or cost data for Shampooers, the hourly figure is $32,600 over a 2,080-hour year — a unit conversion, not an adjustment.
How this is calculated · Self-employment failure rates · What credentials cost and pay back · Look up something else