Why the order decides how smooth your start is
Most people who want to become a self-employed hairdresser begin at the Chamber of Commerce (KVK). It feels like the real beginning: you register, you have a business, and the rest will follow. Registration is in fact the fastest part of the whole route. It costs 85.15 euro and takes one morning, according to kvk.nl, checked September 2026.
What comes after is slower. The municipality (gemeente) that holds your plan up against the zoning plan. The landlord who pulls out the lease. The municipal health service (GGD) that wants to see your workspace before you may do permanent make-up. Get stuck in that order and you already have a VAT number and a quarterly return, but no chair to stand behind.
So this plan runs the other way round. First you decide how you will work, then you check whether that is allowed at the address you have in mind, and only then do you register. Tax, insurance and your calendar follow once that base is in place. Every step below can be ticked off on its own, and every figure names its source and the month it was checked. One warning: salon rules in the Netherlands are partly national and partly municipal. For your own address you will always have to make a phone call yourself.
Step 1: decide how you will work
There are three routes in practice, and they differ more in rules and risk than in craft.
From home. You fit out a room, pay no rent for premises, and start with the lowest fixed costs. The brake here is not money but permission: your municipality looks at the zoning plan and at whether a public facing function fits that address, and your mortgage deed or lease may rule out business use. That route is worked out separately in the guide on running a home based salon.
Renting a chair. You rent a workstation in an existing salon and pay by the week or by the month. You get footfall from day one, a furnished salon and no investment in mirrors and wash basins. In return you depend on the arrangement with the owner, and since 1 January 2025 the Dutch Tax Administration (Belastingdienst) can again impose payroll tax assessments where self employment turns out to be false. The difference between chair rental and your own salon, cost side included, is covered in the guide on chair rental versus your own salon.
Your own premises. The most expensive and the most free route. Rent, fit-out and building work add up quickly, and those items are exactly why the startup figures you find online sit so far apart.
Choose deliberately, because everything after this hangs on it: which permit you need, how high your fixed costs run, and how many clients per month you need to break even. A diploma is not legally required for any of the three routes. Kvk.nl states plainly that training as a hairdresser or barber is not compulsory but is important, checked September 2026. The same applies to beauticians according to ondernemersplein.overheid.nl, with the note that trade bodies such as ANBOS and Huidprofessional require a recognised diploma for membership.
Step 2: check the rules for the place where you will work
This is the step that gets skipped most often and costs the most when it goes wrong.
The zoning plan. Your municipality records which functions are allowed at which address in the zoning plan (omgevingsplan). A salon is a public facing function: clients come to the door, there is parking pressure, there are opening hours. According to kvk.nl and ondernemersplein.overheid.nl the rules differ per municipality and a home based salon often needs permission or a permit, checked September 2026. There is no national norm setting how many square metres you may give over to a business at home, so ignore the numbers people quote on forums. Call your municipality, name your address and your treatments, and ask for written confirmation.
Lease and mortgage. Besides the municipality you deal with your lease or your mortgage conditions. Both can forbid business use of the home even when the municipality agrees. That is a separate check, not a formality.
Hygiene. Beauty treatments fall under the hygiene guidelines of the national institute for public health (RIVM), and laser treatments fall under the Dutch healthcare quality and complaints act (Wkkgz), according to ondernemersplein.overheid.nl, checked September 2026. Cutting and shaving have no comparable regime, but running water at the basin, clean towels per client and disinfected tools are the floor there too.
Permanent make-up, tattooing and piercing. These need a permit. It is tied to the location and not to the person, is valid for 3 years, and the municipal health service (GGD) inspects your workspace before you get it. The inks fall under the European REACH restriction, which has applied since 4 January 2022 and since 4 January 2023 also covers Pigment Blue 15:3 and Pigment Green 7. For tattooing and permanent make-up, NEN-EN 17169:2020 is designated as the safety code under the Dutch tattooing and piercing decree (Warenwetbesluit tatoeeren en piercen, Staatscourant 2022, 4132); piercing has its own hygiene guideline. Sources: ondernemersplein.overheid.nl, the Dutch food and product safety authority (NVWA) and the GGD, checked September 2026. If you move, the application starts again.
Step 3: register with the Chamber of Commerce
Only once you know where you may work do you register. Registration costs 85.15 euro one off and the amount is indexed every year, according to kvk.nl, checked September 2026. It is a business expense, so it goes into your first tax return.
What to bring: valid photo ID, your citizen service number, the address of your business and your start date. You may register from a week before that date until a week after. Think of your trade name in advance. Check the trade register to see whether it is still free and whether a trademark sits on it, because changing the name after you have ordered window lettering and business cards is an expensive lesson.
What you get: a KVK number and, if the tax office treats you as a VAT entrepreneur, a VAT identification number plus a turnover tax number within a few working days. That VAT ID goes on your invoices and on your booking page. A digitally certified extract costs 9.60 euro, a paper one 19.20 euro, and viewing online costs 2.95 euro. The exact price sits on the product page at kvk.nl and changes now and then, so get it there rather than from a reseller. You need such an extract for a business bank account and sometimes for a wholesaler.
A business bank account is not legally required for a sole trader, but it halves the sorting work at tax time.
Step 4: put tax and bookkeeping on rails
This is where the most common mistake in the trade sits, and it costs real money.
The VAT rate follows the treatment, not the type of business. The Dutch Tax Administration charges 9 percent on hairdressing services: cutting, washing, blow drying, colouring, perming, shaving and beard trimming, including the products used during the treatment, plus fitting hair extensions and wigs. But beauty treatments, applying make-up, colour and make-up advice, sunbed rental and manicure or pedicure work sit at 21 percent, even when you do them in the same business. Products sold separately are always 21 percent. This is published on the belastingdienst.nl page about VAT rates for hairdressing services, checked September 2026. So the rule of thumb "services 9 percent, products 21 percent" stops being true the moment you also do nails or facials.
The small business scheme. If you stay under 20,000 euro turnover per calendar year you may opt into the small business scheme (KOR) and charge no VAT, according to kvk.nl, checked September 2026. You then cannot reclaim VAT either, which is exactly why the scheme often works out badly in a year with investments. That trade off is worked out in the guide on VAT and the KOR for salon starters.
Deductions. As a starter you are entitled in the first years to the self employed deduction and, in at most 3 of the first 5 years, the starter deduction on top. The SME profit exemption then lowers your taxable profit by a fixed percentage. The amounts move every year and the self employed deduction is being phased down. Tax overviews from Rabobank and MKB Servicedesk among others put the 2026 self employed deduction at roughly 1,200 euro, the starter deduction at 2,123 euro and the SME profit exemption at 12.7 percent, checked September 2026. The Belastingplan 2027 bill cuts the self employed deduction to 900 euro on 1 January 2027 and the starter deduction to 10 euro, and scraps the starter deduction entirely on 1 January 2028. The SME profit exemption stays at 12.7 percent. Both chambers of parliament still have to pass the bill. Source: the Belastingplan 2027 bill on rijksoverheid.nl, 15 September 2026. Treat those as indicative and confirm them on belastingdienst.nl before you build a budget on them.
The hours criterion. For the self employed and starter deductions you must spend 1,225 hours per calendar year on your business, roughly 24 hours a week across a full year. Bookkeeping, buying stock, training and finding clients all count, so log your hours from day one instead of reconstructing them in December. The SME profit exemption has no such criterion.
Step 5: sort insurance and pension in one afternoon
A self employed person in the Netherlands is not legally required to carry business insurance. The only things compulsory for everyone are basic health insurance and, if you use a car or scooter for the business, third party motor cover. That is how ondernemersplein.overheid.nl puts it, checked September 2026.
That does not mean you need nothing. Three policies come up at nearly every salon. Business liability cover pays for damage to clients or their belongings: an irritated scalp or a colour that runs into a coat is exactly what it exists for. Contents and stock cover protects your chairs, basin, equipment and inventory. And disability cover, or an alternative such as a bread fund, catches the fact that you work with your hands: two months out of action is two months without revenue. A bill for compulsory disability cover for the self employed has been with the Dutch parliament since March 2026, but it is not expected to take effect before 2030, so do not budget for it now.
Two stubborn falsehoods circulate about pensions. First, that self employed hairdressers must belong to the HBA. That trade board was abolished on 1 January 2015 and has not existed for eleven years. Second, that as a self employed person you automatically join the hairdressing pension fund. That obligation applies the moment you employ staff, not to a solo business, according to pensioenkappers.nl and kvk.nl, checked September 2026. If you came out of employment in the sector, you may usually continue voluntarily for a maximum of 3 years, provided you apply within 9 months of leaving that job. After that you arrange it yourself.
Step 6: prices, calendar and your first bookings
The paperwork is done. What is left is the salon itself, and four things there should be in order before your first client walks in.
Your price list and treatment durations. Set a price and a realistic duration per treatment, clean-up time included. Book a colour at 45 minutes because it fits the hour neatly and you will run behind for the rest of the day, at the expense of your last client. Then work backwards: how many treatments a week do you need to cover your fixed costs plus the income you want? That number tells you whether the plan holds, not the price list of the salon down the street.
Your calendar and how reachable you are. In the beginning clients book through WhatsApp, through Instagram and through a phone call in the middle of a treatment. That works up to roughly twenty appointments a week and then stops working, because you are either cutting or typing. A calendar where clients pick a slot themselves removes those interruptions, and cuts no-shows as long as a confirmation and a reminder go out automatically, the kind of choice the guide on salon software for your first month covers in more depth.
Your cancellation terms. Write down what happens on a late cancellation or a no-show, and communicate it before the first client books. A policy introduced afterwards feels to clients like a punishment.
Music in the salon. Play music for clients and you need a licence from Buma/Stemra and from Sena. Trade bodies ANKO and ANBOS run collective schemes with a member discount, according to anko.nl and anbos.nl, checked September 2026. Tariffs depend on your floor area and opening hours, so ask for a quote instead of budgeting on a figure from a forum.
How to apply this next week
Six steps sounds like half a year. It fits in six weeks if you take them in this order.
Week 1: choose how you will work and call your municipality about the zoning plan at the address you have in mind. Ask for written confirmation and check your lease or mortgage deed at the same time.
Week 2: sort what the location needs. Fit out the workspace, get hygiene in order, and for permanent make-up book the permit application plus the GGD inspection. Allow for lead time.
Week 3: register with the Chamber of Commerce, open a business bank account and wait for your VAT ID.
Week 4: set up your bookkeeping. Decide deliberately on the small business scheme, record the VAT rate per treatment and start your hour log.
Week 5: request insurance quotes, arrange your music licence and finalise your prices and treatment durations.
Week 6: open your calendar and let the first clients book.
If you get stuck on one of these steps, there is a separate guide per topic. On where you are coming from: from employment to your own salon, starting a salon alongside a job and starting on a Dutch benefit. On where and with what you will work: working mobile at clients' homes, judging a salon location and the equipment checklist for your first order. On paperwork and money: diplomas and licences per profession, training routes for career changers, registering your business name and financing and microcredit.
For that last week CelerBook is built on pay-as-you-go: the first 5 appointments each month are free, after that you pay 0.25 EUR ex VAT per completed appointment, capped at 30 EUR per month for a solo business plus 5 EUR per additional active staff member. No contract and no fixed monthly bill, so in a quiet opening month you pay almost nothing. You get your own booking page on your own subdomain that you style yourself with photos, colours and your cancellation terms, a calendar for multiple staff that writes every appointment through to your Google Calendar, automatic confirmation emails, SMS reminders at 0.11 EUR ex VAT per appointment, client management with notes and history, and a quarterly VAT export for your return. No usage means no cost. Try CelerBook for free.