Salon build-out: the furniture list that decides your opening date

A furniture list for a salon is usually written as a shopping list: chairs, desks, tables, beds, shelves. A schedule is more useful, because it answers a different question. Not what do we need, but what has to be decided before what, and which piece holds up the room behind it.

Split the list by what needs a drawing

Almost every piece in a salon is one of two things. It is either drawn for the room, or it is built to a standard size and shipped finished. The two behave completely differently, and mixing them in one list is where the date goes wrong.

A drawn piece needs a measurement, a drawing, an approval and usually a sample. A standard piece needs a model, a finish and a delivery address. Ordering the second kind first is what fills a corridor with furniture while the room is still wet.

The four pieces that hold up a floor

Four pieces decide when a room can open, because each one is installed before something that cannot be moved afterwards: the floor, the wall or the ceiling.

• The reception desk, because the power and data route is behind it and the retail wall is usually beside it.
• The retail wall, because its lighting circuit is inside a finished carcass.
• The pedicure side, because the drain fall is under the floor.
• The treatment beds, because the room count and the clearance are decided before the partition goes up.

Everything else can arrive late without stopping the opening. Stools, carts, shelving and waiting seats are worth ordering last, because they are the pieces that can be changed at the shortest notice if the budget moves.

What the quote should tell you

A quotation for a fit-out should answer four questions, and none of them is a price per piece. Which drawing revision is being built, which finish reference is included, how the pieces are packed, and what has to be signed before production starts.

The interval between approval and delivery belongs in the same document, per model. Anyone who gives a single number for a whole fit-out is giving an average, and an average is what misses an opening date.

Ask for the schedule as a table with four columns: piece, drawing revision, approval date, delivery window. A fit-out that can be read as a table is a fit-out that can be managed.

The week before: what to test

The last week is not for buying. It is for testing the things that only fail when everything is on at once: every circuit, every basin, every extraction unit and every reclined seat.

• Run all extraction at once and listen for the change in pitch that means a shared duct is undersized.
• Run two basins together and check the temperature at the second.
• Switch every circuit and note which pieces go dark together.
• Recline every seat through its full travel with a person in it.
• Walk the walkway with a bag in each hand, which is how a client arrives.

What the list cannot decide

A furniture list cannot answer how many stations to staff, whether the retail wall is worth its floor, or whether a treatment room earns more than a second pedicure seat. Those are business decisions, and they belong before the list rather than after the delivery.