Hiring Professional Makeup Artists: What's in the Cost?

I often hear “Why is hiring a Makeup Artist so expensive?” or “Why do you cost so much?”. These are reasonable questions to ask. But professional makeup artist are not just trying to take your money and the reality is the cost to profit margin being a makeup artist isn’t actually that great. So let’s break it down a little.

When you go to your job all your supplies needed to complete your job are provided to you from the company you work for. When you are a makeup artist you have to pay for those items yourself. That’s not just makeup, which alone can cost you thousands of dollars. We will get into that more in a bit. Makeup artist have to pay for their own computers, paper, pens, printers, staplers, and all those other basic office supplies. Then lets add on branding and marketing material from swag to hand out to magazine advertising and more. Then for freelance work you go on location so your work vehicle it’s self, the repairs, and gas. Add on top of that commercial car insurance, which is more expensive and if the car is wrapped for the business (yes that wrap cost money too) you are required to have commercial car insurance. Then we get into insurance and other fees. There’s additionally liability insurance and insurance on your makeup kit. Then add on fees for running a business for the city and state plus business taxes. Beyond this fees for additional training, bookkeepers, tax preparation, networking and professional groups and more. Plus a home office or other brick and mortar location means electricity, water, the space, internet, phone, etc. on top of all of this. So as you can see this is not cheap and we haven’t even started talking about the products used on each client yet.

To be a makeup artist you need lots of product. Multiple foundations, powders and concealer in your kit at all times to match skin tones. Lots of different eyeshadows and lipstick to create different looks. Add on to that in order to keep everything sanitary individual applicator for many items that then are thrown out are needed. Not only is that item thrown out use extra product on them or separating out product for each client to keep everything sanitary is thrown out. A tube of mascara might only last me a week with clients. Add on to this the products used to keep items sanitary that can’t be separate out or thrown out after one use. The kit I bring with me is thousands and thousands of dollars worth of makeup and tools. Add to that the backup products I have at my home office so I don’t run out of products, the physical kit to hold the products, the holders inside the kit to keep everything organized, plus the chair I carry with me and extra supplies for hair and styling emergencies are not cheap. As you see the dollar signs are adding up very fast.

Then people say “Well when you are doing a persons makeup it only takes you 30 minutes in and out? Why should I pay you so much?” Again as you see above there’s a lot of costs going into it. But there’s also the years of training to be that fast and the knowledge of how to work with all face types and what a photographer or videographer needs. When you are hiring a professional of any type this goes into the cost as well. Someone without the training and expertise is going to be cheaper.

So is hiring a good professional makeup artist going to be cheap? No it’s not. As with anyone who is working, a makeup artists wants to make money for the job they perform. Each time you hire a makeup artist all the expenses you see listed above and more go into the cost, along with that expertise. Makeup artists deserve to make money from the job they are performing just as anyone else does. So that fee you are paying them isn’t what they are making. What they are making is only a small part of that fee. So next time you ask for “budget friendly” or “cheap makeup artist” remember what you are paying for. When you post “I don’t want to pay an arm and leg for makeup services” remember the makeup artists seeing that post have bills to pay to and that doing your makeup is costing them a substantial amount and they shouldn’t loose money to work with you.

Being a makeup artist a career just like any other. It’s not a hobby for many of us and we are running real businesses. So when you are hiring a makeup artist remember that is what you are paying for.