How to Start a Hair Salon in Kentucky
A Kentucky hair salon runs on two licenses from one board, and since 2026 they share a single deadline. The Kentucky Board of Cosmetology licenses the stylist: a cosmetologist completes 1,500 hours of training, passes a written and a practical examination, and pays $50 for the license, with an $85 examination application on the way in. The board licenses the salon separately for $100, and not on paperwork alone: an inspector completes an opening inspection first, the application carries a plumbing affidavit, and the salon names a manager holding an active license in its services. Beginning July 2026 every license the board issues, personal and salon alike, renews on a two year cycle that expires July 31 of even numbered years, so the whole industry renews in the same summer month. Around the licenses sits a business stack with Kentucky signatures of its own: an LLC that files for $40 but owes a $175 minimum entity tax, an assumed name split by filer type between the Secretary of State and the county clerk, and a sales tax that leaves hair services untaxed.
Kentucky sources last reviewed: November 3, 2026
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Who licenses hair salons in Kentucky
Hair salons answer to the Kentucky Board of Cosmetology, which administers KRS Chapter 317A with regulations at 201 KAR Chapter 12. The board licenses cosmetologists, nail technicians, estheticians, shampoo stylists and instructors, licenses beauty salons, nail salons, esthetic salons and limited facilities, inspects premises through regional inspectors, and issues the specialty permits for threading, makeup artistry and eyelash artistry. Its fees are set in its own regulation, 201 KAR 12:260, which the board amended in 2025 to reprice renewals for the two year cycle described below. Readers comparing older Kentucky material will meet this agency under its former name, the Board of Hairdressers and Cosmetologists; the current official name is the Kentucky Board of Cosmetology and the board's site is kbc.ky.gov.
That structure is this guide's structure, because Kentucky licenses the person and the room out of the same office on the same new calendar, and because the board reaches into opening day itself: the license does not issue until an inspector has walked the premises. Two other offices appear later in this guide on their own tracks, the Secretary of State for the entity and the state half of the name filing, and the Department of Revenue for the sales tax, withholding and the limited liability entity tax. The county clerk appears twice, because Kentucky sends both the assumed name copy and a copy of the LLC's articles to the courthouse.
Kentucky hair salon at a glance
| Item | Kentucky requirement |
|---|---|
| Practitioner license | Cosmetologist license, Kentucky Board of Cosmetology, KRS Chapter 317A, rules at 201 KAR Chapter 12 |
| Training | 1,500 hours: minimum 375 lecture, 1,085 clinic and practice, 40 Kentucky law; age 18; diploma or grade 12 equivalency |
| Exams | Written and practical examinations; examination application $85, including retakes, at 201 KAR 12:260 |
| License fees | $50 initial license; $100 renewal every two years, in the July 1 to July 31 window of even numbered years |
| The salon itself | Beauty salon license $100; opening inspection before the license issues; $200 renewal on the same two year cycle |
| Manager rule | Each salon maintains a board licensed manager, properly licensed in the services the salon provides, at all times |
| Booth rental | No cosmetology booth renter license exists; renters work under the salon license, and classification turns on control and the tax agencies |
| Entity filing | Articles of Organization $40 with the Secretary of State; annual report $15 filed by June 30; a copy of the articles files with the county clerk |
| Assumed name | KRS 365.015: individuals file with the county clerk; entities file with the Secretary of State for $20 and then file the stamped copy with the county clerk; five year term |
| Sales tax | Services are not taxed under 103 KAR 26:010; retail products are taxable at the 6 percent state rate |
The cosmetologist license, step by step
The cosmetologist license is Kentucky's broad practitioner credential, and the board's license requirements page fixes its shape. The applicant must be at least 18, hold a high school diploma or proof of grade 12 equivalency, complete 1,500 hours of instruction at a board approved school, and pass a written and a practical examination; the board's page is explicit that the license must be in hand before services are provided. The curriculum regulation, 201 KAR 12:082, splits the 1,500 hours into a minimum of 375 hours of lecture, 1,085 hours of clinic and practice, and 40 hours of Kentucky law, and it names artificial eyelash application among the cosmetology subjects, which is why a cosmetologist's license reaches lash work in full.
The money sits in the board's fee regulation, 201 KAR 12:260. The application for examination costs $85, the same for a retake, and the license itself costs $50 on issuance. The renewal is where the 2025 amendment changed the arithmetic: renewal fees doubled on paper, to $100 for an individual license, because the renewal now buys two years instead of one. The same regulation prices the neighboring credentials at the same $50 initial fee, nail technician at 450 hours, esthetician at 750, and the threading, makeup artistry and eyelash artistry permits at $50. Quote any Kentucky fee list printed before the 2025 amendment with care, because its renewal column describes the annual cycle that ended in 2026.
Renewal runs on the calendar that now defines Kentucky cosmetology. Beginning July 2026, renewals occur biennially in every even numbered year, in a window that opens July 1 and closes July 31 at 11:59 PM Eastern. A renewal received inside the window sets the expiration at July 31, 2028; a license that misses the window goes Inactive, the restoration fee in the fee schedule applies, $50 for an individual license, and the board's renewal guidance allows no exceptions. The board's renewal process sets no continuing education hours; it is the fee, paid online, since the board has accepted no physical payments since July 1, 2023 and takes cards through its application portal only.
The beauty salon license
The salon's own credential is a beauty salon license, priced at $100 in 201 KAR 12:260, and 201 KAR 12:030 governs how it issues: the applicant submits the salon application with the required identification documents, pays the fee, and requests an inspection by the board inspector in writing a minimum of five business days before opening for business. The board's salon requirements page fills in the working detail. Applications go in at least five business days before the requested opening date; a completed plumbing affidavit and plumbing inspection are uploaded with the application, because every shampoo bowl, head spa bowls included, must be plumbed in compliance with the Kentucky State Plumbing Code; owner and manager photo IDs go in as well; the listed manager must hold an active board license; and the file includes proof of purchase of the city or county business license, plus a planning and zoning document where the rules require one.
The license has an opening day gate built into it. The board states that a salon may not advertise itself as licensed or open to the public until the final inspection has been completed by a regional field inspector and the license has been issued, and on issuance the salon immediately prints and posts the inspection sheet and the license. The inspection regime continues after opening: under 201 KAR 12:060, each licensee attaches a picture to the license and posts it in an accessible and conspicuous area, including the main entrance and the workstation, the most recent inspection report is posted the same way, and board inspectors may enter any licensed establishment during working hours. Two operating rules from the same framework deserve a place in the salon handbook: each salon maintains a board licensed manager, properly licensed in the services the salon provides, at all times, and a salon located in a residence must have a separate outside entrance for business purposes. Head spa services carry their own scope line on the board's page: they may be performed only by a licensed cosmetologist or shampoo stylist, in a licensed facility. Salon licenses expire July 31 of each even numbered year regardless of the original issuance date, and renewal is $200 on the two year cycle.
Forming your business entity
Most Kentucky hair salons form as a limited liability company, filed with the Secretary of State. The Articles of Organization cost $40, the cheapest formation fee in this guide series, and Kentucky adds a courthouse step most states skip: KRS 14A.2-040 requires a copy of the articles to be filed with the county clerk of the county where the LLC's registered office is located. A name reservation holds a name for 120 days for $15 if you want the name locked before the space is ready.
Two recurring obligations follow the LLC for life. The first is the annual report, $15, filed with the Secretary of State between January 1 and June 30 each year; miss the June 30 deadline and the state moves toward administrative dissolution, so the report belongs on the same calendar as the July cosmetology renewal window that follows it by a day. The second is the limited liability entity tax under KRS 141.0401, which every LLC doing business in Kentucky owes whether or not it shows a profit. The minimum tax is $175, and an entity whose gross receipts and gross profits are each $3,000,000 or less pays only that minimum; above that line the tax is the lesser of 0.095 percent of Kentucky gross receipts or 0.75 percent of Kentucky gross profits, and the minimum is never creditable against it. The return is due the fifteenth day of the fourth month after the close of the tax year. Register the entity's tax accounts, sales tax, employer withholding and the LLET among them, through the Department of Revenue's Kentucky Tax Registration Application, Form 10A100.
Business names: the state filing and the courthouse copy
Kentucky splits the assumed name filing by filer type, and KRS 365.015 is exact about the split, so this guide states it exactly. No one may conduct business under an assumed name without filing a certificate of assumed name. An individual's certificate is filed with the county clerk of the county where the person maintains his or her principal place of business, full stop: a sole proprietor's DBA lives at the courthouse and never goes to the Secretary of State. An entity, a general partnership, limited partnership, trust, corporation, limited liability company or limited cooperative association, delivers its certificate to the Secretary of State for filing, accompanied by one exact or conformed copy. The Secretary of State stamps one copy as filed, and that stamped copy is then filed with the county clerk of the county where the entity maintains its registered agent for service of process, or its principal office if no registered agent is required; only an entity with neither in Kentucky files with the Secretary of State alone.
The Secretary of State's fee is fixed by the same statute: $20 for each certificate, amendment and renewal certificate. The county clerk's fee is set by the clerk fee schedule at KRS 64.012 rather than a single statewide figure this guide can quote, so the courthouse quotes it. An assumed name is effective for five years from filing and may be renewed for successive terms by filing a renewal certificate within six months before the term expires. For a salon, the practical order of operations is formation first, then the certificate, then the local business license the board asks to see proof of at application.
Federal tax ID and business banking
Apply for an Employer Identification Number on IRS.gov. It is free, it issues online in one session, and any site charging you for an EIN is selling you a form you can file yourself. Kentucky keys its registrations to the federal number: the Department of Revenue opens your sales tax, withholding and limited liability entity tax accounts against it through the Form 10A100 registration, the Office of Unemployment Insurance builds your employer account on it, and your bank will ask for it alongside your formation papers.
Open the business bank account as soon as the entity and the EIN exist, and run every fee, product order, rent payment and tax deposit through it. The June 30 annual report, the July renewal window in even numbered years, the quarterly unemployment reports and the annual entity tax all assume the salon can show its own books, and a clean, separate account is the cheapest compliance tool in this guide.
Sales tax through the Department of Revenue
Kentucky's sales tax is a single statewide 6 percent, with no city or county sales tax layered on top, and it reaches retail sales of tangible personal property and digital property plus only the services enumerated in KRS 139.200. Hair services are not on that list, and the Department of Revenue's own regulation says so in terms: 103 KAR 26:010 names barbers and beauty shop operators as nontaxable service enterprises. A haircut, color service or style is therefore not a taxable sale in Kentucky, and you collect no sales tax on the service ticket.
The same regulation assigns the tax on what the salon consumes. A nontaxable service enterprise is treated as the consumer of the supplies it uses incidentally in providing the service, so the tax on back bar products, color, foils and similar consumables was due when the salon bought them, and no exemption certificate cleans that up. The retail shelf is the taxable side of the salon: a beauty business that regularly sells tangible personal property is a retailer for those sales, must hold a sales tax permit, and collects the 6 percent on take home products while filing returns on the account opened through the tax registration application. Keep services and products on separate lines at the register, and know the two Kentucky exceptions that matter to multi service salons: massage services and body modification services, tattooing included, are taxable under KRS 139.200, so a salon that adds massage or microblading sells a taxable service next to its untaxed ones.
Booth rent in a Kentucky hair salon
Kentucky is a quiet state on cosmetology booth rent: there is no booth renter license, no independent contractor permit and no booth line anywhere in the Board of Cosmetology's fee schedule at 201 KAR 12:260. A stylist who rents a chair in a Kentucky salon works under that salon's beauty salon license, in a facility the board inspects, under the salon's licensed manager rule, and the stylist's own cosmetologist license is the only board credential in the arrangement.
Classification is therefore a tax and employment question, not a board question, and it is decided the ordinary way: by the degree of control the salon exercises over the stylist, tested by the Department of Revenue for withholding and the Office of Unemployment Insurance for coverage, against the written agreement the parties actually honor. A Kentucky salon that wants renters treated as independent businesses should paper the arrangement like one, separate books, separate clients, the renter's own assumed name filing where the renter trades under a brand, and rent that does not look like a commission split wearing a lease's clothes. The contrast inside this cluster is sharp: barbers do have a rental license, the independent contract owner license in the barbering chapter, covered in the barbershop guide, and the salon suite guide covers the neighboring decision, taking a room of your own under your own salon or limited facility license instead of a chair in someone else's.
Hiring employees in Kentucky
Your first hire registers the salon as a Kentucky employer on two tracks. The Department of Revenue takes the withholding and tax account registration, through the same Kentucky Tax Registration Application that opens the sales tax and entity tax accounts. The Office of Unemployment Insurance takes the employer account, managed through the Kentucky Career Center, where the Kentucky Unemployment Insurance Portal is replacing the older KEWES employer system beginning in the summer of 2026.
The unemployment tax applies only to a capped slice of wages: the Office of Unemployment Insurance's Employer Guide for 2026 puts the taxable wage base at $12,000 per employee for the calendar year, and a new employer is assigned a 2.7 percent rate, which the guide works out to no more than $324 per covered employee for the year. Budget with those two figures rather than any national average, because Kentucky's wage base is higher than the federal one and the new employer rate is the state's own. Employers also withhold Kentucky income tax from wages, and the local layer adds occupational license tax withholding in most cities and counties. Workers compensation coverage belongs on the same first hire checklist, placed before the first employee's first shift and kept with the licenses it sits beside.
Local rules for a Kentucky hair salon
The local layer in Kentucky is a tax layer as much as a licensing layer. Cities and counties across the Commonwealth levy occupational license taxes on wages earned and net profits earned inside their borders: KRS 68.197 authorizes fiscal courts in counties of 30,000 or more population to impose license fees measured at up to 1 percent of wages and net profits, cities impose their own under separate authority, school districts can levy as well, and a salon can sit inside two or three districts at once. The employer withholds the wage based tax from employee pay and files returns with each district; the business files its own net profits return. These taxes are administered locally, not by the Department of Revenue, and their rates and forms are set district by district.
The licensing side starts earlier than most owners expect, because the Board of Cosmetology builds the local layer into the salon application itself: proof of purchase of the city or county business license is one of the documents in the salon file, alongside the plumbing affidavit and, for residential locations, the planning and zoning document. A salon in a home also needs the separate outside entrance the board's regulation requires. Get the zoning answer for the specific address in writing before the lease is final, and complete the local business license before the salon application goes in, because the board asks for its receipt as part of opening.
Insurance for a Kentucky hair salon
The cosmetology framework does not condition the salon license on an insurance filing, so the insurance stack for a Kentucky salon is set by risk and by contract rather than by the board. Professional liability is the core policy for a room built on chemical services, hot tools and wet floors around shampoo bowls, and it is the coverage a booth rent structure has to think hardest about, because the salon's policy, the renter's own policy and the board's inspection record describe overlapping people working in the same room under a salon license that already answers for everyone in it.
General liability for the premises and property coverage for equipment, furniture and the retail stock complete the standard stack. Landlords, and suite landlords in particular, routinely name their own limits and additional insured requirements in the lease, and those contract numbers, not a statute, are the figures to satisfy. The cosmetology board's silence on insurance is a choice, not an oversight to fill with a guessed number.
Your Kentucky renewal calendar
| Item | Cycle | Fee |
|---|---|---|
| Cosmetologist license | Every two years; renew July 1 to July 31 of even numbered years, expiring July 31 of the next even numbered year | $100 renewal; $50 restoration if the window is missed |
| Beauty salon license | Every two years on the same July window, expiring July 31 of even numbered years regardless of issue date | $200 renewal; $100 restoration |
| LLC annual report | Every year; file with the Secretary of State between January 1 and June 30 | $15 |
| Limited liability entity tax | Every year; return due the fifteenth day of the fourth month after the tax year closes | $175 minimum |
| Unemployment wage reports | Quarterly through the Office of Unemployment Insurance | 2.7 percent new employer rate on the first $12,000 of wages per employee in 2026 |
| Certificate of assumed name, if filed | Five year term; renewal certificate within six months before expiration | $20 to the Secretary of State for entities; county clerk fee set by KRS 64.012 |
Official sources
- Board of Cosmetology: license requirements, hours and categories
- Board of Cosmetology: salon requirements, opening inspection and manager rule
- Board of Cosmetology: license renewal information and the July window
- 201 KAR 12:260: Board of Cosmetology fees
- 201 KAR 12:030: licensing, examinations, salon applications and renewals
- 103 KAR 26:010: nontaxable service enterprises, barbers and beauty shop operators
- Secretary of State: business filing fees, articles, annual reports and assumed names
- KRS 365.015: certificate of assumed name, filing with state and county
- Department of Revenue: registering for a sales tax account, Form 10A100
- Office of Unemployment Insurance: Employer Guide, 2026, wage base and new employer rate
Kentucky hair salon FAQ
Do I need a cosmetology license to own a hair salon in Kentucky?
The salon itself needs the license, a beauty salon license from the Kentucky Board of Cosmetology at $100, issued after an opening inspection. The board also requires every salon to maintain a licensed manager, properly licensed in the services the salon provides, at all times, and every person providing services holds their own practitioner license.
How many hours of training does a Kentucky cosmetologist need?
1,500 hours at a board approved school: a minimum of 375 hours of lecture, 1,085 hours of clinic and practice, and 40 hours of Kentucky law. You must be at least 18 with a diploma or grade 12 equivalency proof, and you pass a written and a practical examination. The examination application costs $85 and the license itself costs $50.
When does a Kentucky cosmetology license renew?
Every two years, in even numbered years. The renewal window runs July 1 through July 31, renewals cost $100 for an individual license and $200 for a salon, and a renewal received by July 31 sets the expiration at July 31 of the next even numbered year. Miss the window and the license goes Inactive and the restoration fee applies.
Does Kentucky have a booth renter license for cosmetologists?
No. The cosmetology board issues no booth renter license and no independent contractor credential. A stylist renting a chair works under the salon license of a board licensed salon, and whether the stylist is an employee or an independent contractor is a classification question decided by control and the tax agencies, not by a board permit. Barbers are different: the barbering chapter licenses chair rental as an independent contract owner.
Where do I file a DBA for a salon in Kentucky?
It depends on your structure, under KRS 365.015. A sole proprietor files the certificate of assumed name with the county clerk of the county where the business keeps its principal place of business. An LLC or corporation files with the Secretary of State for $20 and then files the copy stamped filed with the county clerk of the county where its registered agent sits. The filing is good for five years.