Home / Michigan / Esthetics Studio

How to Start an Esthetics Studio in Michigan: Licenses, Costs & Requirements

Michigan's esthetician license is a limited license for skin care services only, built on the scope list at MCL 339.1210(2): facials, applying removable makeup and eyelashes, and eyelash services including extensions and tinting, all limited to the surface of the skin. Training is 400 hours, or 750 hours for training begun on or after July 1, 2024, and the studio that goes with the license is a cosmetology establishment or a limited cosmetology establishment.

Researched from Michigan state sources. Our guides are free. We may earn a commission when you use a partner service, at no additional cost to you.

The regulator: the Board of Cosmetology at LARA

A Michigan esthetics studio answers to the Board of Cosmetology, inside the Bureau of Professional Licensing at the Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs, known as LARA. Esthetics is regulated as part of cosmetology under Article 12 of the Occupational Code, Act 299 of 1980, and there is no separate esthetics board or esthetics act. Licenses and renewals run through MiPLUS, the Michigan Professional Licensing User System, and the license at the center of this guide, the esthetician license, is one of the limited licenses Article 12 creates for a single branch of practice.

The statute does the defining work. Section 1210, MCL 339.1210, lists the skin care services an esthetician or a cosmetologist may perform, and section 1210(3) limits those services to the surface of the skin, the stratum corneum limit. Everything in this guide follows from those two provisions: the training hours lead to a license for the listed services, the listed services stop at the surface of the skin, and two neighboring trades that new owners often assume are included, permanent hair removal by electricity and microblading, sit outside the license entirely, under different credentials and, for microblading, a different department.

Michigan esthetics studio requirements at a glance

Practitioner licenses: the esthetician license and its boundaries

The esthetician license takes 400 hours in a licensed school of cosmetology, or 750 hours for an individual who begins training on or after July 1, 2024, under 2024 PA 78. The alternative route is an apprenticeship of not less than 6 months in a licensed cosmetology establishment where skin care services are rendered. The applicant must be at least 17 years old, hold an education equivalent to completion of the ninth grade, and pass an examination if one is available. Fees come from the State License Fee Act: a $15 application processing fee plus a license fee of $24 per year, which on the two year cycle is $63 initial total and $48 to renew, at the rates in effect for payments through September 30, 2027.

The scope list at MCL 339.1210(2) is the menu the license authorizes. It includes facials, applying removable makeup and eyelashes, and, at subsection (2)(j), eyelash services, including extensions and tinting, which is why a Michigan esthetics studio can run a lash menu on the same credential, as the Michigan lash studio guide works through. Under MCL 339.1203a(3) the esthetician license is a limited license, good for skin care services only: the licensee may perform only that service, so hair and nail services require their own licenses, or a cosmetologist whose wider license covers them. Every service on the list is also bounded by section 1210(3): skin care services are limited to the surface of the skin. A treatment that works below the surface is not made lawful by being performed gently, or by being marketed as an esthetics service.

The electrology boundary is the sharpest edge of the scope. Electrology is permanent hair removal by electricity, and it is a separate licensed practice under MCL 339.1208. No cosmetologist or esthetician may perform it without the electrologist license, a point MCL 339.1203a(2) states directly. The electrologist license takes 400 hours of training where electrology is taught, or not less than 6 months as an apprentice where electrology is offered, at age 18 or older, with a ninth grade equivalent education and the required examination, at $63 initial and $48 to renew. A studio that wants permanent hair removal on its menu hires or trains for that credential separately.

The establishment credential: the cosmetology establishment license

The premises license as a cosmetology establishment under MCL 339.1204, or, where only specified services will be offered, as a limited cosmetology establishment licensed for those specified services only. The limited form suits a skin care only studio: the premises carry the services named in the license, and a cosmetologist working there may not perform services the establishment is not licensed to provide, so adding hair services later means widening the establishment license as well as staffing for it. The fee is a $25 application processing fee plus $25 per year, which is $75 initial total and $50 to renew on the two year cycle, at the State License Fee Act rates in effect for payments through September 30, 2027.

The application is made by the owners or managers and includes the address and a drawing or diagram showing the required equipment and facilities and full partition and door separation from any adjacent dwelling or school. The premises must pass a department inspection, and the establishment license and each practitioner's license must be displayed prominently, with an individual license allowed at the workstation. Article 12 licenses renew every 2 years on the biennial anniversary of the issue date under R 339.1003, through MiPLUS. The establishment license is void on a sale or other transfer of the establishment or its ownership, or, except for a mobile salon, a change in location, so a move or a sale means a new application and a new license.

Forming your LLC with LARA

Most Michigan esthetics studio owners form a limited liability company so the debts and legal problems of the business stay with the business. An LLC is formed by filing Articles of Organization, Form 700, with the Corporations Division of the Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs, for $50. A professional LLC files Form 701, also $50. Filing can be done online, and the company needs a resident agent and a registered office in Michigan, because that is where the state and process servers reach it.

The follow on duty is an annual statement of resident agent and registered office, due February 15 of each year, for $25. An LLC formed after September 30 does not have to file a statement on the immediately following February 15, so a company formed in the fall gets its first statement deadline in the second February after formation. There is no late fee for a standard LLC. The consequence of neglect is slower and stranger than owners expect: if an LLC fails to file annual statements for 2 consecutive years, the administrator sends a notice, and if all missing statements and fees are not filed within 60 days after that notice, the LLC is not in good standing. No certificate of good standing will issue, the company name becomes available for use by another entity, and the administrator accepts no filings from it except a certificate of restoration of good standing, which costs $50. The LLC is not dissolved, and it may keep operating and keep serving clients while it restores itself, but banks, landlords and licensing counterparties who ask for a certificate will find the gap. Adopt a written operating agreement even though it is never filed; it governs the money between members, and the statutory defaults are a poor substitute in a two owner business.

Trading under a name: the assumed name filings

Michigan calls a name other than the legal name an assumed name, and the filing route depends on the business form. A sole proprietor or a general partnership files a certificate of assumed name with the county clerk of each county where business is conducted or a location is maintained, under Act 101 of 1907. The fee is $6, the certificate runs 5 years, and a renewal certificate filed with the county clerk before expiration costs $4 and extends the name another 5 years. Letting the term lapse is treated as abandonment of the name.

An LLC files its certificate of assumed name with LARA instead, for $25. The certificate expires on December 31 of the fifth full calendar year after the filing year, and it can be extended for additional consecutive 5 year periods by a renewal certificate, also $25, filed within 90 days before expiration. A corporation pays $10 for its certificate of assumed name, with the same December 31 of the fifth full calendar year term. The filing only bites when the business trades under something different from its filed legal name, so a esthetics studio whose salon sign matches its Articles of Organization word for word needs no second filing, while a company formed under one name and marketed under another needs the certificate before the sign goes up.

Getting your EIN

Your Employer Identification Number is the one free, fast step in a Michigan opening. Apply on the IRS website and the number issues at no cost; every LLC and corporation needs one for banking and payroll, and a sole proprietor needs one once they have employees. Michigan paperwork keys off it: a business that has an EIN uses that number as its Treasury account number, the unemployment registration runs under it, and your bank and card processor will ask for it. Get it after the entity exists and before the first state tax registration, so the number is on hand when Form 518 or the online registration asks for it.

Sales tax: the service charge sits outside the tax, retail does not

Michigan charges a 6 percent state sales tax on retail sales of tangible personal property, and there is no city, local or county sales tax anywhere in the state, so the rate is 6 percent in Detroit, Grand Rapids and Marquette alike. The tax reaches retail transfers of tangible personal property. The service charge itself sits outside it, so the price of the esthetics service is not a taxable retail sale. What a client takes home is different: shampoo, cosmetics and other products the client takes home are taxable retail sales, and property that goes with the customer in connection with a service is considered a sale at retail. The business collects the 6 percent from the customer on those products and holds it for the state.

Register before the first retail sale, either through Michigan Treasury Online e-registration or on paper with Form 518, the Registration for Michigan Taxes. The online application is recognized within 15 minutes and processed within up to 48 hours, and a business with an EIN uses that number as its Treasury account number. The sales tax license runs January through December and renews annually, so a license taken out partway through the year still turns over at the calendar year boundary. Keep services and retail products itemized separately in the booking and point of sale system from day one, because the line between an untaxed service charge and a taxable take home product is drawn at the register, not in an accountant's office months later.

Renting treatment rooms: no booth renter license in Michigan

Michigan has no booth renter license and no booth rental fee in Article 12 or in the State License Fee Act schedule. An esthetician who rents a treatment room inside your licensed establishment works under the establishment license for the premises and under their own esthetician license for the services, and Michigan defines the room arrangement itself: a room or suite inside a licensed cosmetology establishment, leased or rented from the owner of that establishment to offer cosmetology services, is a cosmetology suite. The structure, including the option of licensing your own raw space instead, is worked through in the Michigan salon suite guide.

The absence of a renter license does not settle classification. A renter you schedule, price and direct like an employee can still be treated as an employee for withholding and unemployment purposes, whatever the rental agreement calls them. Pair the rental with a written agreement, the renter's own booking and payment handling, and their own product stock, and remember the scope rule runs with the person: a renting esthetician is still limited to skin care services, and still may not perform electrology without the separate electrologist license.

Hiring staff: withholding, unemployment, workers' compensation, and wages

The first hire triggers the employer stack, and Michigan folds much of it into one registration. Form 518, Registration for Michigan Taxes, registers a business for sales tax, use tax, income tax withholding, corporate income tax and unemployment insurance tax, and the Michigan Treasury Online e-registration replaces it online. The Unemployment Insurance Agency issues the unemployment account number, and its online e-registration can issue a new account number in as little as three days. An employer required to withhold federal tax must also deduct and withhold Michigan income tax at 4.25 percent. Unemployment tax is paid entirely by the employer.

A new non-construction employer pays 2.7 percent plus one third of its chargeable benefits component in year one, on the first $9,000 of each employee's wages for 2026 for employers in good standing, meaning all quarterly reports submitted, none missing or estimated, and no unpaid balance of $25 or more in tax, penalty or interest. Employers who do not meet those criteria are taxed on the first $9,500 instead. In year two the rate is 2.7 percent plus two thirds of the component, and from year three the full experience rated formula applies. Quarterly Wage and Tax reports are due even when the business has no employees or no wages to report, and late submission can bring penalties and interest. Account management runs in the new MiUI system; MiWAM, the Michigan Web Account Manager, was permanently retired on November 2, 2026.

Workers' compensation in Michigan is governed by the Worker's Disability Compensation Act of 1969. The act reaches private employers who regularly employ 3 or more employees at one time, and employers with fewer than 3 employees if at least one employee has been regularly employed 35 or more hours a week for 13 weeks or longer during the preceding 52 weeks. An employer under the act must secure payment of compensation through authorized self-insurance or a policy from an insurer authorized to transact workers' compensation insurance in Michigan, so coverage is bought from an authorized private insurer. The wage floor for 2026 is $13.73 an hour, with a tipped wage of $5.49 an hour provided the employee receives at least $8.24 in tips. On January 1, 2027 the full rate rises to $15.00 and the tipped rate to $6.30, so a payroll set up in late 2026 should be built with the January increase already in it.

The local layer, and the services that belong to other regulators

The state licenses the studio; the local layer controls the premises it sits in. Zoning approval, building permits and occupancy sign off come from the city or township, and treatment room buildouts raise local questions about plumbing, ventilation and finishes that should be answered before the lease is signed. The state's own application adds one premises rule with local consequences: the drawing or diagram must show full partition and door separation from any adjacent dwelling or school, so a studio planned inside a mixed residential building needs that separation designed in from the start.

The harder trap is regulatory rather than geographic. Microblading sits outside esthetics entirely. It is not a skin care service, it does not ride on the esthetician license, and it belongs to the body art facility framework run by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services under Part 131 of the Public Health Code, because the definition of tattooing reaches an indelible mark made by insertion of pigment under the skin. The Michigan microblading guide covers that facility license. Electrology, covered in the licenses section, is the other boundary: inside LARA, but under its own license. An esthetics studio that keeps its menu inside the section 1210(2) list, on the surface of the skin, stays inside one regulator and one premises license, which is the simplest structure Michigan offers this trade.

Insurance and recurring costs

The licensing layers above do not condition a cosmetology license on a bond or an insurance filing, which makes Michigan simpler than states that build coverage into the application. The coverage duties that are legal duties rather than choices are workers' compensation for employers inside the act's thresholds, covered in the hiring section, and the tax registrations. Insurance enters through the lease and through prudence: landlords require general liability coverage with the landlord named as an additional insured before handing over keys, and a working esthetics studio carries professional liability for services and property coverage for the buildout, equipment and retail inventory.

Recurring state costs are predictable once the pattern is understood: practitioner and establishment renewals on the two year anniversary cycle through MiPLUS, the LLC annual statement every February 15 at $25, quarterly Wage and Tax reports even in a quarter with no wages, and the sales tax license renewing annually on the calendar year. The State License Fee Act rates quoted in this guide are the rates in effect for payments through September 30, 2027, and the statute sets lower rates for payments after that date, so a renewal priced today should not be assumed to price the same way after the change. Budget for the fee schedule as it stands when each payment falls due.

Your Michigan renewal calendar

• Every 2 years, on the biennial anniversary of the issue date: esthetician licenses renew at $48 each through MiPLUS, and the cosmetology establishment license renews at $50, at the State License Fee Act rates in effect for payments through September 30, 2027
• Every year, by February 15: LLC annual statement filed with LARA, $25; an LLC formed after September 30 skips the immediately following February 15
• Every 5 years: an assumed name certificate renews, $4 at the county clerk for a sole proprietor or partnership, or $25 with LARA for an LLC, expiring December 31 of the fifth full calendar year after the filing year
• January through December: the sales tax license runs on the calendar year and renews annually
• Every quarter: Wage and Tax reports filed in MiUI, due even in a quarter with no wages
• January 1, 2027: the minimum wage rises to $15.00 and the tipped wage to $6.30; the 2026 rates are $13.73 and $5.49 with at least $8.24 in tips
• On any sale, transfer or change of location: the establishment license is void, mobile salons excepted, and a new license application is required

Official Michigan sources for this guide

• MCL 339.1210: the esthetician qualifications, the 400 hour and 750 hour training routes, the 6 month apprenticeship, the skin care services list, and the surface of the skin limit in section 1210(3)
• MCL 339.1208: the electrologist qualifications, 400 hours or a 6 month apprenticeship, and the age 18 requirement
• MCL 339.1203a: limited licenses under subsection (3), and the rule in subsection (2) that no cosmetologist or esthetician may perform electrology without the electrologist license
• MCL 339.1204: the cosmetology establishment and limited cosmetology establishment licenses, the application drawing, inspection, and the rule that the license is void on sale, transfer or change of location
• MCL 338.2225, State License Fee Act: the cosmetology fee rates in effect for payments through September 30, 2027, including the $15 application fee and $24 per year individual license fee and the $25 plus $25 per year establishment fees
• Administrative rules R 339.1001 to R 339.1005: R 339.1003, under which cosmetology licenses renew every 2 years on the biennial anniversary of the issue date
• MDHHS, Body Art Facility Licensing: the body art facility framework that covers microblading, run by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services
• Department of Treasury, Who Needs a Sales Tax License: the 6 percent state rate, the absence of local sales tax, and which service businesses must hold a sales tax license
• MCL 450.4207a: the good standing consequences of 2 consecutive missed LLC annual statements, the 60 day notice period, and restoration
• Department of Labor and Economic Opportunity, minimum wage release: the January 1, 2026 minimum wage of $13.73, the tipped wage of $5.49 with at least $8.24 in tips, and the January 1, 2027 rise to $15.00 and $6.30

This guide is general information researched from official Michigan sources, not legal or tax advice. Requirements, fees and forms change; verify the current rules with the agencies linked above before you file, sign or spend.

Frequently asked questions

How many hours of school does a Michigan esthetician need?

An esthetician completes 400 hours in a licensed school of cosmetology, or 750 hours for an individual who begins training on or after July 1, 2024. The alternative is an apprenticeship of not less than 6 months where skin care services are rendered. The applicant must be 17, hold a ninth grade equivalent education, and pass an examination if one is available. The license costs $63 initial and $48 to renew.

Does a Michigan esthetician license cover lash extensions?

Yes. The scope list at MCL 339.1210(2) includes applying eyelashes and, at subsection (2)(j), eyelash services, including extensions and tinting, so the esthetician license covers lashes with no separate credential. The cosmetologist license covers them too. All skin care services are limited to the surface of the skin by MCL 339.1210(3).

Can a Michigan esthetician perform electrology?

No. Electrology, permanent hair removal by electricity, is a separate license under MCL 339.1208, and MCL 339.1203a(2) provides that no cosmetologist or esthetician may perform it without that license. The electrologist license takes 400 hours of training or a 6 month apprenticeship, requires age 18, and costs $63 initial and $48 to renew.

How much does a cosmetology establishment license cost in Michigan?

A cosmetology establishment license, or a limited cosmetology establishment license for specified services only, costs a $25 application fee plus $25 per year, which is $75 initial and $50 to renew on the 2 year cycle. The application includes a drawing or diagram, partition and door separation from any dwelling or school, and a department inspection. Practitioner licenses and the $50 LLC filing are separate costs.

Can my Michigan esthetics studio offer microblading?

Not under the esthetician license. Microblading is not a skin care service and sits outside esthetics entirely. It belongs to the body art facility framework run by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services under Part 131 of the Public Health Code, which is a separate facility license from the cosmetology establishment license.

When do Michigan esthetician licenses renew?

Every 2 years, on the biennial anniversary of the issue date under R 339.1003, renewed through MiPLUS. Renewal is $48 for the esthetician license and $50 for the establishment license. The State License Fee Act rates in this guide are in effect for payments through September 30, 2027.