How to Start a Hair Extensions Business in Mississippi

Who licenses hair extensions work in Mississippi

Two Mississippi agencies divide this trade between them, and knowing which one owns your service is the first business decision. The Mississippi State Board of Cosmetology and Barbering, in Jackson, licenses practitioners and establishments under Title 73, Chapter 7 of the Mississippi Code. The board is new: House Bill 313 of 2024 merged the former cosmetology and barber examiners boards effective January 1, 2025 and moved barbering into the cosmetology chapter, so one agency now stands behind the cosmetologist, barber, esthetician, nail technician and instructor licenses and the salon establishment license.

Hair braiding answers somewhere else. The registration for braiders sits in section 73-7-71 of the same chapter, but it is administered by the Mississippi State Department of Health under its own rules at Title 15, Part 19, Subpart 60, Chapter 5 of the Administrative Code, and it is a listing, not a license. Because section 73-7-71 defines hair braiding to include weaving and extending, a large share of the extensions trade registers with the Health Department rather than the board.

Neither agency publishes a page addressed to hair extension services, so the licensing answer comes from the statutory text itself: the definitions at section 73-7-2, the license statute at section 73-7-13, and the braiding statute at section 73-7-71.

Mississippi hair extensions at a glance

The license question: the cosmetologist, and the routes that are not open

Start with what Mississippi does not have. No license in Chapter 7 names weaving, extending or attaching hair. The cosmetology definition at section 73-7-2(d) lists cutting, clipping or trimming hair and hair pieces, styling, arranging, dressing, curling, waving, straightening, cleansing, bleaching, tinting, coloring or similarly treating hair and hair pieces, and attaching hair appears nowhere in it. The barbering definition at section 73-7-2(b) does not name it either. So the trade is sorted by two other provisions: the braiding definition at section 73-7-71, covered below, and the full scope cosmetologist license, which carries every part of the trade the braiding definition leaves out.

The cosmetologist license takes 1,500 hours in a licensed school of cosmetology, completed over no less than 9 months, or 3,000 hours in an apprenticeship program certified by the board, under section 73-7-13. Applicants must be at least 16 and hold a high school education or its equivalent, or be successfully enrolled in a community college. Licensing now runs on one examination: in a Board Action Update dated February 2, 2026, the board retired the practical examination, so new cosmetologists qualify on the written theory examination alone, with a passing score of 70 for practitioners and 75 for instructors. The license costs $50 on application under the fee schedule at section 73-7-29 and $50 every two years to renew.

Renewal carries a 60 day grace period, then a $50 delinquent penalty, with a further delinquent fee for each year a license stays expired up to three years, after which the examination must be retaken. No license renews until every board fine and penalty is paid in full, and licensees who are 70 or older owe no renewal fee. A practitioner moving to Mississippi applies by reciprocity at a $55 application fee. The master designation at section 73-7-14 adds prescribed continuing education on top of holding the cosmetology, manicuring and esthetics licenses together; ordinary renewal has none.

The narrower licenses stop well short of installing. Mississippi has no hairstylist license. The barber license at section 73-7-13.1 runs 1,500 school hours or 3,000 apprenticeship hours and covers barbering, whose definition never reaches attaching hair. The esthetician license at 600 hours and the nail technician license at 350 hours cover skin and nails only. The one place the word extensions appears in the definitions is a carve-out in the other direction: a person whose practice is limited to makeup artistry, threading, or applying or removing eyelash extensions sits outside the cosmetology and barbering definitions entirely. That carve-out is about eyelashes, not hair.

The wig specialist license fails on two grounds. First, scope: wigology was defined as a service to a wig or hairpiece, arranging, dressing, waving, curling, cleaning, bleaching, coloring, cutting and shaping the piece itself, which is work on an object, not installation on a client's own hair. Second, availability: under the board's Rule 2.14, the board does not issue a wig specialist or wig salon license to anyone who was not already licensed before July 1, 2013, and earlier holders may only renew. The current definitions at section 73-7-2 do not define wigology or wig specialist at all. Treat the wig license as history, not as a route into this trade.

The braiding boundary: where registered work ends

The braiding definition is the most extensions friendly text in Mississippi law, because the legislature wrote the trade's core techniques into it. Section 73-7-71(1) defines hair braiding as the use of techniques that result in tension on hair strands or roots by twisting, wrapping, weaving, extending, locking or braiding of the hair by hand or mechanical device. A sew-in weave is weaving and extending; a braid attached or crochet attached install is braiding and extending. All of it sits inside the definition, and section 73-7-71(3) makes the consequence explicit: a person who completes the self-test and keeps the brochure and completed self-test at the work location is exempt from the cosmetology and barbering licensure law. Section 73-7-31, the chapter's exceptions provision, carries the same carve-out at paragraph (d).

The registration itself is deliberately light, and it belongs to a different agency than readers expect. You register with the Mississippi State Department of Health, not the board, under the Department's rules at Title 15, Part 19, Subpart 60, Chapter 5. The cost of registration is $25, set by Rule 5.2.1 under the statute's ceiling of not more than $25. Completing the self-test in the Department's infection control brochure and keeping the brochure and the completed test available where you work is the whole ongoing obligation. The statute limits the registration's purpose to maintaining a listing of people who braid for compensation; it does not authorize the Department to license or regulate the practice beyond the document check. Department representatives may visit during business hours, which the rules define as 8:00 in the morning to 8:00 in the evening, to determine whether the brochure and completed self-test are available. The rules state no renewal period or expiration for the registration. Licensed cosmetologists and barbers need no registration at all, and our Mississippi braiding guide covers the registration route in full.

The definition ends at chemistry and at the scissors. It does not include the application of dyes, reactive chemicals, or other preparations to alter the color of the hair or to straighten, curl or alter the structure of the hair, so coloring, bleaching, relaxing, perming and every chemical service around an install sit outside the registration. And the Mississippi definition contains no trimming allowance of any kind: cutting, clipping and trimming hair are named cosmetology work at section 73-7-2(d)(i), so a blend cut or finish cut is licensed work even on a registered install.

One part of the menu has no published answer, and this guide will not invent one. The statute classifies by technique, tension applied by hand or mechanical device, and neither the board nor the Department of Health publishes a method by method ruling that names tape-in, bonded or fusion installs. An adhesive install bundled with a chemical treatment is clearly outside the definition; a purely mechanical reading of an adhesive install is a question the published sources leave open. If bonded methods are on your menu, get the agencies' reading in writing before you offer them on a registration, or staff them with a licensed cosmetologist, which settles the question completely.

The establishment license for your space

Premises follow the same split as people. A business that offers only registered braiding needs no establishment license from the board: the license at Rule 10.4 attaches to premises where a board licensed profession is practiced, registered braiding is excepted from the chapter, and the Health Department registration is personal to the braider rather than tied to an inspected room.

The moment the menu includes licensed work, the full establishment machinery applies. Rule 10.4 requires every establishment where a board licensed profession is practiced to hold an establishment license, and Rule 10.5 sequences the opening: the $85 application, which includes the initial inspection, goes in first, the inspection is scheduled only on a complete application, and the license issues only after the premises pass. A missed inspection appointment costs a $35 reinspection fee before the visit is rescheduled. Renewal is $60, with a $50 delinquent penalty, and a license expired more than a year cannot be renewed at all. The license does not transfer: a change of ownership, of location, including a different area inside the same building, or of name requires a brand new application. The application itself asks whether the establishment will offer services the board does not regulate, naming braiding among them, so a mixed shop declares both sides on one form.

Booth rent needs no separate license in Mississippi: there is no renter license, chair registration or rental permit in the board's rules. A renter's chair is lawful inside premises holding a current establishment license, with the renter holding a current practitioner license of her own. Because Rule 10.4 ties the establishment license to the operator and the exact area, a renter running her own business in a defined part of the salon may need an establishment license of her own rather than shelter under the salon's, the enclosed room version our Mississippi salon suite guide works through.

Forming your business entity

Most Mississippi extensions businesses form as a limited liability company with the Secretary of State. The Certificate of Formation, Form F0100, costs $50, and the recurring obligation is the annual report, Form F0108, which is free for a domestic LLC and is due April 15 every year, fileable online any time on or after January 1. Letting the report lapse costs the entity its good standing, with reinstatement priced at $50, and that standing matters here because the establishment license application asks for proof of it. Mississippi charges no franchise tax on a domestic LLC, so the $50 formation and the free annual report are the whole state entity cost. Forming in another state instead is the expensive route: a foreign LLC registers at $250 and files its annual report at $250 a year. A sole proprietor skips both filings and holds the liabilities personally. The full formation walkthrough is in our Mississippi hair salon LLC guide.

Business names: the voluntary fictitious name registration

Mississippi's trade name system is the most relaxed in this series, because the filing most states require is one Mississippi merely offers. The Fictitious Business Name Registration Act, sections 75-93-1 and following, created a voluntary registry at the Secretary of State: registration, Form F0070, costs $25 and runs for a five year term, renewable for another $25 due by December 31 of the fifth anniversary year. There is no county filing, no penalty for operating unregistered, and no exclusive right to the name.

Voluntary does not mean useless. A studio trading under another name meets the question at the bank, at the payment processor and on the establishment application, and the $25 registration is the cleanest answer to who stands behind the sign. An LLC trading under its exact filed name needs nothing at all. Either way the registration creates no entity and substitutes for no license.

Federal tax ID and business banking

Apply for an Employer Identification Number on IRS.gov. It is free, it issues online, and any site charging for an EIN is selling a form you can file yourself. The EIN keys the registrations that follow: the Department of Revenue's TAP account, the unemployment insurance employer account when you hire, and the business bank account all run off the federal number.

Open the business bank account as soon as the entity and the EIN exist, and run hair purchases, booth income and supply orders through it from the first week; separated books keep the sales tax filing, the quarterly reports and any classification question answerable without reconstruction.

Sales tax in Mississippi: services are not taxed, retail is

Mississippi's sales tax is a tax with a list, and the list is the whole analysis. Section 27-65-23 taxes the gross income of the business activities the legislature enumerated, and hair services are not on the list, so an install, a move up, a removal and a refit carry no sales tax. The register still needs the tax, because the front desk sells things: hair, wefts, closures and take home care products are retail sales of tangible personal property, taxable at the 7 percent state rate plus any local taxes the Department of Revenue publishes for the salon's address.

Register with the Department of Revenue through TAP, the Taxpayer Access Point, and hold the sales tax account and permit before the first retail sale; the Department advises applying early because the permit process can take up to three weeks. Set the point of sale to itemize services and products on separate lines from day one, and decide in advance how an invoice splits the hair from the labor.

Hiring, booth rent and worker classification

Classification is the question the licensing rules do not answer. A booth renter who sets her own prices, hours and client list, collects her own money and carries her own supplies reads as an independent business renting space. A stylist whose schedule, prices, products and clients the shop controls reads as an employee whatever the agreement calls her, and withholding and unemployment insurance follow that reading.

The first hire registers the business as a Mississippi employer on two tracks. For unemployment insurance, file a Status Report, Form UI-1, with the Mississippi Department of Employment Security. A commercial employer becomes liable on paying $1,500 in wages in a calendar quarter, or on employing a worker in some portion of a day in each of 20 different calendar weeks in a year. New employer rates run 1.0 percent for the first year of liability, 1.1 percent for the second and 1.2 percent for the third and following years until a modified rate applies, which can run from 0.2 to 5.4 percent, all on the first $14,000 of wages per employee per year. Reports are quarterly, due April 30, July 31, October 31 and January 31. For withholding, register with the Department of Revenue through TAP and collect Form 89-350 from each employee; the Department's 2026 withholding formula applies the flat 4 percent rate to taxable income above $10,000.

The wage floor is federal: Mississippi has no state minimum wage law, so the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour applies, with federal overtime past 40 hours in a workweek, and state law bars cities and counties from setting a higher local wage.

Local rules for a Mississippi extensions business

The state layers do not finish the opening. The establishment application itself builds the local layer into the state file: the board wants county or city and fire inspection evidence where they apply, and a building permit for new construction. A studio opening inside a city such as Jackson, Gulfport, Hattiesburg or Tupelo should also expect a city business or privilege license on top of the state stack.

Zoning sits underneath the licensing. The establishment license is issued for the premises in the application, and a move to a new address, or even to a different area inside the same building, requires a new establishment application; none of that answers whether a salon may operate at the address at all, which is the city or county zoning for the specific parcel. Make the zoning call before the lease is signed, because the board's inspection and the local use approval come from separate governments, and a business needs both. A braiding only studio skips the board layer, not the local one.

Insurance for a Mississippi extensions business

Nothing in Chapter 7 or the board's rules conditions the establishment license, any practitioner license or the Health Department registration on an insurance filing, so the stack is set by risk and by contract rather than by the state. Professional liability is the core policy for this trade, covering hair and scalp damage claims alleged weeks after a tension or bonded install. General liability for the premises and property coverage for chairs, dryers, build out and retail stock complete the standard stack, and the hair itself is expensive stock, often prepaid by clients and held for specific appointments, so ask how a property policy treats client hair stored on the premises.

Workers compensation joins the stack when the team does: our Mississippi hair salon insurance guide covers the five employee trigger, the 15 percent owner exemption election and the uninsured penalties. Landlords and suite landlords routinely write their own limits into the lease, and those contract numbers are the figures to satisfy; Mississippi names no required limit for this trade, so treat any figure quoted as a state requirement as a sales line.

Your Mississippi renewal calendar

Official sources

• Mississippi Code section 73-7-2, as amended by House Bill 313 of 2024 effective January 1, 2025: the chapter's definitions, cosmetology at paragraph (d) and barbering at paragraph (b), with no weaving, extending or attaching term anywhere in the section
• Mississippi Code section 73-7-13: admission to the cosmetology examination, 1,500 school hours or 3,000 apprenticeship hours
• Mississippi Code section 73-7-71: the hair braiding definition naming weaving and extending, the registration fee ceiling of $25, the self-test exemption condition and the Department of Health's inspection right
• Mississippi State Department of Health: Regulations Governing Registration of Individuals Performing Hair Braiding, Title 15, Part 19, Subpart 60, Chapter 5, with the $25 registration at Rule 5.2.1 and business hours at Rule 5.1.2
• Mississippi Administrative Code, Title 30, Part 2101, Rule 2.14, Wigology License Renewal: the board does not issue a wig specialist or wig salon license to anyone who was not licensed before July 1, 2013
• Mississippi State Board of Cosmetology and Barbering: practitioner licenses, the establishment license, examinations and renewals
• Secretary of State: Business Documents Filing Fees schedule, the $50 Certificate of Formation, the free annual report and the $25 fictitious name registration
• Department of Revenue: the 7 percent sales tax, sales tax permits through TAP and employer withholding
• Mississippi Department of Employment Security: employer FAQs, Form UI-1 registration, new employer rates and the $14,000 wage base

Mississippi hair extensions FAQ