Dress hire and dress rental are the same trade under two names: a rack of occasion wear that goes out for an event and comes back to be cleaned, checked and hired again. This guide is written for the hire side of the vocabulary (hire periods, postal hire, dry-cleaning turnaround) and covers what to set up before the first booking. The dress rental business guide is its twin and goes deeper on the North American market.
Stock by size, not by style
A style in four sizes is four hires, not one. Record every piece as its own unit with a size tag and a barcode, so the booking page can say the size 10 is free on the 14th and the size 12 is not. Buy depth in the sizes your customers actually wear before buying breadth in styles; a rack that is all size 8 turns away most of the people who walk in. The size tracking guide covers the mechanics.
Hire periods and turnaround
Decide the standard hire period (a four-day or a weekend hire is common), what a longer hire costs, and the turnaround after every hire for dry-cleaning and checking. Turnaround is what most new hire businesses under-count: a dress back on Monday is not hireable on Tuesday. Block it on the calendar per piece, automatically. The cleaning turnaround guide has the numbers to plan with.
Postal hire
If you post dresses, the hire period starts when the parcel is delivered and ends when it is posted back, and both dates need to be on the booking. Add the courier time to the turnaround, prepay the return label, and ask for a photo on receipt so condition disputes are settled at the start, not the end.
Pricing, deposits and damage
Price per hire, with the dry-cleaning included, and a tiered price for a longer hire. Take a deposit or a card hold that covers a typical repair, release it after the piece is checked back in, and charge for damage from an itemised list the customer agreed to. Late returns cost you the next hire, so charge for them. The deposits, damage and late returns guide covers the rules and the wording.
The booking site
Customers find a dress on Instagram and want to book that dress in their size for their date. The website should do exactly that: dates first, then the sizes free on those dates, then the booking with the deposit. Deep links per dress make the Instagram post a shop. The online booking guide shows what the flow looks like.
Stylist and production pulls
Stylists and productions hire a rack of pieces on approval and keep some. That is a different transaction from a customer hire: a flat pull fee, then the kept pieces billed at the hire rate when the rest come back. The stylist pulls guide explains showcase billing.
The software
Per-size units with tags and barcodes, automatic turnaround per piece, a booking page that shows dates-then-sizes, deposits and card holds, late-return charges, scan out and in from a phone, showcase billing for pulls, and a marketplace listing for the customers searching "dress hire" near you. Share Marketplace was built with dress hire boutiques and wardrobe houses and prices per transaction. See dress rental software and the dress rental software comparison.
Before the first hire
- Every piece recorded as a unit with size, colour, serial and photo.
- Standard hire period and price; longer-hire price; turnaround per piece.
- Deposit or hold amount; damage and late-return charges written down.
- Booking site live with dates-then-sizes and deep links per dress.
- Dry-cleaner arranged with a turnaround you can promise.