DaySmart Pet (123Pet) Pricing in 2026: What a Grooming Shop Actually Pays

The renewal email lands and the number is bigger than you remember. You signed up for 123Pet years ago at a price that felt like nothing, the software changed its name to DaySmart Pet, and somewhere along the way the monthly line crept up. Now you are staring at a bill and trying to work out what you are actually paying for, because the pricing page shows a tidy “$29 a month” that has little to do with the charge on your card.

Here is the short answer. DaySmart Pet’s published 2026 ladder is Basic at $29, Deluxe at $69, Deluxe Growth at $149, and Premium at $199 a month, with extra users at $9 each. But the two cheap plans do not include the two-way texting most grooming shops live on, so a texting salon lands on the $149 Deluxe Growth tier or higher before add-ons. Once you count calendar add-ons and per-user charges, the real number for a small shop usually sits between $100 and $220 a month. Below is the honest math on every tier and what a solo groomer, a three-chair salon, and a multi-location shop each actually pay.

Key Takeaways

• The $29 plan is not a texting plan. Two-way texting and text marketing start on the $149 Deluxe Growth tier, so a reminder-heavy shop skips the cheap plans in practice.
• DaySmart Pet is per-user. Basic is 1 user, Deluxe and Deluxe Growth include 3, Premium includes 6, and extra seats run about $9 a month each.
• Add-ons stack. Daycare and boarding calendars are commonly reported at around $25 a month each, on top of the plan.
• The processing rate is not public, and declining DaySmart Payments for your own processor can add roughly $10 a month, per one software directory.
• A2P 10DLC is the fee nobody quotes you. Reminder, pickup, and promo texts each need separate carrier registration, no matter which tool you pick.

What This Teardown Covers

• Why the sticker price is never the real price
• The DaySmart Pet plan ladder, tier by tier
• The seven things that move your real bill
• Entry price vs what a texting shop really pays
• What each type of shop actually pays
• DaySmart Pet vs the rest of the field
• The texting fee nobody quotes you (A2P 10DLC)
• Steal this: the questions that reveal the real price
• Common objections
• FAQ

Why the Sticker Price Is Never the Real Price

Grooming runs on thin margins and a full book. It is a crowded market, with roughly 193,000 pet grooming and boarding businesses in the US as of 2026 per IBISWorld, and most are small. The money is not loose, either: the Bureau of Labor Statistics puts median pay for animal care and service workers at $33,860 a year in 2024. A $60-a-month software difference is a real line item at that take-home.

It matters more now that clients are tightening up. APPA’s 2026 report found the US pet industry hit $158 billion in 2025, projected to reach $165 billion in 2026, but the same research found more than half of dog owners now groom at home and spending on salon and mobile grooming dipped in 2025. When clients trim their own dogs between visits, the shops that win keep the book full automatically and do not bleed margin on tools they half-use.

So the useful question is never “what is the cheapest plan.” It is “what is the fully loaded cost once this thing does the work I need,” and that gap is where the DaySmart pricing page goes quiet.

The DaySmart Pet Plan Ladder, Tier by Tier

DaySmart Pet, the software formerly sold as 123Pet, publishes four main tiers. The figures below come from DaySmart’s subscription-plan help documentation and match the listing on Capterra. Prices are 2026 starting rates, so re-check before you sign.

Basic, $29 a month. One user. This is the plan that gets quoted and the plan almost no grooming shop should run long-term, because two-way texting is not included. You get scheduling and the core book, but the reminder conversations that stop no-shows are not here. For anyone with a real schedule, it is a trial tier in disguise.

Deluxe, $69 a month. Up to three users, with more features and room for a small team. The catch is the one that defines DaySmart pricing: full two-way texting still is not bundled. If you want the back-and-forth texting a grooming client expects, you are looking up the ladder, not at this rung.

Deluxe Growth, $149 a month. Up to three users, and the first tier that includes two-way texting and text marketing. For most grooming shops that text reminders and “your dog is ready” messages, this is the real entry point, not the $29 headline.

Premium, $199 a month. Up to six users, with deeper reporting. Past six users you add seats at roughly $9 each per month. This is the tier for multi-chair salons and small multi-location groups.

The Seven Things That Move Your Real Bill

Score DaySmart, or any grooming tool, on these seven, not on the headline.

1. The texting gate. Two-way texting lives on Deluxe Growth and up. If you text, your floor is $149. This is the single biggest gap between the sticker price and the real price.
2. Per-user fees. Basic is one user, Deluxe and Deluxe Growth include three, Premium includes six, and extra seats are about $9 a month.
3. Daycare and boarding calendars. Review sites commonly report these as add-ons at around $25 a month each, on top of your plan.
4. Payment processing. DaySmart does not publish a card rate. A point of a percent on $15,000 in grooms is real money every month, so get the rate in writing.
5. Bring-your-own-processor surcharge. At least one software directory lists the plans roughly $10 a month higher if you decline DaySmart Payments. Confirm this one directly.
6. Onboarding and data import. Moving years of client and pet history in is where switching costs hide. Ask whether import is included.
7. Contract and the free trial. DaySmart offers a 14-day free trial, but confirm whether you are month-to-month or signing an annual term before it converts.

Entry Price vs What a Texting Shop Really Pays

First, the published ladder everyone sees.

DaySmart Pet monthly starting prices in USD, 2026, from DaySmart’s plan documentation and cross-checked on Capterra. Re-check the vendor page before signing.

Now the number that matters. A grooming shop texts, so the real DaySmart floor is $149, and the comparison with flat-rate tools that include unlimited texting looks very different. Below is an illustrative all-in monthly cost for a three-person salon that texts reminders, built from each vendor’s real tier prices plus the add-ons a shop that size switches on. These are modeled estimates, not quotes, and card processing is excluded.

Illustrative all-in monthly cost for a 3-groomer salon that texts (subscription plus texting plus typical add-ons; card processing excluded). Modeled from sourced tier prices, not vendor quotes.

The tool that looked cheapest on its $29 headline is mid-pack once texting is in the picture. That is the whole point: the entry price and the working price are two different numbers.

What Each Type of Shop Actually Pays

The right answer differs by the shape of your business.

The solo mobile groomer. One van, you text everything, you take cards at the door. On DaySmart, texting pushes you to Deluxe Growth at $149 a month, because Basic and Deluxe leave out the two-way texting you need. That is a hard pill for a one-person shop, which is why flat-rate rivals look tempting: Groomer.io is a flat $99 with unlimited texting, and Pawfinity starts around $50. DaySmart only earns a look if you do not text much and can live on Basic or a single-user plan.

The three-chair salon with three staff. This is where DaySmart gets competitive. Deluxe Growth includes three users and two-way texting for $149, so a three-person salon is not stacking per-seat fees yet. Add a boarding calendar and you are near $174, a fair number against MoeGo’s salon tiers and against Gingr once its add-ons and per-staff fees pile on. For a straight grooming salon with no boarding, Deluxe Growth is one of DaySmart’s stronger value points.

The multi-location or multi-van operation. Now the model works against you. You climb to Premium at $199 for six users, pay about $9 for every seat past that, and face the question of whether each location needs its own subscription. At this scale many growing operators stop renting per-seat software and move to one platform they own, where booking, reminders, deposits, and rebooking run as automations instead of a bill that grows with every hire. That is the model behind our rebooking system for groomers and route-smart booking approach.

How the Bill Quietly Creeps Up

The failure mode with DaySmart is rarely a nasty surprise on day one. It is the slow creep. You start on Basic because it is cheap, then a client texts back and you realize two-way messaging is not on. You upgrade to Deluxe Growth and your bill jumps from $29 to $149 in a single click. Then you hire a groomer and the per-user math kicks in, or you switch on boarding and the calendar bills separately at a reported $25 or so a month. None of it is hidden, exactly. It just is not on the front of the box.

DaySmart Pet vs the Rest of the Field

Here is how DaySmart lines up against the tools a grooming shop usually shortlists, on the things that decide the bill.

Prices are 2026 published starting rates from each vendor, cross-checked against Capterra and the vendors’ own pages. Prices change, so verify before you sign.

The pattern is clear. DaySmart’s $29 competes with Time To Pet’s $25 Lite on the low end, and both share the same trap: the cheap plan is not a texting plan. Once texting is required, DaySmart’s $149 Deluxe Growth sits alongside MoeGo and above the flat-rate tools. For the bigger platforms, we broke them down in MoeGo vs Gingr vs PetExec and the MoeGo alternatives guide.

The Texting Fee Nobody Quotes You (A2P 10DLC)

Here is the cost that never shows up on a grooming-software pricing page and hits groomers harder than any other niche: A2P 10DLC registration.

If your shop texts customers from a regular 10-digit US number, carriers require you to register your business and your message campaigns, separated by purpose. Appointment reminders are one. A “your dog is ready for pickup” text is another. A “we have Saturday openings” promo is a third. Many operators assume reminder and pickup texts are exempt because they feel like service messages. They are not automatically exempt, and treating them that way is how deliverability quietly dies.

You will see scary per-violation fine numbers online. A repeated “$10,000 per violation” figure circulates in vendor blogs, but it is unverified, so ignore it. The real cost is worse because it is invisible: unregistered traffic gets filtered, your reminders silently stop arriving, and you have a no-show problem dressed up as a texting problem. So whichever tool you choose, ask how it handles 10DLC registration and how it keeps reminder, transactional, and marketing campaigns separate. We cover the mechanics in the guide to A2P 10DLC and consent for groomers and the SMS automation feature overview.

Steal This: The Questions That Reveal the Real Price

Do not walk into a DaySmart demo or renewal call unarmed. Copy the two scripts below. The first flushes out the real price. The second gets your data out if you switch.

The pricing interrogation (paste into your notes before any call):

1. What is the total monthly price for my exact setup: [X] users, two-way texting on, and boarding or daycare calendars if I need them?
2. Which tier do I actually need for two-way texting, and how many users does it include?
3. What is the price for each extra seat past that?
4. Are daycare and boarding calendars included or billed separately, and how much each?
5. What is the card processing rate through DaySmart Payments, and does the price change if I use my own processor?
6. Is onboarding and importing my existing client and pet history included, or is there a fee?
7. Month-to-month or annual, and what happens to my price when the trial ends?

The data-export request (send to your current vendor when switching):

Hi, we are moving our grooming business to a new system. Please send a complete export of our data in CSV, including all client contact records, pet profiles and grooming notes, full appointment history, and any outstanding package or membership balances. Please confirm the file format and the delivery date so nothing is lost in the move.

Those two scripts save more than any feature comparison. The first stops the surprise bill. The second stops you being held hostage by your own client list, the most common reason groomers stay on software they have outgrown. If a move is on the table, we wrote the playbook on switching grooming software without losing your client history.

Common Objections

“I have run 123Pet, now DaySmart, for years. Why look now?” Loyalty is fine, overpaying is not. The point is not to rip out a tool that works. It is to make sure you are on the right tier, not paying for add-ons you do not use or seat fees you never re-checked. Run the pricing interrogation on your own account first. Half the time the win is fixing your current plan.

“Isn’t $29 a month already cheap?” The $29 plan is cheap because it leaves out the texting a grooming shop needs. Judged on the plan you will actually run, usually Deluxe Growth at $149, DaySmart is a mid-priced tool. Cheap is only cheap if it does the job.

“Do I need to be technical to leave?” No. Any reputable vendor will export your clients, pet notes, and appointment history. The hard part is nerve, not skill. Get the export in writing before you cancel, import it, and confirm the data landed before you flip the switch.

“Isn’t GoHighLevel enterprise software? I run one van.” It sounds bigger than it is. Under the hood it is a booking, texting, and automation engine, and the parts a groomer touches are a calendar, reminder texts, and a rebooking nudge. The difference is you own the system instead of renting it per user, so adding a groomer does not raise your automation bill. See the real plan math on our GoHighLevel pricing page.

FAQ

Related Reading

• MoeGo vs Gingr vs PetExec: What Grooming Software Really Costs in 2026
• MoeGo Alternatives for Mobile Groomers: 6 Tools Compared for 2026
• How to Switch Grooming Software Without Losing Your Client History
• Texting Grooming Clients in 2026: A2P 10DLC, Consent, and Waivers
• How to Cut Grooming No-Shows (Without Nagging Pet Parents)