It is a Tuesday night and you finally sit down to compare grooming software. MoeGo says $49. Gingr shows a number close to $109. PetExec will not show you anything until you sit through a demo. Three tabs, three stories, and none of them tell you the one thing you need: what hits your card every month once the thing is actually running your book.
Here is the short answer. For a solo mobile groomer or a one-to-three chair salon, real 2026 cost lands between roughly $90 and $250 a month once you add texting and per-staff fees, and the sticker price is almost never what you pay. MoeGo fits mobile vans best. Gingr and PetExec lean toward multi-service daycare and boarding facilities and climb fast as you add staff and add-ons. Flat-rate tools like Groomer.io and Pawfinity cost the least to predict. Below is the honest math on all seven.
Key Takeaways
- Sticker price is a trap. MoeGo’s $49 and Gingr’s ~$109 are entry tiers. Texting caps, processing, and per-staff fees push the real bill higher.
- MoeGo is built for mobile: $49 / $99 / $159 per van, $79 / $149 / $239 per location. Unlimited texting is gated to the top tier.
- Gingr advertises a low base but sells payments, two-way SMS, and scheduling as add-ons, plus reported per-staff fees, so a five-groomer shop commonly clears $200 a month.
- PetExec hides pricing behind a demo. The only public number is a reported ~$105-a-month start on Capterra.
- Flat-rate tools (Groomer.io $99, Pawfinity $50 to $90) are easiest to budget because staff and texting are included.
- A2P 10DLC is the fee nobody quotes you. Reminders, pickup texts, and promos each need separate campaign registration, and the platform decides how painful that is.
What This Guide Covers
- Why the sticker price is never the real price
- The 8 things that actually move your monthly bill
- MoeGo pricing, in plain English
- Gingr pricing and the per-staff story
- PetExec, and the demo-gated pricing problem
- The rest of the field: Time To Pet, DaySmart, Groomer.io, Pawfinity
- Side-by-side: entry price vs real cost
- What each type of shop actually pays
- 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 a Lie
Grooming is a good business and a hard one to run on thin margins. Grooming and boarding is a $15.4 billion market across roughly 193,000 US businesses, per IBISWorld’s 2026 report, and most are small: one van, one or two chairs, a couple of staff. The median groomer is not swimming in cash, 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.
So the 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 vendors play games. A $49 plan that caps you at 200 texts is not a $49 plan when you send 400 reminders. It matters more now that APPA’s 2026 data found more than half of dog owners groom at home and professional grooming spending dipped in 2025. When clients are trimming their own dogs, the shops that win keep the book full automatically and do not bleed margin on tools they half-use.
The 8 Things That Move the Bill
Score every vendor on these eight, not on the headline.
- Billing unit. Per van, per location, or per user? A per-van tool multiplies with your fleet, a per-user tool with your team.
- Texting caps. How many SMS are included, and what does unlimited cost? Groomers are the heaviest texters in pet care.
- Payment processing rate. A point of a percent on $15,000 in grooms is real money, every month.
- Per-staff fees. Some tools charge per groomer or front-desk seat. Others include unlimited staff.
- Add-ons. Reviews, marketing, two-way SMS, and scheduling are sometimes bundled and sometimes sold separately.
- Contract length. Month-to-month or annual lock-in? Annual is cheaper per month but harder to leave.
- Onboarding and data import. Is setup free, or is there an implementation fee to move your history in?
- Data export. Can you get your clients and pet notes out cleanly if you leave, or are you stuck?
MoeGo
MoeGo is where most mobile groomers land first, because it was built around the van. Its published 2026 pricing splits by business type.
- Mobile (per van): Basic $49, Growth $99, Ultimate $159 per month.
- Salon (per location): $79, $149, and $239 per month.
Those numbers come from MoeGo’s pricing page and match the listings on G2 and Capterra. On top of the subscription, MoeGo Payments runs about 2.6% plus $0.10 in person and 2.9% plus $0.30 online, standard but real.
What “entry” locks you into. The $49 mobile plan is usable for a solo groomer, but texting is capped and unlimited auto-messaging sits on the Ultimate tier. A confirmation, a 48-hour reminder, a morning-of nudge, and a “ready for pickup” text is four messages per appointment. At five dogs a day, that is roughly 400 texts a month, past the lower caps. So the practical MoeGo plan for a texting-heavy shop is usually Growth, not the $49 headline.
How it breaks. The common surprise is per-van, per-location billing. Two vans on Growth is not $99, it is about $198 before processing, and groomers who scale to three vans discover the bill tripled while they still think of it as “our MoeGo subscription.”
Who it is for. Solo and small mobile operators who want the cleanest mobile-first booking and routing, and will pay for Growth to get the texting they need.
Gingr
Gingr is where the sticker-price game gets loud. The advertised base starts around $109 a month per location, climbing to roughly $169 for daycare plans and $179 to $209 for boarding-heavy ones. You will see slightly different base numbers by source, which is itself a tell.
The real story is what the base leaves out. Per Gingr’s own materials and its SMS add-on documentation, integrated payments, two-way SMS, the employee scheduler, reputation management, and a messaging bundle are all sold separately, and review sites report per-staff fees on top, commonly $10 to $30 per staff, per month. Add it up for a five-groomer shop: a ~$109 base, plus texting, plus a few seats, plus an add-on you assumed was included, and you clear $200 a month easily. That is not a knock on Gingr’s features, which are deep. It is a warning about how you read the pricing page.
How it breaks. Owners sign on the base price, then get a bigger bill in month two when the add-ons start billing. Price Gingr with your real staff count and texting volume, not the number on the front of the box.
Who it is for. Multi-service facilities doing daycare and boarding alongside grooming, with the volume to use the deeper feature set and actually run the add-ons they pay for.
PetExec
PetExec has a different problem: you cannot see the price at all. Pricing is gated behind a demo request. The only public number floating around is a reported starting price of about $105 a month on Capterra, and that is a third-party listing, not an official PetExec quote.
This matters beyond the inconvenience. When a vendor will not publish pricing, the number is usually negotiated, so it varies by how you buy and how hard you push. You also cannot compare on cost without a 45-minute sales call built to sell, not to hand you a clean price sheet.
How it breaks. You budget around the “starting at” figure, the tailored quote comes in higher, and now you are invested because you sat through the demo. Go in with your must-have list written down and your walk-away number decided in advance.
Who it is for. Larger daycare and boarding operations that want a heavy, established platform and will negotiate. For a solo groomer or small salon, the demo-gated model is friction you do not need.
The Rest of the Field
Four more tools do not hide the ball.
Time To Pet is priced for smaller operations: Lite $25, Solo $50, Facility $79, and a Team plan at $40 plus $16 per active user (dropping to $5 past 25), per its help-center pricing. It skews toward sitting and walking, but small grooming shops use it. Watch the per-user model as you grow.
DaySmart Pet (formerly 123Pet) runs Basic $29, Deluxe $69, and a Deluxe Growth tier at $149 that adds two-way texting and marketing, per Capterra’s listing. It is per-user, and two-way texting living on the $149 tier means the cheap plans are not really texting plans.
Groomer.io takes the opposite approach: a flat $99 a month per facility or van, no contract, with unlimited SMS and calls included, per its pricing page. A website add-on runs $79 to $99. For a texting-heavy shop that hates surprises, the flat rate is a strong pitch.
Pawfinity is the value pick on paper: a Groom and Train plan around $50 and a Royal package around $90 that adds boarding and daycare, flat-rate with unlimited staff rather than per-user, per its pricing page. Texting is metered past an allowance, so confirm your volume.
Here is the whole field on one screen.
| Tool | Entry price (2026) | Billing unit | The catch | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MoeGo | $49 mobile / $79 salon | Per van / location | Texting caps, unlimited on top tier | Mobile-first groomers |
| Gingr | ~$109 | Per location + per staff | Payments, SMS, scheduling are add-ons | Daycare + boarding facilities |
| PetExec | ~$105 (reported) | Demo-gated | No public pricing at all | Larger negotiated deals |
| Time To Pet | $25 to $79 | Per user (Team) | Per-user fees as you grow | Small, sitting-adjacent shops |
| DaySmart Pet | $29 to $149 | Per user | Two-way texting only on $149 tier | Established salons |
| Groomer.io | $99 flat | Per van / facility | Website is an add-on | Predictable flat-rate lovers |
| Pawfinity | $50 to $90 | Flat, unlimited staff | Texting metered past allowance | Budget-minded multi-staff shops |
Prices are 2026 published rates from each vendor, cross-checked against Capterra, G2, and GetApp. PetExec is a reported starting figure, not an official quote. Software prices move, so re-check the vendor’s page before you sign.
Side by Side: Entry Price vs Real Cost
First, the sticker prices everyone sees: lowest published entry rate per van or location.
Entry monthly price in USD, 2026 published rates. PetExec is the reported Capterra starting figure. Sources: vendor pricing pages, cross-checked on Capterra and G2.
Now the number that matters: an illustrative all-in monthly cost for a three-groomer salon that texts reminders, built from each vendor’s real tier prices plus the add-ons a shop that size switches on. Modeled estimates, not quotes, but they show how the ranking flips.
Illustrative all-in monthly cost for a 3-groomer salon (subscription + texting + typical add-ons; card processing excluded). Modeled from the sourced tier prices above, not vendor quotes.
The tool that looked most expensive on entry price is not the most expensive in practice, and the cheapest-looking one can climb once per-user fees stack. That is the whole point.
What Each Type of Shop Actually Pays
The right answer genuinely differs by shape of business.
The solo mobile groomer. One van, you text everything, you take cards at the door. MoeGo Growth at $99 and Groomer.io’s flat $99 with unlimited texting are the finalists. Groomer.io removes the cap anxiety if you text a lot. MoeGo earns its keep if routing matters more. Pawfinity at $50 is the budget play if texting stays modest.
The three-chair salon with three staff. Now per-staff fees bite. A flat-rate tool (Groomer.io, Pawfinity) keeps the bill steady as you add groomers. Gingr’s base looks fine until you add three seats and the SMS add-on and clear $200. DaySmart’s Deluxe Growth at $149 competes because it includes the two-way texting a salon this size needs.
The five-van fleet. Per-van billing is now the biggest variable. Five MoeGo Growth vans is roughly $495 a month before processing. At that scale a custom automation layer on one platform can undercut stacking five per-van subscriptions. That is where many growing operators land: instead of paying per van forever, they run one platform and automate booking, reminders, and rebooking themselves, the model behind our rebooking system for groomers and route-smart booking approach.
See what the platform underneath actually costs. Most of these tools are point solutions. If you would rather run booking, reminders, deposits, and rebooking on one system you own, compare the real monthly numbers on our GoHighLevel plan and pricing page before you renew.
The Texting Fee Nobody Quotes You (A2P 10DLC)
Here is the cost that never shows up on a pricing page and hits groomers harder than any 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, and campaigns are separate by purpose. Appointment reminders are one. A “your dog is ready” pickup text is another. A “we have Saturday openings” promo is a third. Many operators assume the pickup and reminder texts are exempt because they are 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 mundane: unregistered traffic gets filtered and your reminders silently stop arriving, a no-show problem dressed up as a texting problem.
So ask each vendor how they handle 10DLC registration, whether they do it for you, what it costs, and how they separate reminder, transactional, and marketing campaigns. A tool that walks you through it beats one that leaves you guessing. We cover the mechanics in the guide to reminder texts that stop no-shows and the SMS automation feature overview.
Steal This: The Questions That Reveal the Real Price
Do not walk into a demo unarmed. Copy the two scripts below. The first flushes out the real price. The second gets your data out cleanly if you switch.
The pricing interrogation (paste into your notes before any demo):
- What is the total monthly price for my exact setup: [X] locations or vans, [Y] staff, and roughly [Z] texts a month?
- Is billing per location, per van, or per user? What happens to the price when I add a groomer or a van?
- How many texts are included, and what does it cost to go unlimited?
- Which of these are add-ons versus included: two-way SMS, payment processing, employee scheduling, reviews, marketing?
- What is the card processing rate, in person and online?
- Is there an onboarding or implementation fee, and is importing my existing client and pet history free?
- Month-to-month or annual contract? What is the early-cancellation policy?
- If I leave, can I export all my client records, pet notes, and appointment history myself, in a standard format?
The data-export request (send to your current vendor when switching):
Hi, we are migrating our grooming business to a new system. Please send us a complete export of our data in CSV or a standard format, including: all client contact records, all pet profiles and grooming notes, full appointment history, and any outstanding package or membership balances. Please confirm the file format and the date you can deliver it. We want to make sure nothing is lost in the move.
Those two scripts save more money 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. See also the SMS templates every salon should steal.
Common Objections
“I already pay for MoeGo (or Gingr). Why switch?” You might not, and that is fine. The point is not to move you off 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 capped on texting you need. Run the pricing interrogation on your current vendor first. Half the time the win is fixing your current plan, not switching.
“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 whole system instead of renting seven point tools, and you do not pay per van for the automation. That enterprise-software allergy is healthy, which is why a pre-built, grooming-specific setup beats raw software.
“What happens to my client history if I move?” This fear keeps people stuck, which is why the export script above exists. Any reputable vendor will export your clients, pet notes, and appointment history. Get it in writing before you cancel, and import it before you flip the switch. Nobody should lose ten years of pet notes to a software change.
FAQ
What is the cheapest grooming software in 2026? On sticker price, Time To Pet Lite ($25) and DaySmart Basic ($29), but both cap or exclude the texting most groomers need. On real all-in cost for a texting shop, flat-rate Pawfinity ($50 to $90) and Groomer.io ($99) are the most predictable value.
How much does MoeGo really cost per month? Mobile plans are $49, $99, and $159 per van; salon plans $79, $149, and $239 per location. Most texting-heavy shops need Growth or higher, so budget $99 to $159 per van, plus card processing.
Why won’t PetExec show its pricing? It gates pricing behind a demo. The only public figure is a reported ~$105-a-month start on Capterra, a third-party listing, not an official quote. Expect a negotiated number after the demo.
Is Gingr’s $109 base the real price? Rarely. Payments, two-way SMS, the scheduler, and reputation tools are add-ons, and review sites report per-staff fees. A multi-staff shop commonly ends up above $200 a month.
Can I move my client history between tools? Yes, if you ask correctly. Request a full CSV export of clients, pet notes, and appointment history from your current vendor in writing, and import it before you cancel. Use the export script above so nothing gets left behind.