Idle Barber Shop Tycoon Beginner’s Guide: Tips, Tricks & Strategies to Set Up a Thriving Haircutting Business

Codigames is an idle tycoon game specialist hailing from Spain, who is behind other notable releases of the sort such as Hotel Empire Tycoon and Idle Supermarket Tycoon.

Its latest venture into this game category called Idle Barber Shop Tycoon revolves around managing a barber shop. You play as Mike Freshcut, a young entrepreneur who returns to his how town and decides to reopen his grandfather’s old barber shop. Mike is full of plans and ideas for what he can do to the place, but given his limited funds he is off to a slow start. Your job is to step in and help Mike get his business off the ground. 

Idle Barber Shop Tycoon is not one of the more fast-paced tycoon idle games out there. On the contrary, the game progresses quite slowly especially during the initial phase. Don’t let that scare you, however, there are things you can do to ensure reviving your grandad’s barber shop won’t take an eternity.

The main objective in the game is to renovate the old place which means you’ll have to invest in new furniture and decorations. Next, you’ll need to get more staff members onboard, so that all your customers can be served promptly with minimum waiting time.

All of these and more are covered in our Idle Barber Shop Tycoon beginner’s guide, which we’ve created to help you effectively manage your first barber shop. If you’ve already started playing the game, but you found you’re not advancing fast enough, know that you’re not doing anything wrong. The game is designed to unfold slowly, but if you apply some of the strategies outlined below, your pace should pick up significantly. Keep reading below!

1. Get Those Reputation Points

Reputation points are one of the main currencies in Idle Barber Shop – the other one being cash (the green bills). Players receive both in exchange for servicing customers, so the trick is to find ways to maximize these rewards.

Reputation points (represented by Purple stars) are extremely important as they unlock new developments in the game. Check out the Reputation bar in the upper right corner of the display and work hard to fill it up as quickly as possible. Once you’ve reached the threshold, you’ll be able to unlock a new part of the story and thus move the narrative along.

This is crucial because you can’t add new furniture, for example, other than by evolving the storyline and getting to the part where Mike orders, for example, a brand new chair. You can’t buy the chair otherwise. Basically new chapters will unlock new items and facilities that you need to add in your barber shop.

Hitting your reputation goal is easy at first, but later on it will take quite a while before you can reach the next stage. This aspect can become frustrating, especially during the initial phase, when there’s not that much to do while you wait to level up, since the barber shop is quite rudimentary by this point.

As a result, it’s very important to be aware of all the methods for collecting Reputation points, so that you can accumulate the needed amounts as fast as possible.

Prioritize Furniture Upgrades Which Increase Reputation

As we already noted above, you will get a small number of reputation points simply by allowing Mike and his staff to do their jobs, aka cutting hair and trimming beards. For each customer you will receive a small number of number of Purple stars, but the amount is rather small – only a few points.

You can increase the number of reputation points you receive after each haircut by upgrading select furniture items. But be careful, not all furniture upgrades will bring extra reputation points. Most of them increase haircut incomes. But pieces such as the Hot Towel Stand work to boost the number of reputation points you receive after servicing a customer.

To start upgrading furniture, tap on the item and then tap on the green “Upgrade” button to start levelling up. You’ll notice the stats rising as you pour more funds into the endeavor.

Upgrade Haircuts And New Beard Styles

You start off by offering a set of Basic haircuts and beard styles which yield a small number of purple stars every time a customer requests one. To increase this sum, you should work towards upgrading these styles to the maximum allowed so that you can grab more reputation for each job. Later on, the game will unlock Advanced and Elaborate styles, but we’ll talk more about that in the next section.

Activate The Reputation Boost

The game provides users with the option to take advantage of occasional video ads offers. You’ll notice them making an appearance in the upper right side of the display. One in particular is rather useful for your Reputation gathering purposes and that’s the Reputation Boost.

Watch a quick ad and it will double the reputation points you receive from your customers for a few minutes (the exact time span varies), depending on the offer. Surely, ads can be quite annoying but if you wish to make progress faster you should not miss the opportunity to activate this power-up. Keep your eyes peeled!

Take Breaks From The Game

This being an idle game, the game continues to produce cash and reputation for you even if you’ve decided to step away and do something else.

You’re actually encouraged to do so while playing Idle Barber Shop. Upon your return you will be able to redeem quite a nice sum (which you can double by watching an ad). Not to mention, extra Reputation points will be waiting for you, as well.

The longer the break you take the better, and it can be up to 6 full hours. To give you an example, if when you left you had 5,385 points and your break lasted 50 minutes, upon your return you’ll find your reputation has increased to 6,079 points.

So if you’ve grown tired of the game’s slow pacing, you are welcome to take a breather and focus on something else while the game works for you in the background. Simply return after a while, and reap the benefits.

2. Unlock New Hairstyles And Beards

As you level up in the game by collecting Reputation points, you’ll get to unlock new Haircuts and Beard options for your clients to try out. There are three types of styles in Idle Barber Shop Tycoon: Basic, Advanced and Elaborate.

Each style supplies a base income which consists of a cash sum as well as reputation. You can increase the amount you receive for each of them by leveling up individual Haircuts and Beards in exchange for money.

Additionally, you need to be careful when performing updates on your hair and beard cutting chairs (and other furniture) depending on the styles you have at your disposal. At first, chair upgrades will increase the income of your basic haircuts. Only once you’ve reached level 400 will the next upgrade unlock which targets advanced haircuts.

Pay attention here, even if you unlock the advanced haircut upgrade but you haven’t mastered any advanced haircuts, it would be pointless to spend money on this upgrade for the time being.

3. Add New Staff Members And Unlock More Hearts For Them

Once you’ve added a second chair in your shop, it’s going to get harder to do all things yourself. Some customers will get annoyed for having to wait too long and leave, so your business will end up losing money and reputation.

To prevent this for happening, you should hire new staff members. At first, you can only get one more onboard, but as you progress your team will have the opportunity to grow quite a bit. Go to the Shop and press on the button in the middle to recruit your first employee for free.

Now, if for whatever reason you’re not satisfied with the employee you got, you can go ahead and draw another character. It will cost you 100 Gems to do so. These are premium resources which are a bit more difficult to stumble upon, but we’ll talk about how you can get more in the next section.

A new staff member comes with its own unique story which gets interwoven with the main narrative. As you advance in the game, their own tale evolves alongside Mike’s. It’s important to upgrade your characters as well, so they can charge more for their haircuts. For select employees you can do that by getting them additional Hearts. This will boost their individual money income each time they work.

To get Hearts you’ll have to keep purchasing staff packs from the store and unlock new cards. Use your Gems until you find a card for a particular employee to level him/her up. You might have to spend quite a few Gems before getting the card you actually need, so if you’ve managed to put aside quite a few of them, maybe it wouldn’t be a bad idea to invest in a pack of 5 staff cards which will take you back with 450 Gems (instead of 500).

Do note that not all staffers require these Hearts to level up. Make sure you check the Staff tab and read about each new employee you’ve unlocked so far. For example, to upgrade William Jones you need to attend a number of customers, while Mike needs to reach a certain number of reputation points to do so.

4. Always Be On The Lookout For More Gems

Gems are precious commodities that aren’t too abundant in Idle Barber Shop. As we discussed in the previous section, you need these yellow stones in order to upgrade your staff members. Additionally, Gems can be used on deals.

The game will make occasional offers which are available by pressing on the dedicated icon in the lower left corner. For example, a Premium Cutting Chair might be available to be installed in your Barber shop in exchange for 45 Gems.

So how do you get your hands on these resources? Well the main avenue for doing so is by redeeming Mission rewards. These can be viewed by tapping the Missions icon in the upper right corner. While not all Missions produce Gem rewards, most of them do, so make sure you don’t miss out on any of them.

New Mission goals are constantly added to the list, provided you do your part and continue playing the game and unlock new chapter stories.

Additionally, you should keep an eye out for the Gems Boost ad offer which pops up from time to time. Just watch a quick ad to get a bundle of Gems for free. If you don’t feel like watching one, no problem, you can always use the Cancel button to get rid of it, but we strongly recommend against it.

Ads can be frustrating and this game makes use of a fair share of them, but on the other hand they can be quite helpful in speeding up the game. Alternatively, you can rely your own cash to purchase extra Gems from the store, although a lot of players will want to continue playing for free.

Given the large amount of ads you’ll be faced with in Idle Barber Shop, we recommend playing the game while you have a magazine/book/website on the side. This way, you can divert your attention whenever ads are playing on your screen, so you don’t have to just stare at it until the ad goes away.

5. Be Careful How You Set Up TV Advertising Campaigns

During the initial stages of the game, you won’t have to deal with a large influx of customers. This means you can take your time with giving your visitors hair and beard cuts. But this also means you won’t make a lot of money.

If you want to attract more customers to your shop, you can do so by setting up a TV advertising campaign. It might be tempting to invest the maximum amount of money immediately, so you can attract the largest number of customers possible, but be careful before doing so.

Make sure your Shop can handle an influx of customers like that. Do you have enough chairs and enough staff workers to cater to their needs fast enough? If you don’t, it might be pointless to spend a lot of cash, only to have a large portion of these newly attracted customers leave without getting a haircut, because they had to wait for too long.

At least in the first part of the game, it would be wise to create small-scale TV advertising campaigns. Couple that with using the Clients Boost power-up and you can get plenty of new visitors into your shop. This is another type of ad-offer and we encourage you to use it whenever it’s available.

6.Upgrade The Stamina Button

When you’re dealing with a large influx of customers it’s a good idea to us the Stamina button to accelerate the pace of your team. It’s the large green button in the lower part of the display. Simply keep tapping it to nudge your staff to move and work faster.

You need to be careful, however, as once you ran out of juice you’ll have to wait a while until Stamina regenerates and you can use the button once again. Fortunately, the game allows you to prolong the button’s usage cycle by throwing in the occasional Energy Boost.

Again, you have to watch a quick ad to get unlimited Stamina for a few minutes (the amount varies). This is an incredible useful power-up, as it allows you to speed up operations without worrying that you might run out of juice.

If you could pair this power-up with the Client Boost, that would be even better. This way you’ll be able to ensure that all your customers’ are serviced during the rush hour and none of the will be left hanging. Don’t worry if you can’t pair the two boosts, there’s nothing you can proactively do to encourage the game to offer the right ad offer when you need it.

The best part about the Stamina button is that it can be upgraded. Once you’ve purchased the Coffee Machine for your shop, you’ll be able to spend funds to improve the button. For example, the Exotic Origin upgrade allows you to enhance the speed boost given by the energy. Drink away!

7. Boost Your Income As Much As Possible

Cash is the other main resource in the Idle Barber Shop, as it can be used to pay for various upgrades around your Barber shop. You’ll end up pouring impressive funds into upgrading your furniture, so that they can yield even more cash when used. You should be constant in your efforts, as it takes a while before you can upgrade a furniture item to maximum.

On top of that, you are supposed to upgrade and purchase new hair and bear cut styles. All this will help you get more cash in your pocket every time you’ve successfully serviced a customer in your Barber shop.

To fatten up your cash reserve, don’t ignore the Money Boost whenever it pops up. This is another type of ad offer, which can unlock extra funds for you, if you agree to watch a quick ad. These make an appearance from time to time, but they are by far the most common Boosts you’ll see in Idle Barber Shop.

One way to get a big cash infusion is by taking a prolonged break from the game. You can stay away for a maximum of 6 hours, after which idle profits will cease to increase. Then when you return later a nice sum of cash will be waiting for you. Double that sum by pressing the “x2” button and watch a quick ad to get your hands on the money. If you don’t feel like it, you can opt to get the initial sum, no problem.

This wraps up our Idle Barber Shop Tycoon beginner’s guide. If you got more tips for the game, which you haven’t seen get mentioned in this guide, drop us a line to let us know in the comment section below!