Billing for your beauty parlour and cosmetics shop in Gujarat
The garba-night makeup chair, the matching bangles and the regulars' page, on one phone.
Ahmedabad, Rajkot and Bhavnagar: the Gujarat cities where a parlour's customers dress for the nights
Three Gujarat cities and what each is known for.
- Manek Chowk in Ahmedabad is a vegetable market in the morning, one of India's largest gold, silver and jewellery markets by day, and a food market at night.
- Rajkot's Soni goldsmiths and silver craftsmen make jewellery, and the city is also known for textile printing and for metal and wood carving.
- Bhavnagar is an important trade city, 50 km from Alang, the world's largest ship-breaking yard, and is famous for its ganthiya snack.
Garba makeup before the nine nights, bangles to match the chaniya and powders sold by the hundred grams from open jars
The garba makeup that must last the night, with the chair booked from four
In Navratri the girls come in the late afternoon for makeup that has to last through hours of dancing, hair set firm, the dupatta pinned. Each asks for glitter, a bindi or an accessory on top. The chair is full until the ground opens, and the extras are added by hand to a total that is only ever said aloud.
The bangles that have to match the chaniya, sold by the set
A girl lays her chaniya choli on the counter and asks for bangles in two matching colours, a dozen of each, and an oxidised set for the neck. The parlour's bangle rack and the cosmetics counter are managed by the same person, and the bangles go on a slip as 'bangles', so at the end of the nine nights nobody can say which colours were asked for.
Multani mitti, henna powder and shikakai, sold by the hundred grams from open jars
The cosmetics counter sells the old powders from open jars: multani mitti for the face pack, henna for the hair, shikakai for the wash. Customers ask for fifty grams of this and a hundred of that. The scoops go into paper packets, the jars are topped up from a sack at the back, and what was sold is guessed from how low the jar looks.
The nine nights read night by night, the bangles sold as the set the girl asked for, the caller's question answered from the phone
The girls the chair finished each night, and what each took home
A garba makeup is long work, and the chair is booked from four. Make the makeup and the hair-do items with their own rates, and the hair pins and glitter pots that girls take home items too. The page of each night then shows how many girls the chair finished and what each took home with her, so you know how many the chair can seat in one night.
Bangles sold in the two colours the girl named, and the oxidised set beside them
Make each bangle colour an item sold by the dozen, and the oxidised set another. The girl names the two colours that match her chaniya, and the bill lists those two dozens and the set she picked beside them, each at its own rate, so she sees what the matching costs her.
The caller's question answered from the phone, not from the jar
A woman rings from the next lane to ask whether you have henna and multani mitti. You look at the phone, say yes or no, and tell her how much is left. She comes for the amount she wants, and the jar at the counter is never opened to find out.
What a Gujarat parlour and cosmetics counter keeps on its phone, from the garba makeup chair to the bangle rack
Bills on your phone
At the garba makeup chair, a bill that lists the makeup, the hair style, a pot of glitter and the bangles she picked, on her WhatsApp before she is out of the chair.
Daily reports
Each of the nine nights as its own line, with the services and products that went, so next year's order follows the nights that were heavy.
Low stock warnings
A warning for hairpins, bindis and glitter pots in the week before Navratri, while the wholesaler can still deliver.
Questions Gujarat parlours ask about garba-night makeup, matching bangles and powders by weight
A girl wants a different glitter colour on each of the nine nights. Can the colour be in the item's name?
Yes. Make each glitter colour an item and put the colour in its name. The bill says which colour went on which night, and the count shows which colour runs out first.
Multani mitti and henna powder are sold from jars in small weights. How do I count them?
Make each powder an item sold by weight, and add the sack to the stock when it arrives. Every packet you weigh takes its grams off, so the count says how much is left in the sack and the jar.
Glitter runs out by the fifth night. Can the phone tell me on the fourth?
Yes, if glitter is an item with a count. Every bill takes off what was sold, and the low-stock warning names the pots nearly gone, so the order goes out on the fourth night and not the sixth.
Navratri makeup in Ahmedabad, and the state's parlour training
A Gujarat Samachar report of October 2026 put Ahmedabad's Navratri cosmetics and makeup turnover at an estimated Rs 10 crore, within Rs 700 crore for the festival. Makeup is a small share of the festival's spending, and a big one for the parlour chair.
Gujarat's women and child development department trains destitute widows aged 18 to 50 in computing, embroidery, sewing, beauty parlour work and more than 30 trades. Parlour work is one of the trades on that list.