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The hidden costs behind choosing a laser


During the past decade, lasers have been established as a quick, safe and effective treatment for hair removal or skin rejuvenation. With introduction of new technologies such as IPL (Intense Pulsed Light) and the development of more sophisticated devices, lasers no longer require a medical practitioner to operate.

However, lasers still require a sizeable investment and when choosing your laser, there are more considerations than just the sale price of the model you have in mind.

There are a number of other costs to take into consideration when deciding which laser to purchase. If your laser comes with a warranty, you should find out where the service department is located and how long typical service takes. A machine that is not earning revenue is lost revenue. Another factor may be the price of shipping and you should inquire if this cost is included with your warranty.

Most lasers that have not been abused don't require too much maintenance, however every laser must eventually replace the treatment handle and this cost of often overlooked.

Your treatment handle specifications will identify the number of 'pulses' or 'flashes' it is capable of performing, while remaining an effective treatment tool. When it has reached it lifetime limit it must be replaced.

The price of the Dermalase IPL of either the Hair Removal or Skin Rejuvenation handles are among the very lowest in Canada, starting from $2500.00 CDN and is included with the purchase of our device. Many competitors handles are more than 10 times that amount and in some cases must be purchased in addition to their device.

Another very important consideration is the handle spot, or crystal size. A large spot size means that you can treat a larger area of your client's skin with each pulse, which reduces the number of pulses per treatment. For example if you were to treat the underarms of a typical client, with the Dermalase IPL handle you could cover each underarm area with 10-12 pulses – however, with a competitors smaller spot size, you may have to pulse the clients arm 20-30 pulses.

( Above: On the left is the Dermalase IPL spot (crystal) size and on the right is a competitors smaller spot)

To understand what the total revenue a single handle can earn during it's lifetime, lets do a single treatment calculation;

  • The replacement price of handle (Dermalase IPL handle starting from $2500.00 CDN)

  • Lifetime expectancy of pulses (Dermalase IPL is 100,000 pulses)

  • Total number of under arm treatments would total 10,000 pulses or specifically 5000 pairs of underarms

  • Price per underarm treatment (Example $50 to treat both underarms)

Gross revenue would be $250,000, minus the cost of the Dermalase IPL handle!

If you choose a handle with a higher purchase price and smaller spot size and use the same formula above, your earnings would be just over $100,000 for the lifetime of that handle – equalling less than half.

Another way to look at the cost is by calculating how much you can earn from a single client per treatment package.

(Above is a typical rate card for a Metropolitan spa offering treatments with the Dermalase IPL)

You can see that the underarm treatment is priced at 150% more than our example, but if you have a lot of competition or are a small home based business it's still easy to be very profitable. Lets see how:

  • The cost of the Dermalase IPL handle flash is $0.18 per flash.

  • An underarm treatment usually requires 6 treatments in total. We know that using the Dermalase IPL, we need to flash the area 10 times per session and over the course of their entire package, that equals 60 flashes.

  • If you charged $50 per session, your gross income would be $300 per client for a complete package ( your total flash cost would be $10.80).

Your net earnings would be $289.20

If you earned $300 using a smaller spot sized handle, and the cost per flash was approximately $2.00 each (based on 10x handle price and number of flashes required).

Your net earnings using a competitor's smaller sized spot handle would only be $60

Keep in mind that you need to deduct your overhead, your rent, supplies, advertising, salary, etc and your profit begins to shrink even more.

One final point to keep in mind is that with a larger spot size – you decrease your working time by half – in the above example it takes approximately 10 minutes to perform both underarms in a single session with the Dermalase IPL. However, with a competitors smaller spot handle it will take 20 minutes to perform the same procedure.

The earnings using a competitors handle is $60 for 120 minutes of work. Sure $30 per hour isn't bad…

but, the total underarm package earnings using a Dermalase IPL is $289 for 60 minutes of work!

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If you want to learn more about the Dermalase IPL - the lowest priced, Health Canada approved IPL Laser Hair Removal and Skin Rejuvenation device manufactured and serviced right here in Canada, including training and certification - just give us a call at 604-788-3413 to book your FREE demonstration.

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