It seems that there is more profit made from the lotion than from the tanning beds themselves, so I was just curious if anyone here knew the business.
Maria — a toothbrush is a plastic object that costs pennies to produce and which are sold dozens of times more. Tanning beds hardly bring it any profit — you’re lucky to get $10 an hour out of one bed. Some places only have a dozen beds, an employee, electricity bill, rent, bed repairs, etc. There doesn’t seem to be much profit at all.

Salons absolutely rip off the consumer on tanning bed lotions. I buy all of my lotions off ebay and save a ton of money. I get why salons do it though. I paid $100 for a full year of tanning. Flat fee; no strings attached. All I had to do was buy one bottle of lotion from this salon. So I bought a bottle of Australian Gold Accelerator for $19. On ebay, I could have gotten this for $14. And with a lot of other ones, the discounts are even more extreme on ebay. But for other people who tan at this salon, and don’t know about how cheap you can get lotions, they’ll pay the outrageous prices for the tanning lotion she sells. I mean, she is offering a really good deal on tanning. I don’t know where else you could pay only $100 and tan for an entire year, but I still won’t pay her prices for lotion. Other people do though.