Shoe shiners can earn a good living as long as foot traffic is good. /Getty Images Once a staple of the urban streetscape, the traditional shoeshine stand has nearly vanished from city sidewalks but is making a last stand in airport concourses and major train terminals. For a reasonable charge, plus tip, men can still get their dress shoes buffed and shined and enhance their professional, put-together appearance. In areas of heavy foot traffic, most shoe shiners can still earn a decent income. Leases and Guarantees A shoe shine stand occupies a small retail space, either enclosed or in the open, and the owner pays rent, a percentage of sales or a guaranteed minimum to the property owner. Other than rent, costs are straightforward: a stand with chairs, supplies, utilities and wages. Employees earn a regular hourly wage and get tips from customers. Charges and Tips A shoe shine stand charges customers a flat fee for the service, usually in the range of $5 to $10; discounts may be available for early service, while special services, such as shining boots, may require a premium.
An account in the UK's Daily Mail Online, published in April 2013, revealed that New York City's Star Shine shop charged customers $7 for the basic service but only $4 if the customer showed up before 11 a.m. Street shiners generally charge less -- a New Yorker article dated March 2013 reported that shoe shiners working outdoors in the city charged a flat $5, with the daily take depending on location and traffic. Bureau of Labor Statistics Although shoe shine attendant isn't an official occupational category, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes mean salary data for personal care services. As of May 2012, the mean hourly wage for this category was $10.56 and the mean annual salary $21,970. The BLS doesn't break out single occupations within this category, and as a result the agency's figures account for shoe shiners as well as those working in higher-paid occupations, such as massage therapists and barbers. Time and Money An average shoe shine may take about 10 minutes; the service is designed to be simple and convenient.
With steady traffic, a shoe shiner may serve four to six customers an hour, and the more customers, the more tips received. Another important consideration is the stand's flat charge. As business consultant Chris MacDonald pointed out in a 2011 article on "Ethics of Shoe Shine Pricing," as the charge approaches $10, the percentage of income in the form of tips decreases, as customers will often simply pay $10 and ask a shoe shiner to "keep the change" for the sake of convenience. /Getty Images Suggest an Article CorrectionEdit ArticleHow to Open a Shoeshine Stand You can find shoeshine stands in a variety of places, including city streets, airports, barbershops and shopping malls. Visiting a shoeshine stand is a great way to care of your shoes or boots, people watch, take a break from shopping or just relax for a few minutes. These little businesses offer a variety of services, including a regular shine, cream shine, suede renew and strip and shine service. Open a shoeshine stand and attract attention, customers and money.
Find a mentor willing to help you develop your skills. Learn the techniques, tips and tricks in providing a professional shoeshine. Search for a good location. When opening any new business, location is critical to its success. Heavy traffic areas are perfect for a shoeshine stand.Rent can be expensive. If you're just starting out, you may not be able to afford rent unless you have a regular source of income, too. Offer a percentage of your sales to the business owner. If your business is doing well, the percentage to the owner will be more. Point out how your business can drive business to the owner's location. Invest in the equipment necessary for your shoeshine stand. Be sure to purchase an attractive, comfortable professional quality shoeshine chair for customers to sit in. Depending on your business plan, you may want a chair that is easy to transport. Buy a professional shoeshine kit to accommodate all types of shoes and boots. Market your shoeshine stand.
Include the following information: your business name, location, when you will open for business, the hours of operation, the rates and any specials. Post signs around the area. Leave information on vehicle windows. Make contact with nearby hotels. Leave business cards or flyers about your service. Open your shoeshine stand. Engage your customers and always be courteous. Remember the names and faces of your customers, along with any other interest they may have shared with you. Connect as much as possible with your customers to better the connection. This can mean a bigger tip and repeat customers. Thank your customers and let them know of any future or holiday sales. Show more unanswered questions Consider purchasing a shoeshine franchise. It would require more money up front, but it would provide you with a location, clientele and the necessary equipment. Experts recommend that you have the funds to cover one year of expenses before you quit any job providing you with a solid income to start a business.
The best hours of operation for a shoeshine stand are mornings and evenings, when people are going to and coming home from work.YOU ARE HERE: LAT HomeCollections With a quick snap of rag on leather, William Calhoun, 58, stropped the salesman's cowboy boots. Then, hunched over, he carefully touched the soles with a toothbrush and polish."I can do as much business as I want here," Calhoun said. "But it's going out. The days get real slow."Bill's Shine, a narrow, plywood shack with its three red Naugahyde chairs, has stood in a niche off Malden and Commonwealth avenues in downtown Fullerton for 40 years. Little has changed except the names of the owners on the hand-painted sign.What has changed profoundly is the business of shining shoes in America.Today, only a few black men like Calhoun make a living at it. Jim Crow laws, poverty and poor education trapped many of an earlier generation into menial jobs. Today, the once-ubiquitous shoeshine boy has nearly vanished from street corners, railroad stations, barbershops and American popular culture.
The handful of men who continue shining shoes in Orange County do so simply because it is a trade they grew up with. In hard times, it is something they can return to. But their numbers are thinning. And in the lobbies of ritzy hotels, about the only place where the bootblack business still thrives, the new shoe-shiners are young, white women.There was a time, not so long ago as old shoe-shiners tell it, when shining was a trade many young black men tried, particularly if they grew up in the South.Willy D. Keaton, 50, remembers those days well.Talking recently to his friend Leon, who runs a shoeshine stand in Santa Ana, Keaton recalled a childhood in Corinth, Miss., and Mrs. Sallie Mae North's barbershop.Like familiar dance partners tracing unrehearsed but familiar steps, porters in the shop caught customers' coats as they slid from tossed-back shoulders. Then the shiners tended to the shoes, Keaton said."My brother Joe could take a rag and make it talk like a man," Keaton said.Slapping the air with an imaginary cloth on an invisible shoe, Keaton pantomimed what he called "the jig," singing the opening bars from "When the Saints Go Marching In" and mouthing "pop, pop, pop."
He did a quick dance, stooped over at the waist as smoothly as a ballet dancer and thrust his right hand forward, palm up, with a wide smile."Most of the white guys (would) go 'Here boy,' and flip a quarter," Keaton said."I'm not talking about what I heard, but what I did when I was like here," he said, holding his hand at knee level."That was the black man's job," Leon volunteered, a bulge of Redman chewing tobacco swelling his cheek. "That's the shoeshine boy."Singing songs, tap dancing, scratching your head, clowning, "white America thought that's the way blacks were," said Carl Jackson, chairman of the Afro-ethnic studies department at Cal State Fullerton. "If you're 'good,' people tipped you. You played down your status."The shoeshine boys' behavior was expected, Jackson said. "They acted that way to survive. It was a shill to survive. If you acted like you had a chip on your shoulder, nobody would patronize you."The stereotype was a "horrifying thing," Jackson said. But for many blacks then, "it was the only way to earn a living.
Shining shoes didn't take a hell of a lot of skills. And you had to shine a damn lot of shoes."Robert Morris, 62, learned the trade from his father after the family moved to Anaheim from Kansas City in 1926. "My daddy," he said, "taught us shining. In case we got out of work, we could always shine shoes."So Morris went shoe shining every day with his two brothers, father, uncle and cousins, "to keep a roof over our head.""We had the town sewed up in the old days," Morris said, chomping on a cigar stub at the Sunny Hills Hand Auto Wash in Fullerton, where he runs a stand.Morris took over the stand in the spring when a friend had a stroke. Despite the continuous traffic, the carwash is "no good for making money," he grumbled. But during the Great Depression, when he used to wait outside Anaheim's old Pickwick Hotel by his box with black and brown polish, business boomed, Morris said."Friday nights, Saturdays, the streets were all crowded--back before shopping malls," he said. "People would get paid on Friday and go out for shopping and a shine.