Mobile County Barber Commission

Barber Commission Shop License (salon)

A barbershop operating in Mobile County needs a Shop License from the county's own Mobile County Barber Commission, priced at $15.00 a year, plus a one-time $50.00 New Shop Inspection fee for a newly opened location — confirmed on the county's own, currently active fee schedule (2026 licenses available; board meetings scheduled through December 2026). Mobile is one of only five Alabama counties — with Baldwin, Jefferson, Lauderdale and Madison — that ran an independent local barber-licensing board before Alabama's first statewide barber law took effect in 2013, and those boards were grandfathered rather than abolished; Mobile County's board still operates today, licensing barbers, barbershops and barber schools in addition to, and separately from, the state Alabama Board of Cosmetology and Barbering. Individual barbers working in the shop hold their own separate licenses under the same fee schedule — Master (barber) $20.00/year, Apprentice $20.00/year, Barber Assistant $20.00/year, and Instructor $35.00/year — and a barber school pays $500.00 to open plus $50.00 annual College Renewal. A $5.00/month late-renewal penalty applies from February 1. This record covers the barbering slice of the 'salon' industry specifically; no county-level requirement is published for non-barber cosmetology services such as hair styling, nail care or esthetics, which remain governed only by the state Board of Cosmetology and Barbering. This license applies in addition to the general Business Privilege License.