Looking for a Gingr Alternative? Here’s Why Groomers Are Making the Switch
“Customer service was seriously lacking. Cannot talk to a customer service rep.” That review could be from any number of Gingr users who watched their support experience deteriorate after private equity took over.
That review could be from any number of Gingr users who watched their support experience deteriorate after private equity took over. Phone support — gone. Processing fees — the highest in the industry. And if you were a PetExec customer? You got pushed onto Gingr whether you wanted to move or not.
You built your business on reliability. Your software should deliver the same.
What Gingr Users Are Actually Saying
The frustration is real, and it shows up in review after review:
Support has disappeared. Gingr eliminated phone support entirely. When you have a billing problem on a Friday afternoon or a scheduling glitch during your busiest morning, you submit a ticket and wait. “No phone support available” is now a defining characteristic of the Gingr experience.
The fees keep climbing. Gingr charges the highest credit card processing fees in the industry. On top of that, their subscription starts at $105/month for the Spa plan — and that is their cheapest tier. Play runs $145/month. Stay runs $155 to $180/month. Every dollar you send through their payment processor costs you more than it should.
Financial reports you cannot trust. Multiple reviewers report that “the financial reports within Gingr never tallied with the income received.” When your accounting does not add up, you are flying blind. Reconciliation becomes a manual process that eats hours you should be spending with clients.
Forced migrations, broken trust. When Gingr’s parent company acquired PetExec, they forced PetExec users onto Gingr with unexpected gateway fees, login issues, and quality concerns. If it happened once, it can happen again.
SMS that never arrives. Appointment reminders are only useful if clients actually receive them. Gingr users report SMS delivery failures that lead to no-shows and frustrated pet parents.
A customer portal clients dislike. Reviewers describe it as “clunky and non-intuitive.” One pet parent wrote: “It took me an hour to enroll and schedule my pets and it should have taken no more than 10 minutes.” When your booking portal frustrates clients, you lose them before they ever walk through the door.
How BarkBook Is Different
BarkBook was built by a groomer who got tired of exactly these problems. Here is how we do things differently:
All Features on Every Plan
BarkBook has three tiers — Solo ($39/month), Shop ($79/month), and Studio ($129/month) — and the only difference is how many employees you can add. Every feature is available on every plan. No feature gating. No surprise add-on fees. No “upgrade to unlock” messaging during your busiest week.
Processing Fees That Respect Your Margins
BarkBook uses Stripe Connect with a platform fee of just $1 flat or 1% over $100. Compare that to Gingr’s highest-in-industry processing fees. On a $75 grooming appointment, the difference adds up fast — across hundreds of transactions per month, you keep significantly more of what you earn.
19 Granular Permissions for Real Access Control
Gingr offers limited access control options. BarkBook gives you 19 individual permissions covering appointments, clients, employees, reports, payments, services, settings, expenses, compensation, payroll, and more. Four roles come with sensible defaults — Manager, Groomer, Receptionist, and Assistant — but you can customize permissions per employee. Give a trusted groomer access to manage clients without promoting them to manager. Changes take effect immediately.
A Visual Calendar That Prevents Double-Booking
BarkBook’s scheduling calendar includes Day, Week, Month, and Agenda views. The Day view shows groomer-specific columns with 15-minute time slots so you can see exactly who is doing what and when. Drag-and-drop rescheduling with automatic conflict detection warns you about overlapping appointments before they happen. No more “dropped appointments causing lost bookings” that PetExec-turned-Gingr users report.
Notifications That Actually Arrive — and Respect Preferences
BarkBook sends appointment confirmations, reminders, cancellation alerts, ready-for-pickup notifications, and thank-you messages automatically via SMS and email through Twilio and SendGrid. Every notification respects each client’s preferred communication channel and per-phone opt-in settings. No SMS delivery failures. No guessing whether your reminder went through.
Complete Business Data Isolation
Every grooming business on BarkBook operates in complete data isolation enforced at the database level on every single query. Your clients, appointments, employees, and financial records are invisible to every other business on the platform. Even a bug in the code cannot expose one shop’s data to another.
A 14-Day Free Trial
Gingr does not offer a free trial. BarkBook gives you 14 days with full access to every feature on any plan, so you can see it working in your shop before you commit a dollar.
BarkBook vs Gingr: Side by Side
| Feature | BarkBook | Gingr |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | $39/month (Solo) | $105/month (Spa) |
| All features every tier | Yes | No — features gated by plan |
| Free trial | 14-day free trial | No free trial |
| Platform/processing fees | $1 flat or 1% over $100 | Highest processing fees in industry |
| Employee permissions | 19 granular permissions, 4 roles | Limited access control |
| Phone support | — | Eliminated |
| Calendar views | Day, Week, Month, Agenda | Drag-and-drop calendar |
| Conflict detection | Automatic overlap, time-off, and hours detection | Not clearly documented |
| SMS/email notifications | Included on all plans, no limits | SMS delivery issues reported |
| Notification templates | Fully customizable with variable placeholders | Standard notifications |
| Data isolation | Database-level per-business isolation | Not documented |
| Forced migrations | No — your data, your choice | Forced PetExec users to migrate |
| Capterra rating | New | 4.6/5 (209 reviews) |
Switching grooming software is a big decision. That is exactly why BarkBook offers a 14-day free trial with full access to every feature. Set up your schedule, import your clients, run a few days of real appointments — and see the difference before you commit.
No contracts. No onboarding fees. No processing fee surprises.
Ready to Stop Overpaying for Unreliable Software?
Switching grooming software is a big decision. That’s exactly why BarkBook offers a 14-day free trial with full access to every feature. No contracts. No onboarding fees. No processing fee surprises.