If you teach music for a living, you have probably priced up My Music Staff. It is a solid lesson-and-billing platform, and for a studio that only teaches, it does the job. The question most owners ask us is simpler: what does it actually cost once the roster grows, and what is still missing at that point?
How per-student pricing behaves
Lesson platforms usually price in tiers based on active students. That model is friendly at twenty students and less friendly at two hundred: every intake pushes you toward the next tier, so the bill grows exactly when you are busiest. We do not republish competitor tier prices here because they change — check their pricing page for today's numbers — but the shape is the thing to plan around.
Two questions worth asking before you commit:
- Does "active student" include paused or summer-break students?
- Does the price change if you add a second teacher, a second room, or a second location?
What lesson-only software does not cover
Most teaching studios drift into three other jobs:
- Instruments going out of the door. School rentals, loaners, trial instruments. Once a clarinet is at a student's house, it needs a serial number, a return date and a condition note.
- Repairs. Even a small workshop bench needs job tickets, parts and a customer who can be told honestly when it will be ready.
- Retail and accessories. Reeds, strings, stands, books.
None of those live in a lesson-billing app, so they end up in spreadsheets — and the spreadsheets are where the money leaks.
The flat-price alternative
Music Shop Suite is $49/month flat, for the whole business. Unlimited students, unlimited teachers, and every module included: lessons and attendance, tuition invoicing, serialized instrument inventory, rentals and loans, repair job tickets and accounting reports. No per-student charge, no per-seat charge, no free trial and no contract.
The honest caveat: Music Shop Suite is a back-office operating system, not a full POS terminal. If your priority is a till with a cash drawer, pair us with your POS rather than replacing it.
When to switch
Switching makes sense if you recognise two or more of these:
- Your monthly bill has climbed with your roster.
- You track rentals or loaners in a spreadsheet.
- You do repairs and write job tickets by hand.
- Teachers, rooms and instruments are managed in three different places.
We wrote a step-by-step switch guide, a side-by-side comparison and a pricing comparison page if you want the detail.
Moving your data
Export students and lesson history to CSV, import with column mapping, check a handful of records, and carry on teaching. Most studios do it between terms in an afternoon.
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