Here's the answer, itemized: boutique beauty and wellness PR retainers run $6,000 to $15,000 a month in 2026, and a typical $10,000 month splits six ways. Media relations takes about 35 percent, the pitching and follow-ups. The media list takes 10, materials like releases and kits take 15, sample and gifting coordination takes 15, strategy and calendar take 10, and reporting takes 15. Every line is real work. Every line is also, in 2026, buildable inside your own company.
Three quiet truths hide behind the invoice. You are one of eight to fifteen clients on your account team's desk. The junior does the pitching, while the partner who won your business appears at the monthly call. And the list is rented, never owned: leave the agency and the contacts, the relationships, and the memory of what worked walk out with it.
What changed is that the retainer's deliverables are mostly documents, and documents are what an AI drafting room produces fastest. The judgment, the taste, and the relationships stay human, and here's the part agencies don't advertise: those were always yours. Editors increasingly answer the founder over the intermediary, because the founder has the one thing no rep carries, the firsthand story. The replacement stack costs $100 to $400 a month plus product for sampling. The price is 4 to 6 real hours a week.
The full unbundling is Volume 1 of our Save $10K on PR series, from QYRAI™, pronounced kai-ray, an AI-driven creative marketing agency.
Own the list. Own the voice. Own the press office.