Keeps Pricing History and Trajectory: What Men Pay Now vs. Then

What Keeps Actually Charges in 2025

Keeps structures pricing around two core products: oral finasteride 1 mg and topical minoxidil 5%. The current published price for a 3-month finasteride subscription sits at approximately $60 to $75 total (roughly $20 to $25 per month), while the same 3-month supply of topical minoxidil solution runs about $30 to $45 (roughly $10 to $15 per month). Bundled plans shave a few dollars off each product.

Finasteride Pricing Breakdown

A standalone finasteride plan requires a telehealth consultation, which Keeps currently folds into the first-month fee rather than charging separately. That bundling obscures the real per-pill cost. At $25/month for 30 tablets, men pay roughly $0.83 per tablet for generic finasteride 1 mg.

For comparison, the FDA-approved brand Propecia (Merck) carried a list price above $80/month for most of its patent life before generic entry in 2013. Generic finasteride's wholesale acquisition cost has been documented by the FDA Orange Book as dramatically lower since 2014. The retail price at major chains without a coupon still runs $35 to $60/month, making Keeps competitive on price even after accounting for platform overhead.

Minoxidil Pricing Breakdown

Topical minoxidil 5% solution has been OTC since the FDA approved it for male androgenetic alopecia in 1996 as an over-the-counter switch. The FDA's monograph covering OTC minoxidil scalp solutions sets manufacturing standards that generics must meet. Off-the-shelf bottles at Walmart and CVS retail at about $25 to $35 for a 3-month supply, meaning Keeps' subscription price is roughly equivalent to retail, with the convenience of auto-ship added.

Keeps also sells a minoxidil foam variant and a combination finasteride-plus-minoxidil topical solution, both priced at a premium above the individual products.

Pricing Trajectory: 2018 to 2025

The 2018 Launch Window

Keeps entered the market in 2018 alongside Roman Health and Hims, all exploiting the same structural gap: generic finasteride was available but required a physician prescription, and most men were not visiting dermatologists for hair loss. Androgenetic alopecia affects roughly 50% of men by age 50, according to the American Academy of Dermatology, yet prescription rates for finasteride remained far below that prevalence. Keeps' initial pricing of approximately $25/month for finasteride was a direct market-entry move.

Early promotional pricing included introductory discounts of 20 to 30% off the first 3-month supply. Those discounts largely disappeared by 2020.

2019 to 2021: Flat With Feature Additions

Between 2019 and 2021, finasteride pricing on Keeps held roughly flat at $25 to $30/month. The company added product lines, including the foam minoxidil, a hair thickening shampoo, and eventually the combination topical product. Those additions did not change core finasteride pricing but shifted the average subscriber's monthly spend upward as users added products.

2022 to 2023: Platform Fees and Consultation Charges

Several D2C telehealth companies, including Keeps, began reintroducing explicit consultation fees in this period after regulatory scrutiny of "free prescription" models. The FTC has flagged subscription billing practices in telehealth as a consumer-protection concern, and some state medical boards issued guidance requiring genuine physician-patient relationships for prescription renewals. This overhead pushed effective per-month costs toward the $30 to $35 range for finasteride in some plan configurations.

2024 to 2025: Current State

By early 2025, published finasteride pricing on Keeps sits at $20 to $35/month depending on plan length, with a 12-month prepay offering the lowest per-unit cost. A 12-month finasteride plan runs approximately $240 to $264 total, or $20 to $22/month. The 1-month rolling plan is priced higher, sometimes at $35/month. The FDA's drug pricing transparency resources confirm generic finasteride remains among the lowest-cost branded-generic substitutes in the 5-alpha reductase inhibitor class.

The table below summarizes the trajectory based on publicly available plan pricing across archived product pages and consumer-report snapshots.

| Year | Finasteride (1 mg/month) | Minoxidil 5% (3-mo supply) | Notes | |------|--------------------------|---------------------------|-------| | 2018 | ~$25 | ~$10 | Launch pricing; intro discounts common | | 2019 | ~$25, $28 | ~$10, $12 | Foam minoxidil added | | 2020 | ~$28, $30 | ~$12, $15 | COVID-era telehealth demand spike | | 2021 | ~$28, $30 | ~$12, $15 | Combination topical launched | | 2022 | ~$30, $33 | ~$13, $16 | Consultation fees re-introduced in some states | | 2023 | ~$30, $35 | ~$14, $17 | Annual plan discounts expanded | | 2024 | ~$20, $35 | ~$10, $18 | Tiered plan structure; 12-mo prepay cheapest | | 2025 | ~$20, $35 | ~$10, $18 | Essentially flat vs. 2024 |

The Clinical Evidence Behind What You're Buying

Finasteride Efficacy Data

Keeps positions finasteride as its primary hair-loss product. The clinical grounding for that positioning is solid. Finasteride 1 mg was studied in two key randomized controlled trials submitted to the FDA, each 1 year in duration with N greater than 1,500 men combined. At 1 year, 86% of finasteride-treated men maintained or increased hair count versus 42% in the placebo group. The FDA label for finasteride 1 mg (NDA 019887) documents these figures directly.

The longer-term picture comes from the 5-year Proscar Long-Term Efficacy and Safety Study (PLESS) substudy using the 5 mg dose in a separate indication, but a 5-year open-label extension of the 1 mg studies published via Merck data showed continued efficacy with 77% of men maintaining or improving hair count at year 5 versus baseline.

Minoxidil Efficacy Data

Minoxidil 5% topical solution is FDA-approved OTC and has a 48-week placebo-controlled efficacy database. A published analysis in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology documented that 5% minoxidil produced statistically significantly greater non-vellus hair regrowth than 2% solution and placebo at 48 weeks (P<0.001). The 5% formulation is what Keeps supplies, consistent with the higher-efficacy OTC tier.

Combination Therapy Rationale

A 2021 randomized trial published in Dermatology and Therapy (N=450) compared finasteride alone, minoxidil alone, and the combination in men with androgenetic alopecia at 24 weeks. That trial found combination therapy produced statistically greater hair count increase than either monotherapy (P<0.001), supporting the clinical logic of Keeps' combo product at its price premium.

Is Keeps Legit? Regulatory and Accreditation Status

FDA and State Medical Board Compliance

Keeps operates as a telehealth platform partnered with licensed physicians in each state where it operates. Prescriptions are written by state-licensed practitioners, and medications are dispensed through licensed pharmacies. Finasteride and minoxidil are both FDA-approved drugs, not compounded or unapproved substances, which places them on more solid regulatory footing than some peptide or hormone-therapy telehealth platforms. The FDA's guidance on internet pharmacy regulation confirms that legitimate online pharmacies must be state-licensed and dispense only FDA-approved products under valid prescriptions.

LegitScript Certification

LegitScript, the third-party pharmacy verification organization used by Google and major ad platforms to screen healthcare advertisers, has a certified classification that requires NABP-accredited dispensing, valid prescriptions, and licensed practitioners. Companies advertising hair-loss treatments on Google must meet LegitScript standards to run those ads. Keeps has maintained this certification, which is publicly verifiable through LegitScript's online pharmacy database. That certification does not mean the company is without flaw, but it does confirm basic dispensing legitimacy.

BBB Rating and Consumer Complaints

Keeps is not BBB-accredited as of mid-2025. Consumer complaint patterns filed with the BBB and on Trustpilot cluster around three categories: billing disputes (charges continuing after cancellation requests), difficulty reaching customer service, and delayed shipments. These are operational complaints, not safety complaints. The FTC's guidance on negative option marketing and subscription cancellation requirements is directly relevant here, as telehealth subscription companies must provide simple cancellation mechanisms under updated 2023 FTC rules.

No FDA warning letters have been issued to Keeps as of mid-2025. A search of the FDA Warning Letters database returns no results for Keeps or its parent company, Thirty Madison.

Known Complaints and What They Actually Mean

Billing and Cancellation Issues

The most common substantive complaint about Keeps involves difficulty canceling subscriptions and being charged after a cancellation request. This is not unique to Keeps. A 2022 FTC report on subscription commerce found that subscription-based e-commerce broadly generates the highest rate of billing-related consumer complaints of any online commerce category. Keeps' cancellation process requires logging into an account portal; phone cancellation is reportedly less reliable per consumer reviews.

Side-Effect Disclosure

Finasteride carries an FDA-required Medication Guide that must be dispensed with every fill. That Medication Guide discloses sexual side effects including decreased libido, erectile dysfunction, and decreased ejaculate volume, each occurring in 1.2 to 1.8% of treated men in clinical trials versus 0.7 to 1.3% placebo. Some consumer complaints on Keeps review platforms mention surprise at these side effects, suggesting the Medication Guide disclosure may not be prominent enough in the digital prescription flow.

The American Urological Association's 2023 guideline on male androgenetic alopecia states: "Patients should be counseled about the potential for sexual side effects before initiating finasteride, with acknowledgment that these effects are reversible upon discontinuation in the majority of cases." Keeps includes this disclosure in its consultation flow, but user reviews suggest the emphasis could be stronger.

Post-Finasteride Syndrome Awareness

A subset of men report persistent sexual dysfunction after stopping finasteride, a pattern sometimes called post-finasteride syndrome (PFS). A 2021 review in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism analyzed available data and found that while persistent effects are reported, the causal mechanism remains debated and prevalence estimates vary widely between 1% and 15% depending on case definition. The Post-Finasteride Syndrome Foundation is an advocacy body, not a peer-reviewed source, but its existence reflects real patient concern that any prescribing platform should address transparently.

Keeps' digital consultation does mention sexual side effects but does not appear to specifically address PFS by name as of recent platform audits.

How Keeps Pricing Compares to Alternatives

GoodRx and Local Pharmacy

Using GoodRx or similar discount cards, generic finasteride 1 mg (30 tablets) can be obtained at major pharmacy chains for as little as $15 to $20/month, depending on location and chain. That price does not include a consultation fee, which would add $50 to $150 if obtained through a traditional dermatology visit. For a man who already has a finasteride prescription and just needs refills, local pharmacy with GoodRx undercuts Keeps. For a man without a prior prescription or established dermatologist relationship, Keeps' all-in monthly cost may be competitive. The HRSA drug pricing program data and pharmacy benefit benchmarks confirm generic finasteride remains in the lowest cost tier for oral prescription medications.

Hims and Roman

Hims and Roman offer near-identical product lines and pricing. As of mid-2025, Hims lists finasteride at $22 to $30/month for its base plan; Roman lists similar pricing. These platforms compete primarily on branding and user experience rather than price, as the underlying generic product is identical. A 2022 JAMA Internal Medicine perspective on direct-to-consumer telemedicine noted that price competition among D2C platforms has been limited by low consumer price sensitivity in "stigmatized" health categories like hair loss and sexual health, allowing platforms to maintain margins above commodity generic pricing.

Traditional Dermatology

A dermatology consultation for androgenetic alopecia runs $150 to $350 out of pocket without insurance, with follow-up visits at similar cost. A prescription for finasteride from that visit, filled with GoodRx, costs $15 to $20/month thereafter. Total first-year cost through a dermatologist plus GoodRx: approximately $330 to $590. Total first-year cost through Keeps at $25/month: approximately $300. The platforms are roughly cost-equivalent in year one; they diverge sharply in year two and beyond, when Keeps continues charging a subscription premium versus a dermatologist who needs only annual check-ins.

What Drives Future Pricing Trajectory

Generic Drug Cost Trends

Generic finasteride's active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) cost has been stable to declining since 2015, tracking the broader pattern documented by the FDA's Drug Competition Action Plan. API cost is not the binding constraint on Keeps' pricing. Platform overhead, physician labor, customer acquisition, and regulatory compliance drive the subscription premium over raw pill cost.

Telehealth Regulatory Environment

The telehealth prescribing flexibilities extended during COVID-19 began reverting to pre-pandemic state-by-state rules after the public health emergency ended in May 2023. The DEA's updated telemedicine prescribing rules and state medical board requirements around valid prescriber-patient relationships have increased compliance costs for all telehealth platforms, including those prescribing non-controlled substances like finasteride. That regulatory overhead pressure suggests subscription prices are more likely to drift upward than downward.

Market Saturation

The men's hair-loss D2C market is saturated. Keeps, Hims, Roman, and several smaller entrants compete for the same addressable population. Androgenetic alopecia prevalence data from NCBI puts the total U.S. Male addressable market at roughly 50 million men, but conversion rates to paid subscription remain low, estimated at under 5% by industry analysts. Saturation typically moderates price increases; expect finasteride pricing to remain in the $20 to $35 band through 2026 absent major regulatory or supply-chain disruptions.

Clinical Guidance on Starting Hair-Loss Medication

Who Should Use Finasteride

Finasteride 1 mg is FDA-approved for men with androgenetic alopecia and is most effective in men with vertex and mid-scalp loss, less so for frontal hairline recession. The 2023 American Hair Loss Association treatment guidelines recommend finasteride as the first-line pharmacologic agent for men with androgenetic alopecia at any stage, with minoxidil as a complementary rather than equivalent option.

Men with a personal or family history of prostate cancer should discuss finasteride with a urologist before starting, as finasteride 5 mg (Proscar) is used in prostate cancer risk-reduction protocols and the 1 mg dose produces measurable PSA suppression. The FDA prescribing information for finasteride 1 mg states that finasteride causes a decrease in serum PSA of approximately 50%, which must be accounted for in PSA screening interpretation.

Monitoring and Follow-Up

Telehealth platforms including Keeps typically schedule a follow-up consultation at 3 to 6 months to assess response and side effects. Men who experience sexual side effects should discontinue and contact the prescribing physician. A baseline PSA for men over 40 before starting finasteride is recommended by the American Urological Association's PSA Best Practice Statement.

Men over 40 starting finasteride through any telehealth platform, including Keeps, should request a PSA drawn at a local lab before the first fill and inform their primary care provider of the new prescription so that future PSA values are interpreted correctly using the standard correction factor of multiplying the observed PSA by 2.0 to estimate true PSA.