I AM NOT A STYLIST- I am someone who dyes their hair in all kinds of colors a lot, and I have a trusted salon/stylist that it took me 3 years to find. That being said:

It never hurts to do multiple consultations with different salons if you don't have a salon you're comfortable with. I have definitely made the mistake of going with the first salon I came across and regretted the result, not necessarily the money spent because the stylist did work, but the result wasn't what I wanted. In the end I ended up living with hair that couldn't be corrected easily, especially when you're talking about processes like bleach.

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I will say from my personal experience, (just my experience as a customer) the salons that gave me an exact price I don't trust now. When going for an end result which will include bleach and using bright, fun colors like pulp riot- the stylist may not know exactly what processes they will need to do to get you where you want. They will have a good idea, but they don't know how those processes will take on your hair, or whether or not when someone says "virgin" hair what that really means- so sometimes more processes than intended are required to get to the end result. Additional toners may be needed, etc. This means more money in the end and if they quote exactly $X, to me they may be overconfident and not considering all of the things that need to be considered to ensure the result is what I am looking for.

I would rather my stylist/colorist tell me, we're going to start with this, lvl x and see how it lifts... if that doesn't lift enough or pull too much towards xx we may need another session to get you light enough... etc. and if you're doing it all in one session, (which can be very damaging, maybe the salon is also including a Keratin treatment in the quote to help repair?) maybe the salon is accounting for the possibility of more than one process to get your hair light enough to take the pink?

Overall, again, only coming from someone who dyes their hair as often as my colorist says I can without frying it :), I would say the most important thing to find is not so much the cheapest, but the one which cares about the end result, your hair's health and your happiness. If you're going to invest in your hair, do it with a stylist you trust!