Top tips for expanding your tattoo artistry business

Photo by Allef Vinicius on Unsplash

If you own a tattoo artistry business, then one of the steepest challenges you face is the prospect of expanding it. 

While this is not entirely unsurprising – it is tricky to scale up any business model – the nature of tattoo artistry makes it particularly difficult to grow a business into a franchise model. 

There are a few good reasons for this, but the main one is that many customers choose specific tattoo artists because they enjoy their work and trust their skills. After all, a tattoo is an incredibly personal addition to make to your body and taking a gamble on a generic tattoo franchise is usually unappealing.

However, this isn’t to say it is impossible to expand your business into a more profitable structure – a model which can liberate you from the tattooist’s chair and free up your time to focus on other areas of the company. 

Here are some top tips for expanding your tattoo artistry business: 

Bulk order the supplies you need

If you want to expand your tattoo artistry business, then you will need to increase the amount of equipment in your possession. These could include tattoo supplies like ink, needles and machines, as well as studio supplies like gloves, soaps, antibacterial cleansers and sterilisation reels. 

When you complete bulk orders of these items, you can keep better track of how much you have available, which studio to send it to, and how much you are spending on each batch. 

Maintain quality control by training your staff personally

One of the trickiest aspects of running a tattoo business is that the quality of each artist can vary significantly – and they can each appeal to a different customer base. Therefore, tattoo artists usually charge their own rates – even if working for a wider business – or branch out on their own altogether. 

Naturally, this can cause you headaches when it comes to paying each artist, managing quality control and ensuring each branch of your company delivers a similar service.

A potential way to get around the quality control issue is to offer apprenticeships to up-and-coming artists. This way, you will have a steady supply of fresh talent, and you can mould them into your company’s ethos and approach to tattooing. 

Build a constant flow of regular customers

Another challenge you will face if you want to expand your tattoo artistry business is where to find additional customers. Without a steady supply of customers, any expansion could put too much strain on your cash flow and fold the business altogether. 

Although online marketing methods certainly have their place, you should also consider offering incentives to existing customers to return more often and recommend your brand to their friends.

You could, for instance, create a loyalty card which they can cash in at one of your new studios, or offer a discount to friends and family of long-time customers.

By rewarding repeat customers for their loyalty, you will find it easier to build a loyal client base and expand faster as a result. 

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