Local tattoo shop celebrates Friday the 13th
Friday the 13th is often associated with bad luck and superstition. For those who enjoy giving and getting tattoos though, it's a great day to get deep discounts and celebrate art and community.
Some people call it the Black Friday of tattoos.
"It is super cool, I literally been coming for six, seven years now, we try to come down to every single one, its like a tradition sort of thing we have been doing," Skylar Solomon says.
Friday the 13th tattoo events are so popular, customers at State Street Tattoo in Salem are lined up out the door. Every Friday the 13th, State Street Tattoo is open from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. offering discounted tattoos and piercings.
"You pay $40, you get an outline only of any of the pre-drawn images or you can pay $60 and you get the outline plus shading or one color," Brandon Mohr, Owner of State Street Tattoo said. "So, there is some options like that to keep them affordable, but then give you a little bit extra."
Mohr says the events have grown over the years with more than a dozen artists working to keep wait times manageable while still maintaining quality.
"We always do themed images every year, depending on what holiday it falls around," Mohr says. "And then we also do your simple tattoos that, you know, it's a walk-in tattoo, we call it, but something that someone, anybody off the street, can find something they like and get. Our requirements are 18 and over, cash only, so we can pay the artists out that day. We have a very streamlined event. So you wait in line, you come in, you get to check out the images, you pick an image, you pay, you get a wristband, and then you wait in line, and that wristband holds your spot. We call you by number, and you just get with one of the, you know, many artists we have here. We get it down to about an hour to three hour wait, tops. But we try to keep everything pretty smooth in the front of the house so we can still spend time and not rush a tattoo."
Dave Monnin is one of the artists who helps lend his steady hands to the State Street Friday the 13th events.
"We don't really make a whole bunch on it, its more of just something to do, give the people something to come get a cool tattoo," Monnin says. "I've just always been into art growing up and I kind of just got into tattooing right around when I was 18 and it kind of just kept going from there."
For some customers it's a quirky way to mark the date, for others like Ashley Wolp, it's a chance to keep her Friday the 13th tradition going.
"Getting a little ghost with a Christmas hat and a candy cane and she's right now she's filling in the eyes for it," Wolp says. "But I got a ghost Friday the 13th last October that has a witch's hat on it, so they match. Usually Friday the 13th always has, like, a negative connotation because of, like, stereotypical, like, Halloweeny type stuff. But I think it puts a nice twist on, like, usually, what's considered a bad day."
Friday the 13th tattoo events are huge for local shops with anywhere from 300 to 700 people going on that one day alone. Mohr encourages anyone to shop local and support small businesses this holiday season.