First grad night a hit!

[Angelas Abstract 2]

Well our first grad night was a hit! We were booked for two hours & after the first hour we were asked to stay another hour. We took Lloyds advice & took a second helper to clean stencils. Our new banner displays came in just in time for the event & they looked great. When we put up the displays we rolled them up to discourage a line from forming, but the kids were chomping at the bit for us to open. We rolled down the banners & it was non stop until 3am. I didn't even have time to take any pics. Angie did take one pic of a Lion tat I did on a guys arm. It was a big one! I didn't think I could fit it on an arm, but I did. I think they loved it. We did a lot of full back tats & other large tats we don't get to do very often, so that was a lot of fun. Of course Letters & more letters I hate doing letters. Angie is laughing at me saying she only did letters twice in 3 hours LOL All went well & we're ready to do it again. I'll post the lion pic ASAP.

[Angelas Abstract 2]

Here it is! One thing we both notice was how much black ink we used. It usually takes us all day to use that much black ink at a festival. Most the kids wanted just black tats.

[littlemanwetzel]

Glad thinks went good for you and hopefully it will lead into more grad nights next year. My first grad night is next weekend i will have 4 people two spraiying and two to help clean, take pics, and pull stencils hope it goes as good.

Did you put any limmits in place like on number of letters per TAT or number of colors per TAT anything like this. Did you have any special graduation stencils or anything.

Your lion looks realy good!!
To bad you couldnt get more pics for grad night advertisment and stuff.

[Angelas Abstract 2]

Thanks Ryan. No we didn't put limits on anything except how many tats per sitting. One tat then to the back of the line to get another one. That seemed to work pretty well for us. Hope your first grad night goes as well as ours did. We really wanted this contract bad, as we saw this as a way into the school system. So we only charged for one artist. I did note in the contract notes, no charge for the second artist or two helpers this year, New Client Discount. Also I noted a $100. per hour rate for additional hours should they want us to stay longer. This did several things for us. First it told them they got a really good deal. Second, it prepared them for a little more expense next year for our services. Third the lower hourly rate offered for additional hours showed them we are very reasonable on our rates & willing to give better service than they bargained for.

[Tat2guy]

Woo Hoo Guys! You did yur homework and did good. One down and 10 to go next year. LOL!. You guys are crazy to offer letters at a grad nite. Blue painter tape and your excuse is the school don't want letters.

Ryan: You are doing Hailey high. Hope you have all your ducks in a row. Limit one tat per person and if they want more send them to the back of the line. Good luck!

[rthitoff]

first grad night of 3 weeks in a row. This one was about an hour drive, and didn't hire me to be there until 2am.(booked me for next year) Man I was tired before I even left the house. The next 2 - 1 is a repeat school which I convinced them to hire a second artist and they agreed. The other is new, but they both are from 12-4. I don't do letters and I only take my small stencils. My first Bar Mitzvah, I had some bigger stencils and then everyone wanted them, and it reduced the amount of tats I was able to do per hour.
Rick

[oughtoh]

Everyone makes me jealous. The schools around here do not have grad nights because they all go to Disneyland.
Ed

[Angelas Abstract 2]

Thanks Lloyd for your advice. It helped us a lot.

[Franco]

When I first started I did like 10 grad nights the first year. This year I've got 46 but I'm doing more than just tattoos now.

I know you just started and I'm just tossing some stuff out there:

1. Take pictures of the person with the tattoo, not just the tattoo. In no time you will have 1000's of tattoo pics but none with the people getting them. This is a great marketing tool. I have 591 sets (different parties) and over 26,000 party pictures from past parties that I use to show clients how much fun people have with tattoos. It also gives you an opportunity to show that kids AND adults love them.

2. It is my experience that even though you put in the contract about the great discount and free helpers it wont make a difference next year because it will be a new set of parents. I do lots of grads each year and every year it is the same thing. I have always given a discount to the schools and this year I stopped unless they hired more than one service. One service: full price. Two or more services: 10% discount. And that is not alot of discount, but I am at the point now where I turn away just as many schools as I service because I'm booked up. So just be prepared next year when they get butt-hurt that you are not giving them the same discount you gave these guys. It will happen.

3. Ditch the numbers and letters for grad nights! The most important thing to these parents is bang-for-the-buck and when they hire you they are looking to get the most tattoos possible. Numbers and letters ruins that. They take too long. I removed letters, numbers, armbands and some other really time-consuming designs years ago and couldn't be happier. I tell my clients we can do at LEAST 40-45 full-color tattoos per hour and they love that. I removed them because of grad nights but realized nobody asked for them if they weren't there so I just never put them back.

And of course, this is all just how I do it. Letters, numbers and armbands are probably good sellers at fairs & festivals, but they slow you down at private events.

[rthitoff]

At my grad night last night/this morning, there were other activities there of course, and I was told, of the photographer, the boogie head guy, the caricature, and me doing tats, my line never stopped or dwindled down, when the others had some down time. I did have about 400 designs, which was probably more than I needed.
Rick