Peak Popularity

On a beach trip a few weeks ago, I noticed that more people had tattoos than I've seen previously. All ages and demographics from what I could tell. It was like tattoos had a breakthrough moment and gone mainstream and as it turns out, such is indeed the case but that was news from twenty years ago and I just noticed.

Once a fringe practice associated with sailors, bikers, and criminals, tattoos in America have become more accepted over the past two generations. After years of steady growth, tattoo artists cite popular television series, beginning with The Learning Channel’s “Miami Ink” in 2005, as establishing tattoos as normal and opening the floodgates. Good public data is scarce, but estimates grant the existence of at least 15,000 parlors in the US and $2 billion in annual revenue. Tattoos and body piercings have gone mainstream, imbued with the respectable title of “body art.” Forty percent of people age 18-29 have a tattoo and 25% have a body piercing somewhere other than their ear.

With so much adoption, its now set to become uncool. I must have experienced peak popularity at the beach this summer. And now robots can replace tattoo artists.