Special Edition: Convention Essentials

Sarah Micheletti

Feb. 7, 2025

Small Business Tips

Artist Resources

Coming off a weekend at The Star of Texas Tattoo Art Revival here in Austin where I helped run Stevie’s booth and got to put up Mind Your Ink advertising (for the first time!), we have A TON of convention related learnings to share for tattoo artists and vendors. Let’s get into it.

Essentials to bring

Surge protector and extension cords

Whether you’re solo at your booth or sharing with friends or a shop, you’re going to need to plug shit in. Surge protectors will help protect your equipment from unprotected spikes, and extension cords will help power reach further locations. Just remember not to “daisy chain” a bunch of cords or power strips in a row; this can overload the system or produce unwanted heat (basically it’s sketchy and not safe).

High-capacity batteries

Whether you need to charge a phone, laptop, or machines, a high-capacity battery might do the trick if you're worried about the plug situation and don't have enough extension cords or surge-protectors. You have a few options that can work. Laptop battery banks (like this Einova battery bank) are pretty portable, fairly affordable, and will usually hold the entire charge of 1-2 laptops. They can be used for laptops, tablets, or phones. Around the same price point, but for a technically different purpose, you can get a battery pack designed to jumpstart cars that also has USB output. I've used this to charge my devices in a pinch. It's definitely not how it's supposed to be used, but if you're looking for multipurpose, this is for you. For a much more expensive option, but also way more capacity, invest in a charger like the Jackery brand ones. These also serve dual purpose, they come in handy if you live somewhere where the infrastructure falls apart anytime it ices or snows.

Business cards or flyers

Business cards are a great way to get your name out there and provide ways for clients to connect with you. While typically thought of as a stodgy thing for business people, it’s still a cool and helpful thing to do as an artist. Make them fun and share your style through them! People love going around and collecting them. Just make sure you have the basics like: your contact info (email or social media), location (city/state), and name on there. QR codes that go to a linktree type url are also helpful if you have them.

Things to hand out for free

Similar to business cards, offering a lil something for free helps people connect with you and get your name out there. Consider:

• Stickers
• Candy
• Pokemon cards

If the cost of your stickers is a tad high, you can always add some signage like “Free sticker for a Bluesky follow” to make it feel more worth it to give them out for free.

Beverages and food for yourself

Convention food is usually shit and overpriced. As long as the convention allows it, bringing in a lunchbox, snacks, and some beverages can help you get through the day without breaking the bank.

Random tools for day-of setup

Doesn’t hurt to pack a lil bag of basic tools that may come in handy when you’re setting up: allen wrench, screwdriver, scissors.

Everything you need to tattoo (and extra)

Differs from artist to artist, but create a list of what you need to actually tattoo before the day-of. If you’re worried about forgetting something, take note of what you use during a tattoo that week at your homebase. And it never hurts to bring extras like plastic wrap, paper towels, gloves, ink cups, more needles of each size than you’d think, and an assortment of inks if you’ve got the room. Shockingly, this convention didn’t have a lot of supply vendors, so we found ourselves running to the shop each day to pick up things that we forgot or didn’t pack enough of. Don’t be like us! Be prepared!

QR code for payment

Having a more permanent lil sign or even just a printed out one for payment makes it easy for clients to pay you post-tattoo or for folks to buy merch. It can be fine to have this on your phone, but if you don’t have someone running your booth, you don’t want to be constantly switching out gloves to pull out your phone to pull it up.

Goodies to get your name out there

We suggest offering these for free, but depending on your budget, you could do these for some low (think $2-5) prices too. Or, we saw a great idea from Bianca (@chaotictattoo) to offer in trade for an Instagram follow!

• Business cards
• Free stickers (they don’t even have to be custom ones you make)
• Matchbooks
• Lil pins
• Koozies
• Bookmarks (DIY by printing at home!)
• Plastic guitar picks
• Postcards
• Coasters
• Small temp tattoos (for the kiddos)

Signage

Banner

Express your brand and style through your banner. And for the love of everything that is good in this world, add your name or social media handle + location in a legible way (font choice, color contrast). If you’re making it yourself (like I did, see DIY banner here), step back about 10-15 ft. as you’re designing it to make sure you can read the darn thing!! Make it eye-catching but not at the expense of legibility. If you have multiple brand colors to choose from, opt for a lighter one as the background as it’ll stand out better against the typically black curtains.

Extra signage - the bigger the better!

Besides your main banner, there’s always plenty of room to put up signage. Respect goes out to the folks who had a neon-esque sign and the other booth that used Christmas lights at Star of Texas.

Availability signs

Let clients know if you’re available to tattoo that day by using signage. A simple 4x6 in sign will do (make it back/front for available/not available language), ideally propped up or flat next to a flash book where they’ll easily see it. This is especially helpful if you don’t have someone manning your booth while you’re tattooing or if you stepped away.

Flash (with prices!)

Display your flash in a book, on a display stand, or within picture frames. Place it flat on the table, on a tripod, or hung on the back curtain. Include pricing; if you’re worried it’ll scare someone away, then change your pricing but don’t just hide it.

Examples of finished and healed work

This is less common to see, but for certain clients, it’s a deciding factor to be able to see your work actually on someone’s skin either to understand how you render out the final design (if your flash isn’t fully rendered) or just see a bit of proof that you aren’t going to fuck it up.

Peg boards, tripods, etc

Make things more visible to folks walking by through elevation. It’s helpful to display flash, availability signs, merch, and more. Plus, you can likely make use of these types of display at your station or at home for the majority of the year.

Merch to sell (if you’re into that)

The biggest suggestion we have in terms of merch is to have a variety of items and price points. Make sure that you have more accessibly priced items ($2-$5) along with your higher priced items. $25 is a good maximum unless it’s a custom, unique piece of art. Having a digital payment method is also always a plus, unless you’re going to carry smaller bills to be able to give change.

• Stickers
• Prints or original art
• Hats, shirts, bags
• Cute kawaii stuff like charms

Now get to it!

Each convention is a learning experience, so don’t stress about getting it perfect the first time. Meet new clients, build connections with other artists, and enjoy. And consider taking a day or two off post-convention to recover, especially if you’re traveling. Keep yourself and your client’s experience at the center of your planning and you’ll be fine.

Did we miss anything? DM us on instagram or reach out at contact@mindyourink.com to let us know.