This whole thing started because I was just too darned picky . . .

When I first began Faketoos as a body art business, I was simply a glitter tattoo artist who was teaming up with my daughter's very successful henna concern. We had seen over the years that her clients often had small children who also wanted something cool and glittery like Mom and Dad. Of course, little kids often won't sit still for henna application, let alone take the precautions of keeping the henna untouched until it has dried. She suggested that I try glitter tattooing using stencils as an additional service to those children. (Or maybe Mom and Dad too!)

I purchased a professional glitter tattoo kit, but almost immediately I was struck by the poor quality of the stencils I received in the kit. The materials were somewhat okay, but the designs were not. Most of them were what is referred to as "lazy" art work; they barely represented what they were supposed to be depicting, almost as if the initial designs were traced from something that had been photocopied repeatedly. Circles weren't round, lines were wobbly, recognizable logos and characters were barely . . . recognizable. I guess I hadn't really investigated what these stencils were manufactured from before I purchased them, because if I HAD, well . . .

I'm a graphic designer who has worked in this industry for over fortyyears. And a good chunk of that time I have spent in the sign business, which uses the same materials and equipment that it takes to produce these stencils. In other words, I had the capability to produce my OWN stencils, as many as I needed, in whatever designs I wanted. I also had the advantage of having many different materials to experiment with; not only the vinyl that the stencils were cut from, but also the transfer tape that carries the peeled stencil to the skin. The best part was the idea that I could start from scratch on the designs, and make them as razor-sharp, clean, and clear as I possibly could.

I knew I was onto something when my glitter tattoo business really started to surge. By the end of my first show season, I was seeing the same kind of long lines at my side of the booth that my daughter had. And I heard time after time how excited my clients were that I had such a huge selection of really great designs, and more importantly how much BETTER my designs looked than any others they had seen before. Then, on the last day of my last show of the year, I had another artist approach me and ask where I was getting all these great stencils. When I told her I produced them myself, she pulled out her wallet and asked how many of them she could buy from me, right then and there.

Now, I'm not THAT crazy, selling to a direct competitor. But it DID give me the idea that if this person was so anxious to obtain quality stencils, then maybe others around the world would be also. And so the retail side of Faketoos was born. I offer you something very simple: the best glitter tattoo stencils on the planet, at low cost and almost free shipping.

How cool is that?