BY DAN HILDEBRAN
Lake Butler Mayor Melissa Hendrix welcomed downtown’s newest business on Saturday, May 17.
During a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the new venture’s 275 West Main Street location, Hendrix said she believed the Tattoo and Beauty Bar on Main would make a significant contribution to downtown.
The two owners of the venture, Taylor Crawford and Ally Appleby, said they met as mutual customers, with Crawford doing Appleby’s lashes and Appleby rendering tattoos on Crawford.
Female-owned and operated
“We just kind of talked about us wanting to eventually put those two businesses together in a building local to Lake Butler,” Crawford explained.
“It’s female-owned, female-run, all female,” added Appleby.
“We offer tattoo services, piercing services, and lash and brow services,” said Crawford. “We have an esthetician that does full body waxing and facials, so the focus is on skincare.”
The pair said that tanning beds are also on the way.
Side hustle outpaces day job
Crawford said her background is in nursing. She added beauty as a side hustle.
“I did both for a long time, the beauty side and the bedside nursing, and this just kind of took over,” she said. “I’ve been doing this for about six years. I was at a salon in Starke for six years, but I live here and want it to be more local to home.”
Crawford said her ultimate goal is to make people feel better about themselves.
‘They just think it looks cool’
Appleby said she, like Crawford, has been in the beauty business for around six years.
After being a stay-at-home mom for a few years, Appleby said she started to engage her passion and talent for art, beginning with drawings and creating logos before moving on to piercings and tattoos.
She owned a tattoo salon in West Palm Beach.
“Then, when I moved up here, I worked at a tattoo shop in Gainesville for a little bit just to kind of build clientele,” she said.
Appleby added that her customer base is diverse.
“I’ll get girls that are 16 that kind of want their grandparents’ or parents’ handwriting or lettering,” she explained. “And then I’ll get women that are in their seventies that want memories, or I get couples that want matching tattoos, or I get people that just really like art and want flowers and stuff that doesn’t have as much meaning. They just think it looks cool.”
Covering a tattoo with a tattoo
Crawford said her business partner excels in cover-ups, repairing previous tattoos that had less-than-desirable results.
“So, people that have been somewhere else and got work done and were not happy with it,” Crawford explained. “They’re able to bring that piece to her and say, ‘Hey, I want to cover this up. What can I do with it?’ And she actually draws up something to put on top of that and cover it completely. You wouldn’t even know it was their old tattoo when she’s done with it.”
Appleby said the cover-up business is busier in rural areas than in cities, primarily due to unlicensed artists working out of their homes.
She added that licensed artists are trained in the prevention of bloodborne pathogens, a real risk when clients use untrained artists.
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