Today we’d like to introduce you to Jordan Brill.
Hi Jordan, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
I grew up in Buffalo, NY spending the long cold winters focused on art and music. When I was 11 my Dad got asked to move our family to Xiamen, China for a work project with Kodak Film. There I began to see the way the locals practiced art and fell in love with the elegance of foreign language- so much so that I continued my study of Mandarin into my college years.
From there I returned to the USA and attended the French Culinary Institute in New York, NY. As a young chef in the early 2010s, it was finally pretty acceptable to have full sleeves so in short succession I covered about 1/2 of my skin in my favorite tattoo style- American Traditional! Eventually a legendary New York tattooer who saw my painting skills and enthusiasm for the craft took me aside and told me, “Man, you’re in the wrong career and you should make a change.” Having just met my now wife, I had clear perspective, and I did decide to make a drastic career change. Through bootstrapping, resourcefulness, asking a lot of questions, and gracious mentors I made the change over a decade ago.
With moving to Nashville in 2019 to better serve my wife’s (Carli Brill) music career, I was blessed to find a fantastic shop.
With each appointment there, I felt a calling to deliver the highest quality tattoo with the kindest experience possible for my clients which was fantastic. I was busier than ever, honing my craft even further but I started to feel like an outsider within my own craft.
You see, around the time I had began tattooing, there was a shift taking place that I hadn’t really seen or acknowledged. The business was moving away from time-tested tools made by tattooers for tattooers and was starting to source every product from overseas. This was for “convenience” and higher profits (in theory) to the shop owners and tattooers. What this really boils-down to, is that everything that used to made from sturdy, recyclable, robust materials here in the West had become replaced by single-use plastics made overseas with no acknowledgment of sustainability.
In a typical tattoo setup you have: bottle bags, plastic wrap, power supply barriers, clip cord covers, ink caps, a rinse cup, tubes, needles, grommets, gloves, garbage bags, and more that nowadays ARE ALL MADE OF SINGLE-USE PETROLEUM-BASED NON-RENEWABLE PLASTIC. Even the stenciling process uses single-use plastics.
When I decided to open my shop Starfolk Tattoo in 2021, I made a pledge to myself and to the tattoo community that I would lead by example making the most plastic-free tattoo shop possible. Every item that I mentioned previously, has been from the beginning either compostable or is sterilized in the same exact was as they do in a dentist’s or doctor’s Office at Starfolk. Even our stencils do not use any single-use plastics.
Four years later, word has gotten out about our enthusiasm for keeping plastic out of landfills. We were recently announced as the only eco-friendly tattoo studio in all of Tennessee on ecotattooing.com which is a great website and resource regarding eco-conscious tattooing and they even offer fantastic alternative supplies to tattooers like us.
I recently even launched an online resource for tattooers hungry for fresh perspective such as sustainability called “The Upgraded Tattooer” to share what I’ve learned along the way.
You know, as a guy who lived in a Third-World country 20+ years ago, I’ve seen the contrast. Plastics are an unfortunate reality in most of the world that isn’t as well-off as we are in the West. It’s ironic because it’s almost a luxury to use less plastic now in the same way that we have so many choices of what to eat at the grocery store. It took a little extra work in the beginning for us to find certain tattoo supplies that were biodegradable. But the extra work has been worth it for us. For us, treating people with integrity and kindness have always been core values of our business and honestly, just core life values. We’re proud of that fact that we can offer high quality tattoos, deliver a warm and enjoyable experience to our clients- while also treating our earth with integrity and the kindness it deserves.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
In general, being an entrepreneur is not for the faint of heart. But in a business dependent on our clients having hundreds of dollars to burn at a time, the tattoo business has been suffering. Tattooers have noticed a pretty extreme downturn in business in the light of everything simply being pricier these days. Even more so with an eco-friendly shop where nearly every piece of our setup is more expensive without plastics. The way we’ve stayed afloat is by sticking to our main tenets of over-delivering value when it comes to customer experience, our dedication to constantly making fresh eye-catching designs, and of course immaculate tattoo quality.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I am a tattooer first and an artist second. The craft of being able to understand and wield a machine that runs on electromagnets that is the grandchild of the electric doorbell patented in 1831. Tattooing is extremely challenging and some days feels next-to impossible but it’s that challenge that keeps me passionate and humbled. When it comes to the artistic side of my craft, I am highly inspired by comic-style art with heavy black, high-contrast, and colors that really stand out. This translates namely into the American Traditional and Japanese Traditional style of tattoo, which is what I’m known for. What I’m most proud of in my tattoo career are the days where I made what seemed to be impossible- possible.
Before we let you go, we’ve got to ask if you have any advice for those who are just starting out?
My advice to anyone thinking of tattooing is that it requires one thing, and one thing only- dedication. Dedication can look like many things, but for us, it looks like failing in one way, shape, or form every day and deciding to come back the next day and see how you could do it better. The growth is so incremental that you almost can’t even recognize it. I felt like it took the first five or six years of tattooing to even begin to know what I was doing. Then, at the 10 year mark, I taught myself some things where I wondered how I’d even gotten this far without knowing them? Again, this requires extreme dedication. Dedication requires humility to admit that you don’t know everything and could do it better next time. Dedication also requires the patience to understand that the fabled “10,000 hours” boils down to 10+ years for most.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.starfolktattoos.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/starfolktattoos/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/starfolktattoos
- Other: https://share.google/uq1cWbO4uMhFt1mfl
