Advertising and Individualism: Tattoos as 'Walking Advertisements'

In the global quest of large corporations searching to discover new revenues for advertising, corporate logo tattoos have emerged as an innovative way of publicizing a company while also revealing individual expression. Currently, in all corners of the world there are many ways of visibly expressing individuality, however, recently, “Tattoos Advertisements Turn People into Walking Billboards” where one can brand a company logo on their body and it will likely lead to free product or monetary incentive. The human billboard trend initially made an appearance in professional sports in 2001 when the professional boxer Bernard Hopkins was paid $100,000 by the online casino GoldenPalace.com to wear a temporary tattoo on his back during his championship fight with Felix Trinidad. As with most risky advertising, the trend sought to outdo its primary representation and eventually in 2003, twenty-two year old Jim Nelson sold the space on the back of his head for $7,000 to CI Host, a web hosting service and the transaction landed him a permanent tattoo of the company logo on the back of his head. Thus began the era of corporate logo tattoo advertising, an era filled with multi-faceted identity portrayal that resulted in taking advertising to a dangerously new dimension.

Advertisements of all kind are used to claim one united thesis that clearly reflects the company ideals and provokes a wide-ranging audience to buy their product. Tattoos, previous to the introduction of corporate logo tattoos, were also meant to argue or make claims for a particular individual because people generally tend to get tattoos of the things that define their lives. Throughout history the purpose of tattoos in society has varied from culture to culture. Often times, tattoos express the significant rituals and traditions of a society and they have the ability to tell a story about the age in which they are seen. According to the National Alliance of Gang Investigator Association, in the past, tattoos were often associated with the personality of a rebel, a motorcycle gang, or someone that was in a way anti-culture. Those that inked themselves did so with a unique or meaningful symbol they created of researched. Consequently, the purpose of the act was very personal and separated them from the norm or mainstream culture. However, when tattoos are stamped on people, the human body becomes a venue of advertising for corporations and the important distinction between self and consumerism becomes blurred because now both can make the same arguments advertisements alone were intended to make. Additionally, the emergence of corporate logo tattoos as “walking billboards” that have the ability to market anything from wine or energy drinks to cars has fundamentally altered the purpose of a tattoo placing it “mainstream” and changing the dynamics from personal expression to social identification. The new trend has opened an outlet whereby one can represent social identity, however it has done this at the expense of personal individuality.

The trend has quietly crept into American psyche and consumed a niche in the advertising world because the media, as with all trends, quickly acts to normalize the oddness of the idea by including the trend into the ebb and flow of mainstream culture and giving the viewer a feeling of comfort and attraction towards the trend. Similar to the way media glamorizes specific fashion tastes over others, it has glamorized the act of branding the human body with a “popular” corporate name. Celebrities are one way trends can become endorsed into society because they have authority and are constantly on public display. A famous singer Lil’ Kim (as seen below) was even featured in Rolling Stones magazine with the Louis Vuitton symbol imprinted all over her body. From the second a person places a corporation’s logo on their flesh, while media may give off the impression that the individual is singling themselves out as unique beings, in reality, they are highlighting their shared identity at the expense of masking personal representations of individuality.

At the forefront of the trend is the freedom of expression and the boundless measures individuals may take to communicate the whole of their identity to others. Corporate logo tattoos provide a viable channel whereby one can broadcast their connection with a social entity. When present on a body, corporate logo graphics are a way of associating with the governing discourse of consumer culture. The problem, however, is that the trend has created this connection at the expense of individuality whereby the force of media has immediately normalized it and socially accepted the concept. As you can see advertising can take place on many levels, but when will media draw line between advertising trends that will flourish in American society versus trends that will consume every aspect of individual identity? Will we continue to lose sight of our individuality and ultimately end up having to sell our souls to corporate America? Consider the name of the website www.leaseyourbody.com. How far is American consumer culture from commodifying our body parts and selling them to the same corporations that are paying humans to brand their name on our flesh? Exactly how far is too far?