The Benefits of Tattoo Parlor Liability Insurance

Tattoo parlors have become a booming business. As of 2018 there were over 20,000 tattoo parlors in the United States, generating a total of over $3 Billion dollars annually. Many tattoo shops are independently owned by the artists themselves, yet plenty have a complement of artists as employees. 

Whether you are an independent owner, owner operator, or simply own the company and let others create the artwork, having one or more tattoo parlors can be quite lucrative and fun. 

To keep it fun, exciting, and profitable, be sure you’re protecting it with the proper tattoo shop insurance. While there are many options for coverage, two of the most important policies you should have for your shop are general liability and professional liability. These are often combined into one policy for affordability and ease of management.

Tattoo Shop Liability Insurance

Tattoo parlors tend to have a lot of foot traffic, which can put it at risk of things going wrong in or around the location. Liability insurance benefits your company by providing protection against a variety of potential common accidents.

Injuries

People may get injured physically when they’re at your store, for instance. If a group of friends is out drinking, they may enter your tattoo shop with the intention of getting new tattoos. 

With their state of inebriation, however, they may be more prone to clumsiness. If one of the visitors trips on a chair and hurts himself, he will likely want your tattoo shop to pay for those injuries. 

If the injuries are minor, the medical payments portion of your insurance policy can pay for the basic care and keep the incident out of court. If the injury requires an emergency room visit or hospital stay, the insurance policy pays for those expenses too. 

And if the injured person decides to sue your tattoo shop for additional remuneration, your professional liability policy will pay the legal costs, settlements, or judgements if applicable. These protections benefit you even if you are not at fault.

Damages

Property damages are a similar benefit of general liability insurance for tattoo parlors. If a customer or third party blames your company for damages to a piece of personal property, they may sue you for the repair or replacement. A friend of a customer may be waiting in your shop for instance and drop a cell phone on the floor. The phone may be smashed by an employee accidentally stepping on it before it’s retrieved. 

This type of scenario is one of many that can potentially happen at any time. The benefit of general liability insurance for your tattoo parlor is that you won’t have to pay for the repairs or replacement out of pocket. 

If you are sued over the matter, you won’t have to close your shop and lose business to take care of your own defense.

Rented Premises

Most tattoo shops rent or lease the commercial space they use to conduct business. One of the risks of renting space, however, is that something could be damaged. An employee may overload a circuit and cause expensive power outages. 

A customer or shop visitor could clog the bathroom toilet and cause flooding. When these types of damages happen to the property, the landlord or owner will expect your company to pay for them. Damages of this sort can be quite expensive, and some landlords will not allow you to lease a business space without first showing proof of insurance. 

Your tattoo shop liability policy includes the business premises coverage that will satisfy that requirement. It benefits the landlord by ensuring damages can be paid for if they occur. It also benefits you as the shop owner because you won’t have to cover expensive potential problems like this out of pocket.

Product Liability

Sometimes despite your best intentions, there is a problem with a product your tattoo parlor recommended or sold. When products are recalled or found defective, your customers will expect you to replace them or make things right in some way. This part of your liability insurance policy pays for those expenses if they arise.

Professional Liability—Along similar lines, there may be occasional times where a client is not satisfied with the services rendered to them. They may request a refund, ask that you remove a completed tattoo, or ask that you replace previous work completed. 

Tattoo shop liability insurance provides completed operations coverage to help mitigate these types of problems. 

As you can see, professional liability insurance coverage is extremely beneficial for your tattoo shop. We always hope that nothing goes wrong, but in the event something does, this policy will protect you, your company, and the assets you’ve worked so hard to build.