Salem Ink

A friend and I went to meet with Loki. We made an appointment so we could talk about the tattoos we wanted. Loki was very abrupt gave us about 6 minutes total of his time. Said we should give him $ 100 each in cash and he can draw up what we wanted. We gave him basically everything including the photos. They were very simple tattoos. He said it would run about $ 300 total each. 1 was 2 small butterflies and the other one was a small hummingbird. Both of us have had tattoos before. It was as if he just didn’t want to do them. If that was the case I wish he would have told us up front. we wouldn’t have taken the drive all the way there. We went because of the information that is posted on the website. How this was a different kind of experience. A more personal experience a more Personal Touch. Not what we got. He may want to read his own consent form. The consent form requires you to show up 15 minutes early. He was 20 minutes late getting to us. The consent also States they Pride themselves on customer service and the customer must show a level of respect and cannot be rude or disruptive. what about the employees?

The pricing was great! Bare minimum is $ 100. They require an $ 80 cash deposit for the appt. I had Ashlie and she was amazing. It was my first tattoo and I was a little nervous. She walked me through every step. She did multiple designs for me until I was satisfied. I would definitely recommend her!

You know how it is with getting major ink done: you think about your design forever, figure out how to articulate it, put aside money/​time, research the hell out of shops and online portfolios. I did all that – and made the significant mistake of choosing Salem Ink.
Matt’s portfolio looked fantastic, and his style seemed like a perfect fit. And I’d been especially excited because Loki, the owner, took the time to record an intro on the site about how he’d had bad experiences with artists who acted like he wasn’t worth their time, so he wanted to open a shop where «everyone who walks through my door» was treated professionally and «with the respect they deserve.»
I filled out the required contact form fields, including both e-​mail *and* phone number, said how excited I was for the reasons above, and described what I wanted. I also said I preferred to communicate by e-​mail, but to feel free to call me if needed to set up an appointment.
I received a reply from Loki within two days. His response, which came from a Hotmail account (!), just said he would pass on the message to Matt. Okay: so far not exactly seeing the professionalism referred to in that intro, but whatever, writing isn’t everyone’s strong suit. Also, I’d never worked with a shop with a booking system consisting of just «passing the message on” – you have, like, a receptionist/​central booking person who has access to the artists’ calendars, and you keep on top of shit that way. Or you provide the artist’s direct e-​mail address, though I certainly get why that might not be the top choice. But again, whatever – maybe Salem Ink finds this system works for them, especially for online inquiries.
I received that initial reply from Loki on June 26. By July 15, I had not heard anything. I wrote to Loki again.
Again I received a prompt reply. Loki called the fact that I’d not heard from Matt «odd» and said he may have just gotten «busy» because, essentially, their shop is just so darned popular. Then he told me to «re-​send any message» I wanted to give Matt and he would pass it along. Er, I already gave the whole spiel in the contact form during my initial inquiry, but apparently they didn’t have it anymore? So I went through the whole thing again. But, you know, it’s cool – stuff happens.
I sent my reply on July 20. By August 4, I had still not heard anything. I wrote to Loki again.
I explained I’d chosen his shop in large part based on the emphasis on respect, so the lack of follow-​up was really disappointing. I said I definitely understood being busy but by this point a good chunk of the summer had gone by and I could’ve had a consult with someone else and/​or gotten on someone’s waiting list, but chose to stick with Salem Ink, relying on his explicit customer service philosophy. I suggested they might find a way to improve customer communication.
Loki responded promptly. He once again called the situation «odd» and once again cited things occasionally getting missed because they were «busy.» He said he’d forwarded my information to Matt «a few times now» and would speak to him.
He got back to me again a few hours later. Apparently Matt said he’d replied to me after the last message Loki had sent him (whenever that was) but he didn’t hear back from me, and he didn’t follow up because – wait for it – they were «busy.»
Loki said maybe Matt’s message had gone to my junk folder. (Nope. As I told Loki, I’d done several searches on all my e-​mail platforms. Unless Matt used an obscure name/​subject line – which, given the level of professionalism here… But also, given Loki’s next comments, I doubt the junk-​folder scenario had any merit.)
Loki said maybe Matt’s message had failed. (In which case, there would have been a delivery failure e-​mail – several, in fact.)
Loki said maybe Matt *mistyped my e-​mail address*! (There’s this copy/​paste function? And also, at that point, it really is just excuses and really is completely your fault.)
Loki «didn’t know»; but «whatever the problem was, I’m sorry again we could not help you out.»
Um. It wasn’t that you couldn’t have helped me out. You just DIDN’T help me out. Because the artist was so «busy» I was not worth the time to follow up with. This… sounds familiar.
Technology can fail, no doubt about it. But also: remember the bit about the required phone number field in the contact form, and my emphasis on calling me if needed? (They could’ve even just asked me to call them.) I pointed this out to Loki, albeit much more cordially.
No response.
So. Not so much with the respect, after all: not for my effort, time, or desire to have the positive experience promised. I live in Cambridge and can’t drive, so just dropping by wasn’t feasible… but maybe if you actually do physically walk through the doors of Salem Ink, you’ll get that experience. I was never given the chance to find out. Seriously, if you can’t handle e-​mail as a means of customer communication, please don’t offer it. It’s a respect thing.

Great place to stop while we visited Salem. Amazing atmosphere like an art gallery. Very clean and the staff were friendly and helpful.

WARNING WARNING WARNING WARNING WARNING WARNING WARNING
DON’T BE A FOOL, READ BEFORE GETTING ANY WORK DONE AT SALEM INK.
My girlfriend’s first tattoo ever was done by «LOKI,» the proprietor of Salem Ink and was a small Celtic piece on her lower ankle that turned out nicely and is used by «LOKI» for advertising in his portfolio book in the studio at Salem Ink. Her second tattoo was also done by «LOKI.» However, unfortunately for her, the results were less than desirable and needless to say there is no photo of that piece in the portfolio in the shop. The piece was to be a Japanese Water Color of some flowers going up and down her arm and shoulder. The piece was disjointed at best. Unconnected lines and improper shading were apparent throughout. The corolla (center) of each flower, and there were many flowers, was not properly blended into the rest of the flower and as a result every flower looked as though it had a spider in the center of it, see attached photo and you be the judge. The branches that the flowers grew out of were disconnected and in short had unfinished lines.
She walked around for a while before she had another artist from «Shining Star» work to fix the piece. The piece was greatly improved but still not complete as she could not sit long enough to complete the much needed overhaul.
A couple of weeks ago I went to Salem Ink on behalf and unbeknownst to my girlfriend and I placed a deposit on a time for her to get the work completed. The appointment was scheduled for March 21rst and was a bit of a birthday gift to her being that her birthday is March 23 and she had been expressing a repeated desire to get the work done. After looking at the portfolios online at Salem Ink it appeared that Adam Harmon would be a good candidate to complete the piece which was further augmented at my girlfriends request during her second sitting by the second artist who did the outline of several more flowers. Based upon the previous work done by «LOKI» my girlfriend did not want to risk another finger painting session that she would have to wear for life.
On Friday the 21rst my girlfriend had her sitting and was very pleased with the work that Adam Harmon had performed. He completed the flowers which had been outlined by the second artist at Shining Star (who was no longer at that place of business), he added 2 beautiful Dragon flies and lastly filled in the gaps left between the color and flower outlines of the original flower pieces done by «LOKI.»
While my girlfriend sat for her session with Adam I jumped into another chair and had my fourth piece on my body done and I am very pleased with the work that Matt Stahura did on me.
Here comes the punch line. While having pizza at Galaxy pizza in Salem the day following our tattoos my girlfriend received a text from Adam Harmon, the artist that did the final work on her piece, in response to a THANK YOU TEXT she sent to him expressing her gratitude for the work he performed.
Here is the text word for word the artist sent her;
«hey want you to know, you kind of caused some drama here at the shop by not being honest with me about how much Loki had done on the Lotus flowers.
There is a general sense of respect between artists, especially artists who work together that we don’t just jump into each others work.
I had to do a lot of explaining this morning and it got my day off to a bad start. I feel like you probably knew what you were doing by sending in your man and having him tell me some BS and then you not coming or sending me any images. I asked until like a min. before the tattoo.
Anyway, it was douchy at worst and ignorant at best on your part. And didn’t make my day any better. Keep that in mind when your planning future work.
Thank you»
So apparently when «LOKI» walked in during my girlfriends sitting in which she was augmenting the original piece with 2 Dragonflies, filling in the flower outlines done by the second artist at Shining Star and finishing the incomplete crayola work where the color had fell short of the flower outline and the corolla’s looked like spider from a Salvador Dali painting «LOKI» apparently had a bug up his ass due to a terminally fragile ego or he simply felt that since he had done a previous work on her that he now owned her hide like a piece of canvas and she needed permission to get any further work done on, near or around the previous mess he made.
I realize there is etiquette in tattooing like many other professions but when your work falls short you need to shut up. It would be like a pitcher giving up 20 runs in the first three innings then complaining about the peanut vendor in section C of the stadium.
As far the inappropriate text sent by Andy Harmon, form your own opinion. And oh yeah, he was tipped well.

Amazing artists, great atmosphere. It’s not as if they’re trying to hurry you through their shop. They know their art and are worth coming up from Boston for.

My girlfriend and I went to Salem Ink about a week ago on a whim and we are so glad we did! We looked up the various tattoo joints in Salem and decided to make our way to Salem Ink where we greeted by one of the artists Mike. He was super helpful and got right to work asking what we were looking for.
We both decided on wrist tattoos that involved basic line work, mine was a bit more difficult on account of requiring perfectly parallel lines. Mike was able to work with my design, apply a stencil once and finish the whole job in about 30 minutes.
Loki, the owner, did my girlfriend’s tattoo, chatted with her about skin care, herbal remedies and generally made our experience there great!
This was easily one of the best experiences I’ve ever had getting ink.

Loki is 100% professional, helpful and makes sure that you are happy with his work!

I’ve been getting tattoo’d by Mike Guinn for about four years now and I get stopped all the time with people asking me who did my work and comment on how amazing it is! He’s still the only person I go to even though I live in Texas now, if you live in Massachusetts it should be no question!