The State of Tattooing in 2025: How Tattoo Schools Are Hurting the Industry (And What Needs to Change)
If you’ve been in the tattoo world for any length of time, you’ve probably heard the debates about tattoo schools—especially in states like Oregon, where they’ve completely replaced traditional apprenticeships. And let’s be real: the current system is a mess. Tattooing has always been an art that’s passed down through mentorship, discipline, and experience. But thanks to overregulation, commercialized tattoo schools, and a lack of real industry oversight, we’re seeing a serious decline in quality—and an increase in problems.
How Oregon’s Tattoo School System Fails the Industry
Oregon is the only state in the U.S. where a tattoo license requires students to attend a state-approved tattoo school rather than go through a traditional apprenticeship. On paper, that might sound like a step toward professionalism, but in reality, it’s a disaster. Here’s why:
1. Tattoo Schools Prioritize Profits Over Skills
These schools aren’t run by top-tier tattooers—they’re businesses designed to churn out paying students, often with minimal real-world training. Unlike apprenticeships, where a mentor ensures a student masters both technical skills and artistic growth, many schools focus on just getting students through the required 360 hours to qualify for licensing. That’s barely enough time to learn how to hold a machine properly, let alone develop strong technique and artistic integrity.
2. Lack of Real Industry Standards
In an apprenticeship, a mentor won’t let you tattoo real skin until you’ve earned it—sometimes after months (or years) of practice on synthetic skin, pigskin, or fruit. In many Oregon tattoo schools, students are tattooing real people almost immediately. This leads to poorly executed work, cross-contamination risks, and clients getting permanently marked by undertrained artists.
3. Devaluing the Craft
Tattooing has always been about respect—respect for the art, for those who came before, and for the clients trusting us with their skin. But when schools turn tattooing into a pay-to-play system, it undermines that respect. Graduates often enter the workforce with a false sense of confidence, lacking the experience needed to navigate the realities of a busy shop. Meanwhile, longtime artists and shop owners struggle with an influx of underqualified tattooers, lowering overall industry standards.
How We Fix This: Apprenticeships, Legislation, and Lobbying
So what’s the solution? It’s not about gatekeeping—it’s about ensuring tattooing remains an art form that values skill, safety, and tradition. Here’s what needs to change:
1. Reintroduce Traditional Apprenticeships in Oregon
The state needs to allow legitimate, structured apprenticeships as an alternative path to licensure. This means setting clear guidelines on what an apprenticeship should include—minimum hours of training, hands-on experience under a licensed mentor, and mandatory health and safety education. Other states allow apprenticeships while maintaining strong health codes, so there’s no reason Oregon can’t do the same.
2. Reform Tattoo School Regulations
If tattoo schools are going to exist, they need stricter oversight. Schools should be required to have licensed, experienced tattooers as instructors (with a minimum of 5-10 years in the industry). The curriculum should include mandatory shadowing in actual tattoo shops, and students should be required to log significantly more hands-on training before earning their license.
3. Lobby for Legislative Change
The reality is that laws don’t change without pressure. The tattoo industry needs to organize and work with lobbyists to push for reform at the state level. This means getting industry veterans involved in policy discussions, educating lawmakers on the problems with the current system, and pushing for laws that protect both tattooers and clients. Other states have successfully fought against overregulation—Oregon tattooers need to do the same.
4. Shop Owners Need to Stop Hiring Unqualified Tattoo School Grads
At the end of the day, shops control who gets hired. If more shop owners refuse to take in undertrained school graduates and instead push for proper apprenticeships, it will send a message that the industry won’t accept mediocrity.
The Future of Tattooing Is in Our Hands
Right now, tattooing is at a crossroads. If states like Oregon continue to prioritize for-profit tattoo schools over real training, we’re going to see more bad tattoos, more public health concerns, and an overall decline in industry standards. But if the community pushes back—through apprenticeships, legislation, and shop integrity—we can preserve the craft the way it was meant to be: earned, respected, and passed down through experience.
The question is, are we willing to fight for it?