Tattoo-Frënn Lëtzebuerg

HOW TO ORGANIZE A TATTOO CONVENTION WITHOUT HAVING A CLUE!

Once upon a time (in spring 1997) four people (Martine, Ferdy, Jeff an Dan), were comfortably sitting together having a few beers, watching TV and chatting.Suddenly someone had an idea:
"Now tell me, we've been visiting quite a few tattoo conventions abroad for some years now. Fine, but what do you think about the idea of organizing our own convention?" First, nobody really knew what to say, but then we thought: Well, why not? The idea is good and it can't be THAT difficult putting together something like that. So we went on: Where shall it take place?
After some discussion the "Centre Larei" (the Larei) revealed itself being the best solution. There was only one problem: we didn't know, what the town council would think of our idea. So, the days between sending our application and receiving their answer seemed quite long indeed. But it was worth waiting as we received permission to use the Larei for our convention.How big an event will it be and how long shall it last?
For the first edition we decided to limit the whole thing to the great hall and the foyer of the Larei and to organize the event on Sunday (26th October 1997) only, as we hadn't the slightest idea of how people in Luxembourg would accept it.What tattoo artist, piercer and other exponants should be invited?
In fact, this was our smallest problem as we got to know some of them during the 3-4 years we have been visiting conventions and everybody we asked agreed to come, which resulted in a complete sell-out of the hall in just a few weeks.
How shall we call the event?
"International Tattoo Convention Luxembourg"?
Too common. Besides, the designation of a convention should contain the name of the town where it's taking place.
"International Tattoo & Piercing Convention Vianden"?
Hmmm ... better. But still not the right stuff. Moreover, this isn't enough, because people abroad don't necessarily know where to locate Vianden.
After some dicussion, finally the name under which the event is still known today was pronounced:

INTERNATIONAL TATTOO & PIERCING MEETING VIANDEN, LUXEMBOURG.

How shall we organize it?
Now, the only thing missing is a concept of how to organize the whole thing. It didn't take us very long to decide that our convention shall become a convention for everybody. Everyone who wants to attend, even if it's onla to satisfy one's curiosity, should be allowed to do so, as the idea behind the organization is to familiarize the people in Luxembourg a little more with the whole scene. Even if there are studios in the centre and the south of our little country that have been established for years and e certain scene exists, most of the people don't really know, what to think of it. Our aim is to transmit a positive image to the public.
To allow this, we decided not to charge any admission fee.
Moreover, the rent for the stalls has been kept cheaper as that of the conventions abroad, in order to do also something for the tattooists, piercers and other exponents. By the way, this rent hasn't been changed since the first convention.
Now we only had to cater for food and drink and to organize a small show program and it should work.
So, we managed in barely 6 months to put together our first convention.
And the fact, that it still exists today shows that we were right with our decisions.