By Charles Romans
Carter County Times
Carter County native Morgan Kinder is a talented young woman thriving in the traditionally male dominated field of tattoo work. Learning her trade and building her business was no small task, but Kinder was determined to overcome all obstacles to achieve her dream.
Kinder worked at a nursing home in Carter County for seven years, but even though she enjoyed the job it was not what she truly wanted to do with her life. Added to this was the fact that as her three children grew older, they became involved in sports and other school activities, and Kinder said she wanted a job that allowed her the freedom to be part of those aspects of their lives.
“I never wanted to be the mother that had to call work and ask for permission to go to my kids’ school functions,” Kinder said. “And I refused to miss them.”
Around six years ago Kinder said that she became involved with permanent makeup at Connie’s Beauty Salon in Grayson. That process included micro-blading eyebrows, and Kinder said that she stayed busy during the tax refund season when people had more disposable income. Though the rest of the year was less busy, she enjoyed being able to set her own schedule and work around spending time with her children.
During the post tax season, when business slowed, Kinder returned to school to get her KMA Certification (Kentucky Medication Aid) and ultimately returned to work at the nursing home, but was again forced to juggle conflicts with work schedule and time she needed to be with her children. Fortunately for Kinder there was a salon in Ashland that had seen her work and wanted to hire her. In spite of the ‘feast or famine’ cycle of that type of work, she decided to try to make that work once again.
“While I was working there, they came up with the idea for me to do ‘tiny tattoos’,” Kinder said.
Tiny tattoos, she explained, are typically the small tattoos people get on their fingers and take about fifteen minutes to tattoo.
“Where I had experience with the microblading, I sort of had experience doing it,” Kinder said.
She was already knowledgeable with skin depth and needle sizes, so this was something she eased into quite well.
“I started doing it, and I fell in love,” Kinder said.
Describing herself as the kid who always needed to get the temporary tattoos every time she went shopping, it was inevitable that she enjoyed the new process so much.
“I have always loved tattoos,” she said. “I think they are beautiful.”
While working at the Ashland Salon, Kinder completely immersed herself in all things regarding the tattoo industry. However, she consistently ran into roadblocks in the male dominated field, and found it virtually impossible to find someone to help her learn more. Fortunately, though, she made the acquaintance of another female tattoo artist, Leah Kelly, a tattoo artist with a shop in Kermit, West Virginia, and Kinder was able to learn a lot from her.
“She has taught me everything,” Kinder said. “And she is the lady that does my personal tattoos.”
After all of her struggles to become a tattoo artist – from male artists not wanting to train her to even some suppliers refusing to sell to her because she was female – Kinder is now thriving. She has gone from being so discouraged that at one point she entertained the idea of quitting to now thriving at her location at 130 South Hord Street in Grayson. In fact, she stays so busy that her mentor and now friend Leah Kelly tattoos in Kinder’s shop a few days each week.
Kinder’s Shop, Silver Spur Tattoo, has a western feel and is very family friendly.
“I don’t want to be one of those businesses you are afraid to bring your kids into,” Kinder said.
She makes sure that everything is family friendly, with videos for children to watch while their parents are getting tattoos or piercings.
Silver Spur offers a broad range of tattoo and piercing possibilities, and also periodically has ‘flash sales’ of predesigned smaller tattoos that can be applied in 25 or 30 minutes. Every needle Kinder uses is a single use needle that is never reused, but disposed of in a container that is then picked up by a company that specializes in that sort of disposal. All equipment is also sanitized between clients to ensure that every client has a clean, comfortable experience.
“I think Grayson needed a place like this,” Kinder said. “ A place you can feel comfortable bringing your family into that’s comfortable and friendly.”
Kinder said that not everyone will like tattoos and that is perfectly okay. But when you come into her shop, the main thing is that when you leave you’ll be happy with the service and glad you came in.
You can contact Silver Spur Tattoos at (606)249-5231 or find them on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/silverspurtattoos.
Contact the writer at charles@cartercountytimes.com
