Crazy about the clean: why did you get referred?

In chatting about the ancient art of tattooing recently (no, I’m not game enough to have any, but yes, I find them fascinating) I was surprised to hear my husband of all people highly recommending a particular tattoo artist.



Given my husband’s tattoo free stance I was surprised that he would recommend anyone and was keen to find out what was so amazing about this artist’s work. Turns out however that my husband wasn’t referring him based on his work but on the fact that when a friend of his tried to enter the premises with shoes on he was told to leave and the floor was immediately mopped where he’d walked. The commitment to maintaining a sterile environment had impacted on the person getting the tattoo so much that he had then told it to who knows how many people and that story had impacted on my husband enough for him to pass on the artist’s name.

It’s an unusual referral chain! Who’d have thought a tattoo artist would be getting referred because he was crazy about the clean? I certainly wouldn’t have, but his passion for sterility made such an impact that it’s become a little bit like urban legend and inspires confidence in respect to safety to those that hear about the story.

It got me thinking that you might not always know why people refer you: I’ve heard home owners refer builders because they took the time to clean up their work site at the end of each day and one of my uni lecturers loved telling the class that he flew Singapore airlines because they always have the “prettiest” cabin crew.

Or why people don’t refer you: I’ve heard an irate friend tell people not to shop at a local grocery store because they rudely refused a $20 note when she was shopping for something that cost less than $5.

By Kirsty Dunphey with No comments