An entrepreneur from an early age, Sir Richard Branson has been considered one of the most influential people in the world. Does the English business magnate have tattoos?
Sir Richard Branson does not have any tattoos and has said he has no intention of being getting any. Branson did wear fake tattoos in a 2009 commercial for his rail company, Virgin Trains. In 2020, he stated that he would get tattooed aboard Virgin cruise ship “Scarlet Lady” for his 70th birthday but this did not come to fruition.
For more on Sir Richard Branson and his relationship with tattoos, read on.
Richard Branson
As the founder of the Virgin Group in the 1970s, Sir Richard Branson is one of the most influential business magnates in the world. He started his first business at just 16 years old, running a magazine called “Student”.
His first real success came in 1970 when he started a mail-order record business, then used his profits to open Virgin Records, a chain of music stores, in 1972. Virgin Records was highly successful and was later rebranded as Virgin Megastores to reflect the stores branching out into multimedia retail.
The brand grew rapidly and Branson expanded into other enterprises, launching Virgin Trains and the Virgin Atlantic airline. Eventually, he even looked to send the company into space when he founded Virgin Galactic, in the hope of one day being at the forefront of space tourism.
He was knighted in March 2000 for his “services to entrepreneurship”.
Branson has no tattoos that we’re aware of and has stated in the past that he will never get any, a strong sign that he has some aversion to being inked.
Fake Tattoos
Though he has no tattoos in reality, Branson has appeared onscreen with heavy tattooing in the past. In 2009, he appeared in a commercial for his company, Virgin Trains, dressed as a train station trash collector.
The commercial was promoting the completion of upgrade work on the London to Scotland West Coast train line, a major investment that was intended to improve the speed and frequency of Virgin trains operating on the route.
The most noticeable feature of Branson in the commercial were the heavy sleeve tattoos on both arms. Even if he never gets a real tattoo, we at least know how he would look if he decided to get inked thanks to his commercial appearance.
Virgin and Tattoos
Despite Branson’s personal aversion to tattoos, they became a key feature of his cruise line, Virgin Voyages. The first ship in the fleet, the “Scarlet Lady”, was unveiled in 2020 and seeks to offer a unique cruise experience for young adults and above, with children not allowed to travel on the ship.
As part of the ship’s appeal to this younger holidaymaker, the “Scarlet Lady” features a yoga studio and running track, as well as a tattoo parlor. While getting tattooed on a moving vessel probably seems like a bad idea, the sheer size of the 60,000-ton cruise ship means it should be safe to get tattooed.
Surprisingly, the “Scarlet Lady” might actually be one of the better places to get a tattoo, as the onboard artists have been recruited from SOHO Ink, one of New York’s finest tattoo studios.
Branson said that he would be on board the ship for his 70th birthday in July 2020, even saying that he would mark the occasion by getting tattooed in the ship’s tattoo parlor. Unfortunately, the launch of the “Scarlet Lady” was ill-timed due to the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic and Branson did not spend his landmark birthday on his new cruise liner.
Whether or not this means he has shut the door entirely on getting a tattoo in the future, it seems that, for the time being, Sir Richard Branson will remain ink-free.