Dallas tattoo shop has a vending machine to let you choose your next tattoo piece

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Everyone is talking about Dallas' Elm Street Tattoo and its unique gumball machine that lets the adventurous get a new tattoo design at random. It's a fun way to cover some real estate on your body.

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Everyone is talking about Dallas' Elm Street Tattoo and its unique gumball machine that lets the adventurous get a new tattoo design at random. It's a fun way to cover ... more Photo: Halfdark/Getty Images/fStop Photo: Halfdark/Getty Images/fStop Image 1 of / 26 Caption Close Dallas tattoo shop has a vending machine to let you choose your next tattoo piece 1 / 26 Back to Gallery

Dallas' Elm Street Tattoo and its unique gumball machine promotion is helping adventurous ink enthusiasts get a new tattoo design at random. However, whether this makes things more or less stressful depends on how picky you are with body art.

A customer pays $100 to the shop and drops a penny in a gumball machine. Then whatever comes out at random from inside a plastic ball get tattooed on them. If the customer doesn't like what comes out, they can spend an additional $20 and take another chance. Customers choose the placement on their body of course.

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One of the owners of the shop is world-famous artist Oliver Peck, who has become an ambassador for the traditional tattoo world via various reality show appearances.

The tattoos are small and usually used as filler on tattoo sleeves with larger pieces taking up major real estate. They are traditional Americana tattoos, so customers don't need to worry about getting something offensive, unless snakes, skulls and nautical imagery bother you. If you don't want what comes out at random, you are out $100 so think twice before taking the chance.

A shop employee told the Dallas Observer that the tattoos in question would normally cost between $160 to $250 so customers are getting a deal of sorts.

Of course, it is customary to tip your tattoo artist. They are putting something permanent on your sweaty, smelly body.

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All told, it's a great way to promote a shop and the fun of getting tattooed. It just might convert a tattoo newbie into an inked heathen along the way.

Black Mass Tattoo in Austin has also rolled out its own similar promotion with $60 pieces, but the ink up for grabs there is a little more non-traditional than the ones at Elm Street Tattoo.

Back in 1996 Elm Street Tattoo shop was the first to hold a Friday the 13th tattoo marathon, tattooing customers with special "13"-related pieces at a reduced price. That trend soon became a common tradition among tattoo shops across the globe.