Although Ami James and Chris Nuñez own the Florida tattoo shop featured on the TLC reality series, it doesn't mean that they hold the rights to the name Miami Ink.  At present, the two co-owners are facing the future with much uncertainty, worried that their business will soon fade from the limelight once that series ends it run on cable TV.

For those who are not familiar, Miami Ink is a series that follows the events that take place at a tattoo store in Miami Beach.  The shop, which shares the same name as the title of the show, has rapidly become a tourist spot and has generated much profit with the help of some notable guest celebrities plus a little drama from its resident tattoo artists, James, Nuñez, Chris Garver, Darren Brass, and Yoji Harada.  Now, the show draws more than one million viewers a night with dozens of fans showing up daily for a glimpse of their idols.

But what happens when the show stops airing?  In reality, Discovery Communications actually owns the rights to the name Miami Ink, and because of this, James and Nuñez are eventually planning to pack up their needles and move to a new tattoo studio carrying a brand of their own. According to The Miami Herald, they have decided upon the name Love Hate, which is also the name of their bar in South Beach.

“When you pull your Miami Ink sign off my window, how are they going to find me,'' James worriedly said.

Meanwhile, James and Nuñez are getting ready for the launch of the new Love Hate tattoo studio, which is located a few doors from the Miami Ink location on Washington Avenue.  Construction workers are currently finishing renovations of the new establishment, which James and Nuñez designed with production crews in mind.  The new studio is reported to have extra spaces between the tattoo chairs that that allows for multiple camera angles and a small control room in the back.

At present, the producers' reception to the idea is still unclear but a show executive says that the cast will refer to the new location as Love Hate but the Miami Ink name will still go on the front windows.


-Kris De Leon, BuddyTV Staff Columnist
Source: The Miami Herald
(Image courtesy of TLC)