Following immigration detainments across Santa Barbara County over the summer, Goodland Tattoo’s owner and store manager felt like they couldn’t just stand by and watch.
Alex Ramirez, manager of the Latino-owned tattoo shop in Santa Barbara, said he believed they had a responsibility to do something, especially as children of immigrants.
“The only reason why I do any of this stuff is because I don’t want to feel helpless, I don’t want to feel powerless. I want to feel like at least I am doing something,” he said.
Goodland Tattoo is hosting its first Cultura Flash Day of the year on Saturday to raise money for immigrant advocacy organization 805UndocuFund.
Primitiva Hernandez, executive director of 805UndocuFund, said she feels inspired to see the shop mobilize to support the grassroots organization.
“It is bringing us together, by offering a space of joy and chaos,” she said. “We have to create those spaces to bring joy so that we can withstand the attacks that we are seeing on not just our community but on ourselves as people of color.”
Hernandez added that she is grateful for Ramirez’s previous support of 805UndocuFund by organizing events outside the tattoo shop in collaboration with his other jobs at Community Arts Workshop and Desmadre Media.
“He’s found so many ways to help his community,” she said.
Goodland Tattoo owner Chris Cruz said he is proud of his heritage and showcases it in his shop. It’s speckled with iconic symbols such as a figure head of Don Ramón, a popular Mexican sitcom character from the 1970s. There’s also a mariachi hat hung on the wall and a framed photo of the Virgin of Guadalupe.
The flash sale will include a set of predetermined Aztec- and Mayan-inspired designs ranging from $100 to $300. Ramirez and Cruz said they have more designs they are working on. With the sizes of the tattoos, they will be available only for legs and arms.
“We are the only shop who’s done anything like this in town,” Ramirez said.
The exact amount of the proceeds going to 805UndocuFund will be decided after the event, when the shop has the total number of sales.
However, Ramirez and Cruz said they estimate that most of the money will go toward the organization.
Saturday’s fundraiser will be at the shop at 2830 De la Vina St. It’s set to begin at noon and go “till late,” according to Goodland Tattoo Shop’s Instagram account.
“We don’t know what to expect because something like this event could be scary, having brown people come to a brown event,” Cruz said.
Cruz and Ramirez said that fear surrounding immigration raids cost them a large portion of their clientele, especially after their move in August 2024.
“You just saw that die down when he opened this location because people were just scared to come out,” Ramirez said.
Cruz packed up his shop in Old Town Goleta after more than five years. In Goleta, he was known as “the guy who spoke Spanish,” and clients relied on him to provide services they couldn’t get at other tattoo shops.
However, the Cultura Flash Day is more than just tattoos for Ramirez and Cruz. For them, it is a personal cause, closely intertwined with their identities.
“It is actually still scary to talk about this stuff,” Ramirez said. “There was a time I didn’t even want to mention that my parents are either immigrants or undocumented.”
The shop leaders also urge people to support 805UndocuFund in other ways, such as following it on social media, volunteering or donating.
“The conversation is happening right now and everybody is talking, but what are you doing?” Ramirez said.
Hernandez also urges other artists in the area to get involved in the community.
“I want to make a call to action to the rest of the artist community to get plugged in and use their talents to help each other out, because there’s something for everyone to do,” she said. “You don’t need to be on the front lines.”
More Cultura Flash Days are to come, according to the shop’s Instagram page. To see the tattoo designs available this weekend, click here.
