Tats entertainment: Marketers get inked

— -- Looking to make their mark with potential customers, companies across the country are tapping into tattoos as a marketing tool.

Businesses are launching products with tattoo-centric names, stamping their logos on temporary tattoos and using ink-covered models in their advertising.

Late last month, 7-Eleven began selling Inked, a proprietary energy drink. The beverage, at $1.99 for 12 ounces, is targeted at consumers with body art — as well as those without it who "think that having a tattoo is cool," says Michele Little, 7-Eleven category manager of non-carbonated drinks.

More specifically, Inked is aimed at 18- to 40-year-old men and women, says Little, who doesn't have a tattoo herself but would consider getting one.

Inked is hitting store shelves as body art becomes downright fashionable.

Not only do big-screen celebrities and soccer stars have tattoos (think: Angelina Jolie and David Beckham), "normal, everyday people," such as college students and stockbrokers, increasingly are sporting them, says Don Hellinger, CEO of tattoo-focused magazine Inked.

More than a third of people ages 18 to 25 have tattoos, and 40% of people 26 to 40 have them, says a Pew Research Center study conducted last year.

In addition to getting exposure on live body parts, tattoos are also getting an immense amount of TV time. Based on the success of Miami Ink— a tattoo parlor reality show that began in 2005 — TLC cable network this year launched two tattoo-related shows: London Ink and LA Ink. Cable network A&E also had its own offering, Inked,which went off the air last year.

The increasing amount of commercialism hasn't offended most tattoo-wearers, Hellinger says. In fact, many tattoo fans welcome it.

"It helps broaden the acceptance of tattoos," he says. "It gives a woman with a tattoo the confidence to wear a dress that she may not have worn before. It now gives a guy the confidence to roll up his long-sleeved shirt and show off some of his ink."