My name is Billy Gibby but I go by the name Billy The Billboard. My adventures into tattoo advertising all started in 2003. I have always had a passion for helping people in need, but in 03 people might say I took helping people in need to an extreme. At the time I was donating blood and volunteering at the American Heart Association as much as I could but wanted to do more. I had heard about living organ donation and found a website where people in need of organs can search for donors. That’s when I found someone who after talking on the phone, and via email for quite some time, became my friend. I decided that I wanted to donate my kidney to her. After a long process of tests and more tests a date was scheduled for surgery. The only problem for me was I hadn’t had any money saved up for the time I would have to miss from work to pay my bills while I recovered from the surgery.
I had to come up with a way to get some money fast, but how? I kept thinking of ways to come up with money and then I remembered a championship boxing match with Bernard Hopkins and Felix Trinadad. Bernard had entered the ring with a temporary tattoo advertisement for the online casino GoldenPalace.com . I thought to myself if Bernard can get them to advertise on him with a temporary tattoo advertisement maybe they would advertise on me as well. After all, I was a tough man fighter myself with an undefeated record. That hardly compares to a champion boxer so I had to do more. What if I were to advertise with a permanent tattoo instead of a temporary one? I emailed the company and sent them photos of my fights and newspaper articles I had been in and explained my situation. They decided to advertise on me with a permanent tattoo advertisement that is now on my back. That gave me enough money to pay my bills while I recovered from surgery.
The surgery went great and my friend is doing well. I have since donated over 20 gallons of blood platelets as well. This was the start of my adventures in tattoo advertising. Some have called me crazy for tattoo advertising on my body, some have called me a male prostitute for selling my skin for money. I will let you, the readers, be the judge of that. I now have 8 permanent tattoo advertisements with a lot more on the way. Each week I will post a blog about my adventures in tattoo advertising, about the companies I now advertise for, and for the reasons I am doing this. Stay tuned!