When I first started my spray tanning business I spent a lot of time on the road. Almost every weekend I would travel to a ballroom dancing competition to work my spray tan magic. When I first started there was a huge element of experimentation and play. I was always on the look out for new products that would give my clients the desired results. At the time I met a wonderful dancer from Australia, Paul Green, and he introduced me to this wonderful product that was widely used by body builders down under. At the time I was spraying with a little airbrush (this was before the days of the HVLP). 

In latin dancing the costumes are very small and sexy – it is all about the body. Without even thinking I started just playing with the idea of using lighter and darker DHAs to create the illusion of shadow and tone. I wanted my clients to look the best and the sexiest and to feel the most confident. The technique I created was different from just enhancing the body with airbrush make-up – it was about using different qualities of DHA to cause shadowing when the tan was developed.

This technique got noticed by Vogue in 2003 and has continued to get press. We call it “the sculpted tan.” One of the coolest moments was when Jay Leno actually mentioned it in his monologue. He said “there is a company in NY called Brazil Bronze that can spray you on a six pack of abs….hello, while you’re down there can you spray me on a smaller ass?”….something along those lines, too funny right?

A couple of years ago I had a call from People Magazine. There were pictures of Mariah Carey floating around flaunting a tight six pack. Was it a contoured tan?

I really don’t know. It certainly wasn’t my contoured tan because my work is much more about illusion. Your friends should thing you look good or healthy – but not be able to put their finger on the fact you got a spray tan. If I spray a woman – with a perfectly conventional – more soft female body type, I am not about to go spraying on a six pack. My job would be to enhance what is already there, the illusion of a smaller, narrower waist, an enhanced cleavage, a higher bum, coverage of cellulite…..If it was a guy who was more cut, like a body builder – then I could be more aggressive, using lighter and darker shadowing to make the body look more defined.

Over the years I have trained many people to use my techniques. The thing that I like the very best about my job is when I meet someone in the salon and I am able to make them feel a little bit more body confident. It really is amazing how you can spray someone, give a little color and a little definition – and someone could immediately feel a little happier and more confident. I know I would not want to show myself on the beach without a little self tanner in all the right places!

Do you know when I first got the idea to do spray tanning I was actually in England at this huge dance competition in Blackpool. I read about it in a british magazine and just thought it sounded great (because I am sooooo white.) I came back to NYC and tried to find somewhere that offered the service and discovered that no one was doing it. A little voice in my head said “Sally this is a really good idea.”

I remember buying the initial equipment with my tax return check and looking in the Times real estate section and finding a tiny sublet in the perfect spot in Soho.I mean it was really surreal, the first time I picked up the Sunday Times I immediately found this sublet – and two weeks after having my big idea I had my own space. Anyone who knows New York understands that this is about as improbable as winning the lottery.

The path from having an idea to having a business was not without hiccups. Here I was with a genius idea, however I had no customers. I mean, the idea of spray tanning or airbrush tanning was completely foreign to the American public. Nobody had even heard of it. Something within me really drove me. I made it my destiny to make sure every lunatic, ultra violet white woman and man new about this amazing sunless tanning treatment. I didn’t have money for a publicist but I took it upon myself to write press releases to every paper and magazine I could think of – and when I wasn’t writing press releases I was yacking away telling everyone who would stand still long enough about the wonders of airbrush tanning.

I am remembering this today – because someone emailed me to congratulate me that Brazil Bronze got into the Best of the Best issue of Allure magazine this month – and it is a really cool thing for me. For the people at Brazil Bronze all the ins and outs of creating the perfect fake tans – are kind of a compulsion for us. We are always scouting out new products and trying to figure out how to give the best color with the least fading – or how to make the color last as long as possible – or what we can do to make the service just that little bit better. Just this month I was at the USDC – this huge ballroom dance competition in Orlando – and I found this amazing, crazy crazy dark exotic color, and I found a fixative you can spray on right after so you can get sprayed and the color won’t come off on your dress. Who else but me could be so excited about this?

So anyway – I have a heart full of gratitude for all the adventures of the past 7 plus years. The stories I could tell. If it was a story with pictures it would be QUITE racy….”spray tan secrets of the stars and the not so famous” – maybe one of the days I will get around to it… just to titillate you – guess which male celebrity thought that the paper mask (I wear to not breathe in spray tan solution) was disposable underware? I walked into the room only to find a very famous man trying to wiggle his unmentionables into a paper cup. Random House should really call me – I have quite the stories…ha ha ha.