A Just A Little Bit Orange Feature
By Clara Pettitt. Copyright © 07/03/2000. All Rights Reserved.

Mike Gets A Fantasy Tan

In which Clara meets Starr Hamson of Fantasy Tan, her cohort Adele Alden, and becomes part of the Fantasy Tan research team. And, incidentally, gives her brother Mike a Fantasy Tan.

When I spotted Starr's one white arm, one tanned arm, brown ankles, and completely white face, I thought: Yeah! That's my kind of woman.

Adele, a blond with light green eyes set off by what looked suspiciously like a real tan, did not appear to be a sunless tanning work in progress.

My Fantasy Tan adventure started several months ago, when I first heard from Starr through email. She informed me that she was a businesswoman who had developed an airbrush sunless tanning system called Fantasy Tan. I was intrigued, but I thought, gee whizzles, doesn't the poor thing know that Mystic Tan is taking over the planet?

How can a petite blond from South Carolina take on the Mystic Tan juggernaut? Out of a sense of compassion for the underdog, I agreed to meet Starr and her associate Adele at a Marriott near the San Francisco Airport. "We just want to make sure that you are nice and shiny white, so we can tan you," Starr reminded me in her email.

So on the evening of May 25, 2000, I hopped on a bus in downtown San Francisco and went out to the airport. Starr and Adele picked me up in their rental car and took me to the Marriott nearby, where we hung out in the Executive Lounge eating cheese and drinking soda while we got acquainted.

While we ate snacks, I asked Starr how she met Adele. Starr has been involved with airbrush cosmetic application for years, beginning with her Halloween and theatrical costume shop Starr Struck in Hilton Head, South Carolina.

In addition to the shop, she has a face painting business which appeals to women who are single parents, want to work, but do not want the separation from family a 40-hour work week entails. The face painting business takes place primarily in kid-friendly environments such as fairs and festivals, so her employees could be with their children as they airbrushed designs on the faces of customers, frequently children themselves.