WOW! News story on KCAL 9 about the adult business in recession. WOW.
 

Never have I seen a news piece like that. Anyone else just see that?

nope, no link eh?

lemme look for one.

i recorded it live from my tivo.

i can't find a link, but basically they were talking about how for the first time the adult business is taking a hit and is in recession itself. they had hustler as an example who quickly told everyone that everything is ok and business is booming, which most know is inaccurate, but i can respect, because who the hell would go on tv and say that business is down. the anchor reported that dvd sales are down 30 percent and a professor from a school i forgot already basically said that when gas and milk and home prices are this unfavorable, that porn is a luxury item that people can do without. that is basically the gist of it.

i guess my whole point is that i've been in this biz 10 years and i've never seen any media outlet actually say that shit is hitting the fan in the adult biz.

i will try to get this off my tivo and made into flash.

DVD sales are down more than 30%, and old school "adult companies" such as Playboy, Hustler, and Penthouse that have done well in the DVD market need to get their heads out of their asses, figure out that no one is buying DVDs any more, and that there is a new model for the delivery of adult content. This is a no brainer; The fucking music industry couldn't see it coming anyhow.

I'm not saying the Internet is "all powerful", but it's the current model for content delivery. Our problem is figuring out what the next business model is going to be - and jumping on that before the Internet dies off.

As for our business slump, well, business has picked up for us in the past week. I'm happy right now. I hope it holds.

Our industy is like any other - ups and down, and let's not be fooled by thinking that a recession isn't going to affect us.

michael Klein in the house

i don't think anyone is fooled that recession won't affect us. what i'm getting at is ITS NOT CLOSE to being over. technically in the definition of recession, we're not even in one yet as a country.

it's time to do more with less in this business and maximize every click.

bottom line until the country bounces back.

Actually you would be shocked Ive been on other boards and there are people who still think we are recession proof. We were 20 yrs ago. lol

Good luck!

in kinda related news i was reading the paper here that also reported strip clubs are going downhill in toronto, and that 10 have closed in the past year or so .... i'll see if i can dig it up was a pretty interesting read..

Anyone that doesn't think porn is a luxury is kidding them self. However, I never knew anyone actually watched KCAL News.

found it

http://www.metronews.ca/toronto/Local/article/45463

porn in the internet sense and my own description is a "luxury impulse buy".

no one wakes up in the morning and says "hey i really have to buy some porn today".

its up to us to be smarter, convert better, and trip that chemical switch in the consumers brain to take the plunge and on that impulse pull out the credit card and sign up.

.

No one is sucking cock to buy porn.

Exactly.

Someone might suck it to pay their mortgage though.

My wife was just talking to her sister she is a dealer in a casino. She went to work today and they cut everyones hours. I feel for the kid.

nah, I think I would let them foreclose.

Missed it but Variety had a similar story.

a link to a video would be great.

These stories have nothing to do with a recession.

DVD sales will be down to zero in a few years because of internet downloads
and it has nothing to do with any recession.

The strip club story in Toronto is a 10 year trend and again has nothing to do with a recession.

Adult paysites are competing with torrents and megarotic type sites.

The fact is most people use their credit cards "MORE" during a recession and they
buy items like porn to feel good because they can buy something on their plastic.

Visa, Mastcard, First Data and TCYS all posted their sales recently and all of them
reported a 15% - 30% increase in sales and card useage. First Data and TCYS process
about 70% of all credit and debit cards worldwide and they both reported strong sales today !

Um how many people really were using credit cards during the last one?
Plus may I ask how the use of cards increasing now has anything at all to do with porn sales and a recession. That just looks like more debt, combined with crap like people actually finding ways to pay their rent or mortgage with their cards. Add to that other typical expenses and all that crap.

As a whole we all know that the wages sure in hell have not increased much if any. Housing shot through the roof than sucked people under. Gas prices have spiked beyond any wild dreams. Food prices are skyrocketing out of control. Then of course credit companies are jacking interest rates for the fuck of it if you are lucky and out right cancelling your policy if you keep everything paid off. Lets not also forget the banks themselves are nickle and diming their customers however they possibly can in hidden fee's. However ya sure everything is hunkydory.

I wouldn't neccessarily believe that the lack of money would this much affect the will to WANT porn, the same as people need to eat they also need to fuck or jack off where one thing is always easier than the other, and the amount of horny men with a boner is still more or less steady - that won't change.

Besides other factors, let's not forget this very simple think that's kind of getting old - you can get it for free.

There is no comparsion, you can't get any goods for free in nowadays world, unless they are digitalized, what can be digitalized can be pirated.

As far as even monkeys nowadays have an access to and can somehow handle PC - I suppose the distribution is still definitely moving towards the internet, towards the households / homes/ and I expect most of the brick and mortar stores going out of business in a couple of years.

At the same time, internet enables not only a vast choice and secure delivery, but also a massive piracy and variety of short term scams, where the marketers who support this by funding all those wild tube sites and torrents are rather massively damaging the business as a whole.

It's also not 1998 anymore, the surfer is more educated and I guess we have to thank the fathers of the xxx internet for making lots of the potential members scared to even think of using their credit card again..

Smartest thing I've read on GFY in a while. You are correct. Currently, the U.S. economy as a whole, is in a "slowdown." Whether this slowdown actually becomes a "recession" remains to be seen.

hmm, slow down, yes. Housing is literally in a depression, prices dropping and the rest of the economy is hurting. Some people like Allan Greenspan are already saying recession, others not. Semantics aside the world is so tied together economically that no place is unaffected and that will include this industry.

Strip clubs here are going through real slow times too. I've spoken to some people and most mention gas prices and the real estate market woes (lots of lost construction jobs in parts of Florida)

yeah but the banks that issue the cards are all reporting higher default rates. So Visa is just fine cause they are getting increasing charge fees but the banks themselves (and their creditors like Harley Davidson, for example) are reporting higher defaults and i'm guessing that translates into higher credits and chargebacks.

It's not a recession, it's our business coming off it's high.

Not all DVD companies are down or taking a hit, not even close. Just like not all online adult companies are down or have taken a hit, several are very much up.

The "downturn" of this business started to happen far before the eco started to fall. If you wanted to put a solid marker in when our business took a trackable downturn, it would be exactly each time the 2257 rules have came about.

People will cancel Internet access during a recession or money hard times, online porn is part of a technology that costs money - that technology is what has us by the balls.

Wow, I'm shocked at some of the veterans in this industry think. Assuming that the decision to stop watching porn (due to a recession) is a conscious thought - just like the guy surfing TGPs makes a several-points decision to buy a site membership?

Yes, a guy who has a recurring membership may just cancel if things are getting tight, probably more so because he's bored with the content, etc.

A guy may visit his virtual girlfriend on a video chat site a little less often if he's having troubles paying the bills.

But to categorize the buying of porn online (whether site memberships, videos, video chat) along with typical consumer purchasing (a new car, paint the garage, going out for dinner) is simply incorrect and misleading. Is porn recession-proof? Nope, but it is much *closer* in shopping patterns to things like gambling and alcohol which are even mild addictions, and therefore a lot harder habit to break, recession or not.

well said Doc, I agree 100%

It makes me laugh that people actually get paid to report on shit like this and then don't do the research (ie. figure out the real reason that DVD rentals and sales are down). The average Joe will buy into this crap the same way the US has bought into the "War on Terror" it's all very laughable from where I am sitting. Are computer sales down? Are people cancelling their interweb connection? How about their cell phones? Didn't think so.

Yep, very true.

what you have to listen to are the individual trends you are seeing and feeling as a company. you look at those and modify your business to continue to compete and be prosperous. regardless of what anyone here on gfy thinks, the perspectives and resulting reactions are very much individualized based on a multitude of factors that no one person can even factor into the equation. anyone saying that this industry is not affected by the current economic conditions is borderline manic.

4cents.

well, you don't really need a diploma from a college to post on gfy, or an understanding of consumers and purchasing habits either. lol.

[QUOTE=Kevsh;14126099 but it is much *closer* in shopping patterns to things like gambling and alcohol which are even mild addictions, and therefore a lot harder habit to break, recession or not.[/QUOTE]

"Closer" but still ...

Nevada Gambling revenues are down 5% from a year ago (january to January)
Taxable revenue was down 12.63% February to February

The first drop since the recession of 2001.

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/new-data-show-gambling-revenues/story.aspx?guid={368F458C-276B-44D9-B2B5-FE69F6566F18}

You are right as I stated earlier, my wife sister is a dealer with A list gaming company and they cut all dealers hours as of yesterday. They cut her hours in half. Also if someone needs a porn fix you dont have to pay for it anymore. It may not be exactly what you want but it will do considering its free.

i don't gamble much but if i did i surely wouldn't be doing it now.

We are going to see a lot big changes in the adult industry over the next twelve months.

Some of the very large traditional DVD based companies will either go out of business or "merge" with companies with a strong internet presence.