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From Behind Our White Picket Fence Week 176
By Freddy and Eddy
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Farewell to A Labor of Love…

Oftentimes, facing a painful truth is far more difficult than the truth itself.

Such has been the case for the past year with regard to our little adult store on Venice Blvd. Though showered with accolades since opening in 2005  – a cover story on the LA Times Calendar section, appearances on Discovery Channel and Tyra Banks, reality television show offers, numerous print and online praises, among other things  – our little boutique has failed to do what every business must, eventually, to stay alive - turn a profit. And so, four plus years after debuting what we continue to believe is a unique sex-positive shopping experience, we will sadly close the doors in a few weeks to instead focus on our online business (which is thriving), the Love LA Show, and the promising LA Weekly Little Sexy Black Book web presence you are visiting at this very moment.

It’s tempting to blame the economic downturn for the demise of our cozy little sex shop, but again the ugly side of truth rears its head. If we are to be honest, the blame mostly falls on two pillars. The first is the business model itself. From the beginning, we hoped to keep the burden of profit on our website, which attracts significant traffic (resulting in healthy, low-overhead orders), while building our store clientele slowly through word of mouth and media mentions. Over time, we hoped, enough of a customer base would be built to ensure healthy repeat visits and attraction of new patrons until reaching a critical (and sustainable) mass. In this respect, we’ve had a modicum of success, and indeed we continue to see new and familiar faces virtually every day we’re open.

This brings us to the second pillar, which operates in almost diametrical opposition to the first; that is to say the environment we created almost discouraged shopping. With almost no evidence we are an actual business (our location hard to find, products displayed discreetly, free coffee, free DVD and book lending library, and an ethical standard that precluded us from selling unnecessarily), many visitors have come and gone without ever purchasing. This is no fault of theirs, as we were the very ones talking them out of supporting our business. Not only that, but our desire to help in more profound ways meant sometimes spending hours with individuals and couples trying to work through issues better left to therapists, lowering our number of customer interactions and opportunities for sales. It is no wonder our part-time employees over the years outsold us by a wide margin, moving easily through visitors without extending the personal help and understanding, they routinely posted our best sales batches.

All of this provided the “perfect storm” when the economy took a dive last year, compounded by the continued deterioration of Alicia’s mother, whose Parkinson’s Disease, advanced dementia, and $3500.00 per month assisted care fee forced her into our home as the holiday season hit, effectively eliminating one half of our duo from the day to day business operations at the precise moment she was needed most. This totally unwelcome situation not only further damaged our dwindling revenues, but almost ended our marriage. By Valentine’s Day we were barely speaking, let alone having sex, and our bills had reached the point of overwhelming paralysis. We were forced to choose between paying vendors or our home mortgage, credit cards or rent for the store, insurance or food. It only made divine sense that we’d wreck our Honda minivan after cancelling our collision insurance.

But such is the state of the world, right?

Through it all, however, we’ve held fast to the belief that life changes and that such change should be embraced, if not initiated. We took to the road for Spring Break in our beat-up 1985 RV, landing in our favorite RV park (Ocean Mesa) in El Capitan 100 miles later. With just enough distance between us and our store, we began the discussion of how to dig ourselves out of our deep financial hole, plot a business course that made financial sense, and untangle ourselves from the 6 day a week, 10-12 hour per day grind of running a retail store. Many tears were shed, disappointments revisited, and by the time we’d passed through Pismo, threaded our way up the Highway 1 through Big Sur, and landed in Pacific Grove, the answer was obvious. The wonderful experiment that is Freddy and Eddy, “where couples can come,” must evolve to survive.

And survive and thrive it will! Having rededicated half our duo to our website a few weeks back, we’ve seen our online revenues climb steadily back to their previous levels, interest in Love LA spike, and the anticipation of getting our lives back inject excitement into our bedroom we haven’t felt in quite some time. We have already begun planning a weekly Podcast, a road trip across the country this summer to visit fans of our website, and future “Love” shows in locations outside SoCal. You may even see us popping up around town doing seminars in other adult stores, so keep checking back here to follow our crazy adventures and perhaps join in the fun...

Most of all, thanks Los Angeles, for providing the opportunity to do something truly fulfilling, beautiful, sexy, and profound.