Written by Jennifer @ 8:15 pm

This week I was a panelist at a teach-in entitled “Survival Strategies for Small Business during an Economic Downturn” hosted by Metro Independent Business Alliance in the Twin Cities.   Panelists included a revered record store owner, the marketing genius behind the first fair-trade coffee wholesaler in the US, a second generation industry leading independent appliance retailer, a representative from the Small Business Administration’s SCORE program, and myself.  We spoke with a room that included upwards of sixty folks ranging from an optometrist, a music distributor, children’s toy store owner, bankers, insurance agents, independent media representatives, a music distributor, a bookseller, and a graphic artist to name just a few.    

Several of the attendees had never heard a first person perspective of what it is like making a living in the adult industry and they certainly weren’t used to words like queer, bisexual, dildo, heterocentric, or vibrator being confidently projected from the front of the room at a business networking meeting.  What I think we all learned is that small, independent businesses, regardless of specific industry, have very similar struggles and often the solutions we find are amazingly adaptable to one another’s circumstances. 

There were a few recurring themes from the evening.  One of which was, that folks are finding a return to local buying, principled business, and mission driven decision making are creating success in the midst of the colossal failures of so many of these news making colossal corporations.  Smitten Kitten and our allied businesses in the adult industry are flourishing right now because we’ve been committed to principled action since the beginning.  A new listserv has recently begun for feminist identified sex toy retailers across the country and I believe it will help push the pace of change even faster. 

I am so happy to see that since 2003 when The Smitten Kitten started selling only non-toxic sex toys – a time when this had not be tried before and several people thought we could never make a go of it without selling cheap, outrageous mark-up “jelly” toys- there are now a handful of stores across the country who are not only making it, but are being successful!  Not only are we collectively proving that this business model can and does work, but we are seeing a ripple effect happening throughout the industry beginning with more educated and demanding consumers, to more responsible retailers, to better educated distributors and more safety conscious manufacturing. 

The METRO IBA panelists represented other industries who likewise struggle to succeed within markets that are seemingly overpowered by the giants that drive prices so low that quality necessarily suffers.  But we also prove that the independent sellers among us are flourishing as well!  Smitten Kitten is doing excellent business so far this year and we are thrilled to have not only just been honored as the “Business of the Year” by Twin Cities Quorum (GLBTA Chamber of Commerce) but also given the honor again this year as “Best Sex Toy Shop” by the City Pages. 

Cheers to good, safe sex, good music, and good coffee!

Written by Jennifer @ 8:23 pm

So much bandwidth is being used to complain about Amazon.com’s apparent policy of de-ranking so-called “adult” books.  Essentially Amazon has enacted a corporate policy that they feel is in the best interest of their business and are excluding potentially offensive content by de-ranking “adult” content books from bestseller lists and in some cases removing titles from search results altogether. 

Most of the complaints I have read today in my decidedly unscientific content analysis of google returns using the search terms “derank amazon” seem to be the fact that this policy 1. unfairly excludes legitimate books that include GLBTQ or feminist topics and  2. that the policy is not being applied consistently even between publishers of different editions of the same books.  See Carolyn Kellogg’s blog published on the LA Times website yesterday for a quick and dirty synopsis of the flap.

But wait, is that the point or is it much more fundamental than that.  Fundamentally this policy is rude–depending on your point of view.  It’s rude because I don’t think adult content is necessarily offensive and certainly nothing to be saved from by a paternalistic corporation claiming to have my or your best interests at heart.  Having said that, Amazon.com is a business, not a library or other public institution that is supported by taxpayer money and that means they can do whatever the fuck they want- pretty much.  They have the right to censor their inventory in any way they want.  So if you don’t like it, don’t buy from them!  Sign the petition and forward the news and do all of that, but don’t forget to actually buy the book from a reputable bookseller who actually does have your best interest in mind.

How about this, buy your books from Amazon Bookstore the oldest feminist bookstore in the country who sued Amazon.com for trademark infringement.  Yes the oldest continuously operating feminist bookstore in the country sued Amazon.Com and settled for an unspecified amount of money.  Don’t get too excited it wasn’t enough money to keep them solvent for more than a few years but they now have a new smart-as-hell owner with the passion and heart to make it thrive.  When Amazon Bookstore changed ownership they had to let go of the trade name they had been using since 1977 as per their agreement with Amazon.com and now “Amazon Bookstore” has been re-named “True Colors”!  Go to their website: http://www.amazonbookstorecoop.com/

Don’t forget that it does matter who you do business with.  Your money is important. Hopefully enough customer backlash will occur over this policy decision to make Amazon.com rethink their cost/benefit analysis, but in the meantime give your cash to the myriad retailers who will appreciate it.  The authors and small publishers whose livelihood depends on sales volume will appreciate it too.

Here’s the real rub.  The folks who might inadvertently stumble over titles on Amazon.com via a best seller list or search return, that they might not otherwise find are the ones who are suffering.  While Amazon.com has every right to deny potential customers the pleasure of understanding anal sex, you’d be a better friend if you just told them about it yourself, shared your books freely and then bought them their own copy so you can have your copy back.  By it from us, True Colors http://www.amazonbookstorecoop.com/ or your own local radical bookstore. While you’re at it, request it from your library too! 

Written by Jennifer @ 7:20 pm

I just watched the film Milk for the second time this month.  There are so many memorable scenes in that film, but do you remember when Harvey and his boyfriend were standing in the street admiring his brand new Castro Camera storefront and the liquor store owner came across the street to “welcome” them to the neighborhood.   Harvey wanted to join the Eureka Valley Merchants Association.  Do you remember what happened next?  They were threatened- told that the police would pull their license because the San Francisco police were happy to enforce God’s law. 

The next morning after making love Harvey was cooking breakfast for his lover and over the sizzle of the skillet he said, “We’ll form our own business association.  We’ll start with the gay businesses.  We’ll get the addresses of every customer who comes in the store for a roll of film and we’ll ask them what they want.. what they need changed..we’ll get some money rolling in here..revitalize the neighborhood.” 

To which his young lover says, “Harvey, what’s with all this political activist crap.  Man I thought you were a goddamn republican.”

“I’m a business man, Scott and businesses should be good to their customers even if their customers are gay.”

Whether you want to call it “all that goddamn political crap” or “just business,” Harvey Milk helped change not only the political landscape of San Francisco but helped inspire a movement for queer economic and political empowerment by showing how good business can be a tool for political empowerment and social justice.  That’s exactly what happened.  Harvey successfully organized businesses and in so doing made allies in unusual places- not only did he make a reluctant ally out of the liquor store owner across the street, but with the Teamsters Union too.  Simple economics.  Dollars and cents is a bottom line- a common denominator. 

It honestly hadn’t occurred to me that the work we (and I mean “we” as in all of us here in this room) do in business was part of a queer economic movement until Sam, Executive Director of Quorum, mentioned the movement in passing at an event a couple years ago.  I stopped her and asked her to explain what she meant by the “movement” in that context and she gave a wonderfully eloquent and impromptu explanation.  That was my light bulb moment.  It wasn’t the only one I’ve had in my life, but it was a major one.

 I obviously run a politicized business.  The Smitten Kitten is a woman-owned, dyke owned business in a hyper-heterocentric and often misogynist adult industry.   I come from a radical feminist tradition where we all know that “the personal is political” and orgasms are about as personal as it gets- or as public as it gets depending who you are.  The Smitten Kitten is a community centered business whose mission is and was from the start to make enough money and garner enough resources to give back to the community.  When my friends and I opened our business we aimed to create a space where we could belong, where we could build a sex positive community, and celebrate sex, sexuality and gender expression.

We didn’t understand what we were doing in the greater context of queer economic empowerment.  We certainly didn’t understand the nuts and bolts business of it either.  A long way from economically empowered, we were struggling.  We were doing what I know now were really ridiculous things just because we didn’t know any better.  But one by one, customers came in anyway and bought butt plugs, picked up floggers, tried on harnesses and bought dildos to take home to their sweethearts.   We sold a ton of lube, lots of condoms and so many groundbreaking, radical books and videos!         

Twin Cities Quorum and the wonderful relationships I’ve built through this organization have helped me not only learn business, but reconcile the business of my business with the radical politic of my business.  Really, they’re one in the same, but it was a process for me to figure that out.  Now I am proud to say that The Smitten Kitten which began with a grand total capital investment of $30,000 sold just over 1.1 million dollars worth of sex toys last year. 

Will all of The Smitten Kitten staff please stand up.  These people are the heart and soul of our organization and I am so proud of them.  Please help me congratulate them on jobs so well done!

I want you all to congratulate yourselves too.  You should feel good about supporting our local GLBT and allied chamber of commerce.  You are part of a movement and your money is important- now more than ever.  Support member businesses.  Invite people who aren’t yet members to join.  Think right now about who you know who could benefit from membership.  You’re neighborhood bakery, your tailor, your favorite restaurant… think about it, your favorite sex shop might not necessarily have been your first thought for who should be a part of this chamber, but look what happened, look at the difference it made. 

So to all of you who are political activists, goddamn Republicans or just business people, Thank you. 

Written by Jennifer @ 6:29 pm

1. The total start-up cost for Smitten Kitten was just $30,000 in 2003.

2. Inga Muscio’s book “Cunt” inspired our start-up philosophy.

3. We learned the organizational and research skills it took to open Smitten Kitten in the Minnesota State University, Mankato Women’s Studies program.

4. Jennifer (that’s me) is the sole owner of Smitten Kitten. Jessie and Jessica are both doing other things now.

5. The Smitten Kitten serves Peace Coffee for free to customers (when we have a fresh pot brewed)

6. We teach workshops about feminist entrepreneurship and consult start-up businesses.

7. In addition to being Smitten Kitten team members, our staff are also talented in other areas: we have a professional midwife, an improvisational comedian, a women’s health advocate, a teacher, and an illustrator on staff.

8. Smitten kitten never hosts any gender-exclusive events- that means that we don’t do any “women only” workshops. People of all genders are always welcome all of the time!

9. We are members of Twin Cities Quorum, our local glbt chamber of commerce as well as NGLCC the National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce.

10. We have had three different websites since we opened in 2003.

11. We had a knitting group that met in the store every Sunday morning for 2 1/2 years, now we’re starting a new parent’s group called “Sexy Mama’s Sunday Mornings”.

12. Smitten Kitten was a special guest of Sweden’s pride festival in Stockholom in 2006 where we introduced Outlaw Leather strap-on harnesses in Europe for the first time.

13. The Eroscilator is a popular staff favorite vibrator at The Smitten Kitten

14. We receieved a terroristic threat in 2003 after we “came-out” about the issues with toxic toys in the adult toy industry.

15. We have had two pet hamsters who lived with us in the store, Cooter and Anna. We loved them dearly.

16. Smitten Kitten offers benefits and health insurance for employees, domestic partners and their families, who work more than 28 hours per week.

17. The first toy the Smitten Kitten ever sold was a Fun Factory, Dinky Digger. We sold it over the phone to my mother in Alabama.

18. $pread Magazine is the only magazine we sell at The Smitten Kitten

19. Smitten Kitten has a FaceBook page and a fan site at “TsK Minneapolis” and “Fans of The Smitten Kitten”

20. The furthest any customers have driven specifically to come to the Smitten Kitten is 456 miles- from Winnipeg

21. We have shipped sex toys to every continent except Antarctica

22. One time the US Postal Service returned a package to us because the addressee was deceased.

23. About three or four people per month come in the store because they think we’re a pet store.

24. My friend Megan Hoogland owned a tattoo shop and she mentored us about owning a business as women in a male-dominated industry. She also let us use her office to start up Smitten Kitten before we had a place of our own. See: http://www.meganhoogland.com

25. Our store was broken into once and the theives stole cash out of the register but forgot to bring a bag or think to grab a shopping bag to put the money in. They tried to run with it (mostly change) after the alarm sounded and proceeded to drop most of it in the street as they were running away.

Written by Jennifer @ 9:30 pm

Some sex toys are toxic. I know it.

My first encounter with this issue was a series of unfortunate ones with a purple, jelly dildo I bought from Good Vibrations when I was in college. I can’t remember how I first learned about Good Vibrations, but it was most likely from a reference in one of the books about lesbians that I discovered at my college’s LGBT center when I was first coming out. I can’t remember exactly, but I’m sure I spent part of that semester’s student loan disbursement and several hours poring through their online catalogue before I decided to click the “purchase” button. I waited in nervous anticipation for a week for the Brown truck to show up with my purple dildo.

I thought it was weird that it came floating in a sea of foam peanuts without any packaging but instead wrapped in a clear plastic sandwich baggie. I tried it out even though it smelled strange and I felt a little funny about it. It burned a little at first and then more later. I didn’t know why. I tried it again and again and it burned more and more. I used the same lubricant I always did. I cleaned it as per the photocopied instructions that I found amongst the peanuts and I got paranoid that I had some sort of vaginal infection. And then my purple, sandwich baggie dildo began to pit and get sticky despite my diligent reading, re-reading and careful execution of the care instructions. Finally, I threw it away with an awkward mash-up of failure, shame and disappointment.

That mash-up was internalized until, through the process of opening my own sex toy store, I learned what the real deal was with my purple sandwich baggie dildo. It was toxic. Now I have damn good reasons to believe that I bought a phthalate filled vinyl dildo that was not only a heinous waste of my time and my money, but was horrible for my body too. Some sex toys are toxic. My vagina told me not to trust that purple, sandwich baggie dildo but I didn’t listen. I listened to the bill of goods Good Vibrations sold me instead.

When my friends and I opened The Smitten Kitten in 2003, we modeled our starting inventory after Good Vibrations, a store formerly known as Toys In Babeland, and a store that has since been sold to Good Vibrations called Grand Opening. We meticulously planned and strategized about how to best spend our ten thousand dollars to buy our opening inventory. We took into account things like size, shape, function, cost, color, packaging, manufacturer and most importantly what our “sister stores” were selling too. We anxiously awaited the arrival of that same Brown truck.

No kidding, even the cardboard was sweating when the boxes arrived. Our first shipment of inventory arrived on one of the hottest days of the summer. Each of us opened a box right away and each of us discovered that our products were beading some sort of oily substance. The super slippery oil was leaching through the peanuts and soaking the boxes. It smelled like a headache - the kind of headache that hangs on even after getting fresh air and drinking water. We tried to wash a few of the vibrators, but they beaded again with the same oily substance.

The shipment was almost an entire loss. At first I didn’t connect the problems I had with the purple sandwich baggie dildo and the sweaty cardboard sex toys we had now. I didn’t make the connection because I was still under the impression that my problem had been with my vagina or my technique or something else but NOT the product itself. Knowing what I know now, that was really fucked up.

Now I know that phthalates feel and look like oil as they leach out of vinyl. Now I know that many “jelly” toys are made out of vinyl. Now I know that you can smell phthalates as they “off-gas” from plastics. Now I know that breathing phthalates will give you a headache. Now I know that phthalates can cause burning sensations when they come in contact with skin. Now I know that heat causes chemical reactions, like the off-gassing of the phthalates in those July-hot boxes, to happen faster. Now I know that the temperature inside my vagina was about 98 degrees, the same as the air temperature that summer day. Now I know that some phthalates have been associated with certain cancers in laboratory tests. Now I know that these same chemicals can wreak havoc with your hormones. Now I know that many of the sex toy manufacturers and stores I used to buy my sex toys from knew all of this before I did. Now I know it wasn’t my vagina. Now I know it wasn’t my technique. Now I know it was my purple, sandwich baggie dildo.

Do the research yourself! Don’t take my word for it! You might, like a lot of other sex toy users and folks in the sex toy industry, come to different conclusions. The guiding principle at The Smitten Kitten is: Unless I’d use it, I don’t sell it. That’s the conclusion I came to about how to run my business. More and more sex toy stores are coming to the same conclusion and more and more manufacturers are starting to take notice. Not only is it just the right thing to do, it’s good business.

There are several lessons to be learned here but if you take nothing else from this story please let it be: Trust your instincts and honor your body no matter what.