but AITA has to respond to new situations and complaints too, and at the moment those things aren’t calls of ‘we’re being bled to death by the council’, they’re about ATVOD and other issues. The AITA website’s recently been re-jigged but the letter should be on there too, to be downloaded, but you can certainly find it online; its contents are in the public domain now.” Wondering what his personal feelings on the unlicensed vs licensed debate were, industry veteran Inglis was well placed to give his overview: “Comparing licensed and unlicensed, legal and sometimes ‘dodgy’, that often comes down to R18 sales. Those dropped almost 30% year on year for a time, since the downturn four years ago, but last year it levelled off. I can’t give exact figures but over the last 12 to 18 months DVD sales within sex establishments have stabilised, generally. That’s partly due to - well, not everyone loves the latest technology. You can watch movies on your computer but people still go to the cinema. Similarly, there are people who prefer their adult entertainment on DVD and I feel that market has bottomed-out, for the next few years anyway. When the overall financial situation improves, so will adult sales. Image quality, the full film, not clips, the collectors of their favourite stars; there’s a lot of reasons to chose DVD over ephemeral content. But the shrinking market has meant shrinking wall-space given over to films and that’s been filled by a growth in toy sales, to female customers, plus the improved choice and quality of lingerie which is on the market now. Perhaps a shop would have been 70% DVD and 30% others in the past, but that’s tended to change.” Turning to his spin-off business,
SEVLicensing.co.uk, he explained how nearly 30 years of experience was something that can be bought, for a reasonable fee. “
SEVLicensing.co.uk has come out of my work within the adult industry and my experience can save clients a lot of money. Where someone needs in-depth, serious advice on a complex situation, perhaps a new licence application on a change-of-use premises, they need
renewal through etc.”
“THE FIRST THING WE DO, LET’S KILL ALL THE LAWYERS”
David Boothby of Pulse & Cocktails responded to my questions by email, saying: “All 23 Pulse and Cocktails shops are licensed. To get shops licensed - although incredibly difficult in some locations and expensive, as there are a lot of T’s to cross - an application will almost always require good legal representation, resulting in a few thousand pounds that can be added to most licence fees. However, it’s our policy to be licensed at every store.” He continued: “You asked are we licensed to enable us to sell R18 material? In law we need to be licensed; the majority of our sales are from products designed to encourage or stimulate sexual activity, and that is the legal requirement for a licence. The fact that a licensed shop can sell R18 material and serious bondage is incidental to that of the 1982 Miscellaneous Act. This refers to a licence ‘Not being required where sales of items designed to encourage or stimulate sexual activity are not a significant percentage of turnover or profit’. It doesn’t say which and significant has not been defined in law. This law applies equally to bricks and mortar stores, online retailers, or other retailers who sell sex products. Many sail close to the wind with this one if challenged for proof, therefore it is not an area of risk that we want any part in.”
Referring to the protection licensing gives Pulse and Cocktails, Boothby explained: “As R18 material can only be purchased face to face from a licensed store, this has given us a great deal of exclusivity and trading advantage, and contrary to general trends we’re finding our R18 sales rising. The majority of our customers do not want ‘bits of free porn’ or downloads, all of which could soon be put behind an
age verification firewall. Buying customers want to come into large stores and look at thousands of titles covering every area of interest or persuasion they may be interested in.
“In answer to your other questions, as to what factors we weigh up before deciding on new stores; we’ve opened three in the last year - Firstly, although the law is poorly and unwillingly policed by local councils, we would rather be licensed by them than run the risk of being prosecuted or closed down. Secondly, we could not be who we are, and offer the complete selection and shopping experience our customers get when visiting one of our stores [if we were unlicensed]. You ask about licence fees, there is no consistency to fees charged. They should only reflect the cost to the council of their administration - but they don’t - but to look just for cheap licence fee locations would be as silly as opening a shop down an empty alley because it had cheap rent.” Concluding, Boothby said: “We’re thankful that the 1982 Miscellaneous Act has given us exclusivity and legal security, which is not enjoyed anywhere in Europe or North America, where their markets are deteriorating into a free-for-all. Porn in Europe and areas of North America is almost worthless, but that is certainly not the case in the UK where it’s a much- valued area for us. Online sex toy sites compete on price, decimating their own margins, and sexy lingerie is mainstream now, not the preserve of the exclusive product it was for more risqué shops. “No, the future for us all in retail is still challenging, online sales may be rising, but for the vast majority of shoppers in a specialised marketplace such as ours, it’s a very poor alternative to visiting a good licensed store: Pay Today Play Today.” It’s nice to end on an upbeat note, but you get another retail Shakespeare joke anyway: My local camping shop is having a small summer sale. The sign says, ‘Now is the discount of our winter tent’.
“Porn in Europe and areas of North America is almost
worthless, but that is certainly not the case in the UK where it’s a much-valued area for us.”
professional help to avoid going down a costly route. On occasions they’ve already gone far too far, ignoring the church around the corner, and they need steering back on course. My experience with compliance, negotiating with local authorities, their processes and how objections can be dealt with - one little thing can scupper months of work and thousands of pounds of investment.
“Councils have a responsibility to protect the public in their area. Adult shops do have an effect on their neighbourhoods but there are ways to protect the area without blocking an application altogether. I can help give that perspective and avoid too much ‘judgemental thinking’ at the application stage. They may overreact to objections, but the reality is most sex shops trade quite happily, causing no problems, next to ladies hairdressers and food stores. They don’t ‘jump out and get people’ and that’s the way to sell them to councils. Especially ones with old-fashioned and out-of-date views. I’ve been licensing shops since 1983 and know what sorts of things upset councils, how to be ready for an inspection, how to get a
David Boothby: “It’s our policy to be licensed at every store.” 49
Erotic Trade Only June 2012
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