IS THIS BUSINESS KILLING ITSELF? :: Simply Jimmy D :: Breakin' News or Breakin' Balls: It's all the same to me!

jimmyd _writes "I received this email from Big Joe this morning:

TO: JimmyD
RE: This Business is Killing Itself

The adult industry is made up of a bunch of idiots and perverts that do not understand anything about business. Coming into this business over a year ago, all I see is people stumbling over their feet just to screw each other for small amounts of money. I see sales people undercut prices, and bringing the whole industry down, just because they don't know how to sell in any other way. I run a DVD production house, I see the quality of products we do, I know we can kick Hollywood's ass with our DVD's , but I still have to sell it for a price that is ridiculous.

People wake up, if this will continue, we are all going to be out of business.

Big Joe

Thanks for the email, BJ.

First off, I completely agree with you regarding the "idiots and perverts" part, although I'm not sure being a pervert is necessarily a character flaw if you're a pornographer. Adding "idiot" to that flaw (which is often the case) might not be a plus.

I also agree with you when you mentioned, "...all I see is people stumbling over their feet just to screw each other for small amounts of money."

Unfortunately, this too is a reality in the jiz biz. Someday a wise man or woman may write of this business, "Never have so few tried to fuck so many for so little." Of course, in that statement I'm also refering to this industry's proclivity for trying to put one over on their loyal consumers. I will admit, though, that for a select group of people in this business, my possible future sage's quote might read, "Never have so very few fucked so many for so much."

You see, Joe, the jiz biz is very much like much much of the Third World in that there isn't much of a middle-class here. It's basically made up of a select few "haves," and a whole lot of "have nots," all struggling, and biting, and kicking, and back-stabbing, and fucking over their friends and co-workers in blind hope of becoming one of the "haves." And to make matters worse, there's a substantial number of porn citizens who believe they're part of the "have" community, but in fact they are not. Why? Because what they consider wealth is really not, and it's often very temporary. A new girl comes into the business. She hails from East Texas or some other depressed, white trash section of the country. She's never made more than a few bucks in a titty bar and suddenly she comes out here, fucks everyday for a month on camera, and stuffs 30 grand or so in her pocket. She's suddenly rich, right? Well, she thinks so as she goes out and buys a new car, rents an expensive condo, and goes on a shopping spree on Melrose. Of course, Month Two in the business sees her making less than half what Month One made her and the income decline continues until finally she's hooking on the internet. Where they fall from there I'm not sure, and I'm not sure I want to know.

But I guess I'm rambling on and getting off-subject here. We do sometimes have people who achieve certain lower-levels of wealth, but it's often a temporary condition. Today you're the hot, new, director churning out movie after movie, supposed hit after supposed hit, and making some fairly semi-serious dough. Then tomorrow you've suddenly become "Jimmy who?" and wondering about making next month's rent.

You also wrote, "I see sales people undercut prices, and bringing the whole industry down, just because they don't know how to sell..."

I gotta tell you, Joe, I'm not sure it's the sales people who are making the decisions to bring the prices down--I'm pretty sure it's their lords and masters making those calls. Not only that, but most sales people in this business do very little selling anyway. At least that's been my observation over the years. They're more like glorified order takers. Yeah, there's some exceptions to that. I've seen some salespersons actually get on the phone and "sell." But for the most part, they get on the phone and ask to take down the buyer's next order. In fact, they often sound like the counter help in a deli.

"You want DVDs with that order of VHS, Irving?"

"No thanks. I'm on a diet and trying to cut back. Just give me the VHS unless the cook's made up some spiffs today. Mmmm boy! I love spiffs!"

I swear, if some company's didn't have a FAX machine for buyer's to submit orders, there would be no "selling" going on at all.

"Harry! Baby! How's sales going today?"

"I don't know. Let me check the FAX."

Your last statement about "kicking Hollywood's ass," Joe, might be a case of wishful thinking. I don't think we're ever going to kick Hollywood's ass in anything we do. And if you think about it, why should we even try? We're supposed to be making masturbatory aids here, not mainstream feature films. I'm not saying the quality doesn't have immense amount of room to grow, but when all is said and done, we're making fuck flicks whose job is to titillate and arouse. Sure, DVD technology allows us to do that in bigger and better ways, but let's not lose sight of our mandate, i.e., to visually kick-start as many dicks as possible in the hottest possible way.

Thanks again for the email Big Joe. I was wondering what I was going to write about today. You solved that little problem.

"


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