If Eric Johnson had his way, he would make Kristen Bjorn do a new movie every week.
"Our customers love his stuff," says Johnson, president of Toronto, Canada-based Sureflix Digital Distribution, the parent company of Maleflixxx.com, one of the most successful video-on-demand websites in the business. "We have movies of his that are twenty years old that once we've put them on, they've sold and they've never made less. Every month they make the same amount of money. It never stops."
It's a relationship that is a special one for Johnson, who notes that Bjorn's involvement with Maleflixxx signaled a key point in the company's growth. Knowing that someone of Bjorn's caliber was interested helped Maleflixxx cement a solid reputation that has since attracted almost everyone else in the business.
"It was a huge thing for us to get Kristen Bjorn, because he's a smart guy," Johnson says. "He's a leader in the industry, and he saw what we were doing and went, 'You know what, you guys have got it.' And I think we've done a very good job of proving to him that we had the right thing."
That "thing" started in 2000 when entrepreneur Erik Schannen became the technological guru and force behind the design and conception of the site. The challenges Maleflixxx faced were convincing studios to trust them with their most important asset without a proven track record, and overcoming the consumer bias of the day.
"At the time, online streaming video was mostly short clips shown in small, grainy formats," Johnson says. "We had to convince consumers to purchase our product online and we had to convince them that we had the best technology available. We taught them to expect more from their Internet experience."
With more than 125 studios, Maleflixxx has everything from mainstream to edgy, amateur to classic, with a theme list also helping viewers make decisions. It has exclusive content deals with a handful of big name studios: Bjorn, Lucas Kazan, Studio 2000, MSR, High Octane, Matt Sterling, Big Blue Productions, and Sharpshooter. The company also has two programs — the Private Label and Build Your Own Cinema programs — that allow customization of the site for larger affiliates, studios, and webmasters.
The company regularly surveys its consumer base asking customers what they want, what they like, what they don’t like, and how the site can improve. Maleflixxx — which charges by scene — tracks what its customers watch, when and how they watch it, and in what combination. With detailed information on every rental, they compile a massive database to analyze. "We take all that information and decide how to merchandise the product," Johnson says.
Maleflixxx has localized its network in six languages (English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese), and Johnson says that the company pioneered two industry innovations: the pay-per-view consumption model and scene-based rentals. While there is some overlap, Johnson says the hard-copy viewer and the VOD viewer are usually different customers.
"One of the benefits of online distribution is that we're reaching people in eighty-five countries. And I know that most of those countries don't have gay adult video stores where people can walk in and rent or buy it, and where maybe they can't even get mail orders because it's prohibited from being mailed into their country," he says. "We have people up to eighty years old that consume the product."
Johnson says that giving viewers as much information about each scene — from models to themes to sexual content — is a key to keeping customers happy. Keeping the studios happy is just as important, and while all of the clients get the same care, they don't all collect the same check.
"We've never believed in all-you-can-eat sites where it's one low price," Johnson says. "How do you put a brand new Titan production that they spent $100,000 dollars on up against some amateur title that's been shot in three hours in a hotel room, and say for the same price you get all that? That's not fair. And it doesn't support the industry. It doesn't allow studios that spend a lot of money on their productions a higher price point. We sell the higher quality content at a higher price."
Different studios participate in different ways, Johnson says, with each deal dependent upon what the studio brings to the deal and what the site does for them. "We want to treat all the studios fairly, and we want to make sure that everybody that's participating in this is getting their fair share based on what they're providing to the deal," he says.
"We've slowly closed every single studio, with a handful left that we don't have of the marquee studios. I believe in the near future they're all going to come on board; it's just a matter of time. When they see the value of the relationship that we bring, it's not about percentages, it's about how much money you make with us."
If more proof of its influence is needed, note that Maleflixxx Television — the world's first digital cable channel devoted exclusively to hardcore gay programs — is poised to lead the technology charge and the call for more mainstream acceptance of gay culture. Launched last April, the successful Canadian channel is just another sign that the Maleflixxx name is here to stay.
"We're getting into the quiet, humble, and proud part of the development of our company where it's, like, people actually know who we are now," Johnson says. "It's a little more than that, but it's nice to have a successful business and be able to take a leadership position and be able to support the industry."
Contact info: 416-703-8186; [email protected]; Maleflixxx.com; Maleflixxx-Affiliates.com
