Matt Owens used to hear the suspicious declarations from industry peers and fans who weren't convinced. Straight college men jerking off next to each other, even kissing or sucking each other's dick? Bullshit!
"We used to have a big problem, especially when we went to the Gay Erotic Expo, trying to convince people who were like, 'Oh, they're not straight!' But the last time we went, we had no problem with that aspect. I think we've come to get a reputation online that they really are straight, so no one harasses us about that anymore."
Owens understands why some people can be so unbelieving: He used to be one of them. "I’m just a guy from the South who was looking at websites, and I got tired of all the fake stuff," he says. "I got tired of all these sites saying, 'Look at these straight guys!' And the minute they talked, the purse fell out. So right from the get-go, I was like, We're going to do this with only real straight guys."
So in November 2001, StraightCollegeMen.com launched, and quickly caught on. Owens knew that as long as gay men existed, so too would their fascination with seeing just how far straight men might stray. "My personal preference is to get to know the guys and then just see their personalities in addition to seeing their goods," Owens says. "What you see is what you get. There's no re-shooting, there's no cheating the audience. There's so much out there that does."
The initial clips were solos, all shot in Owens' living room. As the site grew, fans wanted to see two men together. Memberships increased, so Owens gave it a shot. "The very first shoot with two guys is pretty darn tame… but things just kept growing and growing, and as membership keeps getting bigger, the more we can afford to pay the models. So during this last anniversary shoot, we rented an entire island and gave away a truck to the best performer."
That shoot with four guys had even Owens amazed. A straight guy fucking himself with a banana? Yep! "The whole purpose of that was, if they do what they do now for money — which is not bad money — for a truck, a tangible object… they all impressed me. I was jaw-dropped. They were eating cum and butt-fucking."
Money and prizes have proven to be a tempting incentive (Second Place for that recent shoot was a year's worth of rent) for straight men to play with each other. The key to getting true straight men comes in the screening process, during which Owens asks plenty of questions to make sure he's not being fooled.
"They don't know what they're really getting involved with when they start. It's more just come in, do an audition — just a solo, which is not gay. We ask them, 'Would you prefer to be in a video with a guy or a girl?' It's very open-ended. They pretty much have to say girl, because even if they say, 'I don't really care,' we still press. Some of the guys are just in it for the money. They're all really straight. It's a big area in degrees of homophobia. Some don't care: anything at all, whether it looks gay or whatever. They're not signing up to do this not-so-straight stuff… it's sort of a bending process. You don't start them out with the most intense thing ever the first time."
The popularity had fans clamoring for DVDs, but brief forays into VHS and only two DVD volumes were all fans had to tide them over until January 2005, when Owens and his small staff finally started to unleash 30 volumes (and growing) comprised of content from the site.
"I'm a bit of a quality control freak, so nothing less than perfect was going to work. So it took us awhile," Owens says. "I finally just gave myself a kick in the butt and said, 'You know, it's crazy to ignore. We've already got the content, it's really just moving it over into the DVD format.' "
The line was recently picked up by distributor Pulse, the new home for Falcon. "Pulse took it on and put some credibility behind it, and it's been selling great. Pulse is very happy with us. Stores are now re-ordering, which is great."
Owens typically launches a new video on the site about every three weeks, but 2006 calls for a new DVD every other week for Pulse, which will increase the site's shooting schedule. Owens has less than a year's-worth of previously shot content to catch up with release on DVD. "Within the next six months, we'll get to that point where it comes out on the website and perhaps two weeks later it's on DVD." And with the DVDs opening up the StraightCollegeMen world to a whole new audience, 2006 figures to be a big year.
"I knew it would work, just because I was so tired of the other websites that say, 'These are straight guys!' and they're so not straight, and anybody with half a bit of gaydar could tell. But they continue to market it that way. So I just knew, Let's do this for real, there are a whole bunch of people that will appreciate it, and that's what happened. It just keeps growing. The brand is pretty big right now, and it's getting bigger. It's sort of the no-bullshit that makes it what it is, that makes people want to watch."
Contact info: StraightCollegeMen.com. Distributed by Pulse, 818-428-6609; [email protected].
