Online novelty retailer Stockroom.com has acquired San Francisco-based Stormy Leather, a leading manufacturer of fetish clothing and toys.
Although Stockroom.com has been a steadily growing organism since its creation in 1988 by 21-year-old college student Joel Tucker, the company "definitely seems to be experiencing quite a growth spurt this year," according to Marketing Director Juli Crockett.
Prior to the recent Stormy Leather acquisition, Stockroom.com already was expanding its manufacturing with the debut of its Kinklab line and the acquisition of Syren Latex. The company launched a redesigned Stockroom.com website in 2006, as well as an all-male version of the Stockroom site, GayStockroom.com. Stockroom.com's long-awaited affiliate program launched in early 2006, allowing the company to provide for all toy stores in the Kink.com network of sites.
As it did with the Syren acquisition in 2006, Stockroom.com plans to bring the entire Stormy Leather production team on board and plans to renovate the Stormy Leather retail store.
"When Stockroom.com purchased Syren, our design team performed a makeover on both the store and the product line, [which] breathed new life into the company," said Stockroom/Syren Latex designer Jeff of L.A. "Reinvigorating the Stormy image will involve the same strategy of carefully redesigning the store and selectively editing and adding to the product line that we exercised with Syren Latex. The renovated Stormy store will not only be more aesthetically pleasing, but visitors will find it easier to shop."
Stockroom.com's Tucker said, "I am happy and excited about Stockroom's acquisition of Stormy Leather. These are two complementary enterprises, each with a long history of positive community involvement and industry leadership, and each founded upon similar values.
"When I started doing leather crafts in my living room while I was still a college student, I didn’t really imagine that such a sizable and complex operation would sprout from that seed," Tucker said, "or that it would allow me to work with such an admirable, entertaining, diverse, smart—and let’s not forget cool and glamorous—team of individuals."
Tucker told AVN Adult Novelty Business that Stockroom.com was the only potential buyer Stormy considered. "Pete and Chrissy told me that they didn’t want to approach anyone else until finding out whether Stockroom would be interested," he says. "Naturally, we were."
"Stormy wanted someone that would take care of their brand and their employees," Crockett explained.
Both companies have been able to balance rapid growth with an in-house family atmosphere. Crockett told ANB, "When I started working for Stockroom—out of Joel’s apartment back in 1997—it was nuts to watch a company grow so quickly and yet maintain the same family feeling."
To clear out the store for the renovation, Stormy Leather will hold a "Before" sale from April 20- 30. The store will then be closed for renovations until May 15, when the doors to the new, improved Stormy Leather will open and an "After" sale will begin. The Grand Opening play party and fashion show are scheduled for Friday, May 18, at the Stormy Leather retail store.
Skin Two once cited Stormy Leather as "possibly the best fetish store [it has] ever seen." The SF Bay Guardian 27th Annual Readers' Poll voted Stormy Leather "Best Leather Shop" just after the company's 18th birthday at the beginning of August 2001. Now, more than 20 years after its creation, Stormy Leather has been voted several times for "Best Women's Leather Store" by the Society for Human Sexuality.
