Adult Presence Increases At 2003 VSDA Show: Final Update

Video producers – adult included – breathed a sigh of relief on the second day of the Video Software Dealers Association's (VSDA) Home Entertainment 2003 Expo, as still more attendees flocked to the open suites on two upper floors of the Venetian Hotel & Casino here.

But while attendance figures were not available at press time, the overall number of exhibitors at this year's show had decreased from the previous year, though the adult industry presence was slightly greater. In all, 11 hardcore manufacturers took suites on the 33rd floor of the hotel, occupying most of one of the floor's three wings, with mainstream companies dominating the remaining halls as well as the entire 32nd floor, while Hustler and Vivid split a gigantic suite at the end of the hall on the 35th floor.

"The acquisition of VCA has been a priority of ours for some time, and we finally got that accomplished," noted Jimmy Flynt II, Hustler's national marketing director. "This is a year after our acquisition of the distribution of the Vivid titles, and we're strengthening our distribution base. Hustler Video is expanding; we're expanding our lines and changing around some things, taking some titles out and replacing them. 

"Barely Legal, of course, is not one of them; that's been one of our best sellers right along, and we're also doing very well with Young Sluts, Inc," Flynt II said. "In fact, I was the one who brought Kat Slater on board, after I met her through some of my mainstream contacts. She's a very good director. And we're just up here with the stuff we love, that I think really says what Hustler Video is all about, and that's hardcore, and we're here talking with our New York retailers and distributors and seeing what we can do for them." 

"Things are really going well," he continued. "Our retail operations are dynamite and we're rolling new locations out. I can tell you that the next location we open will be Ft. Lauderdale. Our apparel lines have really taken off; it's been a bout three years, and we're really doing phenomenal business in all the malls across the United States now. Things at LFP just couldn't be better." 

The folks at VCA, however, were less than forthcoming, in part because of the several recent management changes announced last week, as well as the fact that their recently-promoted head of sales, Alan Gold, had quit just the day before the show started. Sunset Thomas was there to sign autographs and promote her latest feature, Truck Stop Trixie, and posters from several productions adorned the room, but the activity was mostly to assure retailers that even with the personnel changes, VCA would still be there to service their needs.

Vivid's Howard Levine was equally upbeat, and with even more news. 

"Big things are happening at Vivid," Levine announced. "The biggest news is that we are doing a reality TV show. The cameras are following around the Vivid girls in their daily lives, very much like the Osbournes thing. We really, truly believe that it will catapult some of the girls into a super-stardom type of things, and will make some girls household names. It's going to be gigantic, and a lot of [network] people are battling for it. We are in negotiations right now, and we really think it will knock sales through the roof."

"We're going to be day-and-date on VHS and DVD on August 11 on all our features, and we're already day-and-date on our four-hours and six-hours as well, and that's what we're kicking off at the show," he added. "We're pushing our features in a big way; they're getting great reviews all over the place. We're here to tell retailers that there are still features being made that are well done, that they should sell in their stores, and that the girls are still selling." 

But video was only part of Vivid's activities. 

"We're in the middle of a licensing frenzy right now, with the Vivid Virility and the Vivid Condoms," Levine noted. "Vivid Virility is like an herbal Viagra, and it's doing really well, and the packaging is absolutely gorgeous; same thing with the condoms. They just ordered another million pieces. 

Levine reports that Paradise Marketing, the makers of both Vivid Condoms and Vivid Virility, are pursuing retailers that don't normally carry adult products. According to Levine, Virgin Megastores was considering placing a kiosk of Vivid Virility in their stores. 

Other new Vivid branded products on the horizon include a line of comic books featuring the Vivid girls and even a real book, Sex Tips From The Vivid Girls, that will be published later this year. 

"So there are a lot of things going on, and we hope that retailers will take advantage of the mainstreaming of Vivid," Levine said. 

Also look for sex toys from Doc Johnson, featuring the pussies of, among others, Sunrise Adams and Kira Kener, both of whom were signing autographs in the suite. 

But with the show competing against Internext, some companies had a dearth of porn stars signing autographs, if they had any at all. 

"Half of our people went to Internext!" complained Adam & Eve's Jason Hoke, although the lovely Carmen Luvana was on hand to promote her biggest feature for the company, Rawhide, due out in late September (though fans can check out trailers and other material from the feature at rawhidexxx.com.) Luvana's first starring role for Adam & Eve, however, was in Stripped, which releases in the first week of August. 

But -- "We've got a lot of things going on," Hoke assured, "not the least of which is Candida Royalle's first new movie in five years, Studhunters. It's on a two-disc DVD format, released last month. Everything with her is a labor of love. She shot it just over a year ago but a lot of work and time went into the DVD."

The DVD has a director's commentary, bonus scenes, bloopers, behind the scenes, ads for her Natural Contours line of personal massagers, and more.

The big news at Private North America was that — it isn't, anymore. 

"Beginning on Friday [August 1], we are Private USA," announced sales manager Mara Epstein. "To kick off Private USA, we've brought three talent with us: Justine, Kelly Marie and Angelica Sin, all of whom we hope to be working with in the near future. The other activity we have going on here is, we're hosting a drawing for customers to win DVD players, PDA titles, videos and magazines. We're also introducing our PDA eMAG to the market. It has vignettes, and it plays on most PDAs. It's one hour of hardcore XXX action on a chip, so you just stick it in and play. We'll be shipping the Jodie Moore eMAG in about a month. Each chip contains video clips, digi-tales, games, and they come packaged with earphones so you can have privacy in your own space." 

Epstein was also elated that Private's Gladiator—Special Collector's Edition two-disc set had won VSDA's Best Overall DVD Presentation for Adult Product, and she was ready to capitalize on it.

"We're getting ready to promote our next epic, Cleopatra, directed by Antonio Adamo, and we expect to include the same whistles and bells as our award-winning Gladiator," she said. "We'll be giving everything Gladiator gave to the consumer, and then some. We will also be launching a gay epic called Marc Anthony, the largest-budgeted gay title in the market, from our newly-titled Man-Size, which used to be Private Man." 

Speaking of awards, Wicked Pictures snagged the coveted Adult Title of the Year for Breathless, starring Devinn Lane — but it was fellow contract stars Sydnee Steele and Stormy who greeted retailers walking into the Wicked suite, as well as company VP Joy King, who gave us the big news.

"We're getting ready to release our first Jenna comp," announced VP Joy King, "but I hate to even call it that; it's completely and totally unlike anything anyone else has done. We've created almost a documentary of her career with us. We've included interviews, footage of her accepting awards at the AVN show and lots more. Wicked doesn't do compilations, and I hate to refer to this as one, but we chose to do this one because we felt it was appropriate. It's an overview of her career, and it'll be called the Jenna Jameson Anthology, releasing day-and-date August 25." 

Speaking of day-and-date, King almost apologized for Wicked's lagging behind some of the other major companies in getting its VHS and DVD releases coordinated, but promised that by winter, the company would be up to speed, with Wicked's DVD production staff working overtime to catch up to its video releases.

All of the above companies took part in sponsoring an "Adult DVD Interactive Party," which was held in the Venus Lounge at the Venetian on Wednesday evening. Plenty of actresses showed up, including Angelica Sin, who had been signing autographs in the Private suite, and was dressed in a Cleopatra costume to promote the company's upcoming release.

Incidentally, King, Epstein, Levine and VCA's Marty Turkel were the company representatives on the Expo's adult retailing panel, along with retailers Halsey Blake-Scott and Richard Rosenberg. Discussion covered a wide range of issues, including the necessity for retailers to be familiar with the product they're selling. Levine in particular hammered that point, as well as delivered a warning to those who only stock catalog titles and compilations that it's the new release video and filmed features that become catalog and provide the footage for the comps, so lack of support for new releases translates to no new catalog titles and no new footage for comps.

Pleasure Productions experienced a dearth of autograph signers, with contract stars Gina Lynn, Nikki Benz and Krystal Steal also on the road, though one of Steal's stops would be Internext. However, the company's newest babe, Trinity, was promised to be present later. 

But company president Frank Kay was excited by their latest DVD innovation: P.O.D. – Popshot On Demand. 

"What it does is show you a little icon on the screen, and if you click it, it takes you to five or six seconds before the cumshot, so you can see the popshot right away." 

That feature will be showing up on the company's latest discs, all of which will be going day & date as of the Labor Day holiday, starting with Something Wicked, starring Krystal Steal, directed by Cash Markman. 

"DVD is 50 percent of our sales, so we've got to get those DVDs out there," said Pleasure sales manager Andy Green.

Kay opined that VHS sales would have to dip below 20 percent of the market before his company would consider making DVD-only releases — like the upcoming Gina Lynn Interactive, which should debut by the end of the year, as soon as their technicians work out some operational bugs.

Directly across the hall from the Pleasure conglomerate – they have nine imprints altogether, including the recently acquired Matt Zane Productions, Armageddon Entertainment and Bedtime Productions – was Smash Pictures, though catching national sales manager Stuart Wall without a retailer in tow was no easy task. 

"Our Legal Skin series is stronger than ever," Wall noted, "and we're taking lot of orders for it here. A new International Booty is coming out, Vol. 6, and we just released our second interactive DVD title, starring Kaylynn and Nicole Sheridan, and in a few weeks, we'll have a new amateur series, Test Drive, directed by Red Ezra, so things are doing great. We've only been around for a year and a half, and Smash has really taken off.  Also in August, we'll be releasing Stocking Secrets, a new softcore series which stars some Penthouse Pets, Jana Cova and Maliya Madison." 

"We got our Penthouse store open last week," he added, "which we're partners in with [Penthouse publisher] Bob Guccione. We can't sell anything yet, thanks to the local mayor, but Tera Patrick was there, and we were very well received." 

Exhibiting for the first time in many years was Video Team, whose "fort" was ably held down by sales VP Joannie Lee. 

"With the way the market has turned, we've had a lot of strength on our new releases, and we're going to move forward with that," Lee said. "The market seems to be breaking off and separating so deeply between the lower-end and higher-end product, and we're really pushing our higher-end productions, and we're doing it successfully. Our My Baby Got Back series is as strong as ever, and our No Man's Land Asian and Latin versions that we've brought out have done very well. We have uplifted our condom-only policy so that we're condom-optional now, and that has made a big difference in our new release sales. One of the ones that we expect to do well with is Chocolate Cream Pie, a fresh new line from this year which has just gone through the roof."

We followed the lovely Gauge into the Metro Interactive suite, and as she prepared for the rush of fans, sales and distribution director Rick Williams filled us in on the company's new direction. 

"Our theme right now is, we're turning up the heat. We're introducing our new line, Fusion, which will feature new directors, new talent, and really hot product. We're revamping the company and coming out with new and exciting things." 

Among those would be Michael Raven's Sex In The Studio, featuring Money B and Cletus Mack, members of the band Digital Underground. 

Also, Williams noted, "We're in final negotiations to have Bridgette Kerkove come on board as both a director and a contract star." 

Arrow Productions was also on hand, sharing a suite with Bizarre Video. 

"Mainly, we're pushing the DVD classics that we have: Deep Throat, Devil In Miss Jones, Debbie Does Dallas, Candy Stripers, as well as the Goddaughter series," noted sales manager Vince Miller "We have stayed away in the last year or so from new releases, because they're not cost effective, but we are going into production on Deep Throat 7, and we are now looking for the ideal fellatrix to star in it."

Veteran actress Anna Malle was across the room signing for Bizarre, but she didn't figure into the company's biggest news.

"We're doing a fetish hardcore line, which we never did before, and Playboy picked it up, so we're getting it in the cable market as well," announced company owner Keith Gordon. "We were doing a feature line with High Society, and they stopped shooting for a little while, but we developed such a large audience for sex products – but I didn't want to do the normal sex products, so I said, 'Let me do something that's fetish-y,' and people have been very receptive to it.

"We've come out with Ribbons Of Desire, Kinky Couples Sex Games, Horny House Calls – I could go on and on," Gordon said. "What we're doing is taking the fetish concept – no bondage, no tying up – but we're taking the latex and the leather and the fetish concept and putting it into a sex movie, and that's been doing extremely well for us. They're selling really well." 

But that's not all.

"The newest thing for Bizarre Video is, we are opening up an operation in Europe, which is a pretty big move for us. We're going to have our own operation out of Europe, distributing to all the distributors and retail stores, which we never did before, so this is a pretty big move for us. We've always done well in Europe, but when you're not there, whatever you sold there was just gravy. Now, we're fully going in and taking control of the market." 

Bizarre's offices will be in Amsterdam. 

Caballero Video also had a presence at the convention, mostly to promote its Blue Pictures division. 

"Blue Pictures is our new release division," noted sales manager Dick Lane. "We come out with eight to 10 new movies every month; a little bit of everything. And then, of course, there's Caballero, which has all the classics featuring John Holmes, Seka, Andrew Blake, and we have our two-hour and four-hour VHS and DVD." 

Besides some immensely popular gay titles such as new release Daniel And Me, and a five-hour gay comp series, Balls, look for Blue Pictures' latest features, Carnival 2003 – "Four hours of orgies in Brazil with the Mardi Gras; it's fantastic." – and Sex Machine, starring the beautiful Brazilian babe Dyane (pronounced "Diana"). 

The best food to be found among the adult group had to be at the Hustler/Vivid suite, which featured roast beef sandwiches and tiramisu, among other delicacies. But for the sales staff of both companies, it was work, work, WORK!   

Besides some immensely popular gay titles such as new release Daniel And Me, and a five-hour gay comp series, Balls, look for Blue Pictures' latest features, Carnival 2003 – "Four hours of orgies in Brazil with the Mardi Gras; it's fantastic." – and Sex Machine, starring the beautiful Brazilian babe Dyane.

At the far end of the hall, we also found Underground Entertainment, which owns the Mike Hott Amateur line, and was pushing its DVD collections of Japanese videos — 25 discs, four full-length features on each disc. 

Suiteless and walking the halls, we ran into Greg Alves of Zero Tolerance, who was reminding retailers — "They all know who I am" — that his company's products all come with both hard and soft covers. 

"We're releasing several new lines," Alves said. "We've just come out with one called Strip, Tease, Then Fuck, which has a lot of tease and build-up before the sex; we're just releasing this week Ass Cleavage 2, which has April's first anal in it, and we've got another new series coming out called The Incredible Gulp, an all-swallow series. We're also starting an all-teen anal line." 

We also made a foray into the "clean" hallways, where we caught up with Ivan Nagy, honcho of MacDaddy Entertainment, who informed that he's made a deal with Michael Ninn for softcore cable and disc versions of Ninn's artcore. 

"We made a deal with Michael for a very soft line that can go into all the stores that we go into, like Borders Books and Movie Gallery, because most of them don't carry hardcore." 

Look for the first of those titles to debut in September. 

One of our first stops in "clean" territory was Peach DVD, to see company owner David James. 

"Tricks Or Treats, which is our October release, is big in preorders and it's way above our best-seller ever," James said. "We're following on from what we did with some of the Jenna shoots: Multiple angles and multiple endings. Every time you press a button, there's three things that could happen, and it's random selection, so you have no idea which you'll see." 

The company just got back from Hawaii, where they shot Peach Island — and even enlisted some U.S. Navy personnel to act as judges in an on-screen contest. 

James is most concerned now about market penetration, and is vying for as much mainstream press as he can get for the company, which is the number three softcore video purveyor in the country. One of the things which James believes will take the company where he wants it to go is talent. 

"Initially, we'll concentrate on having three or so big names, and Angel Cassidy is one of them; Lana is another, and then we'll let the market grow in that direction," he analyzed. "The thing is, the young ladies have to be able to act; we need them to talk, sing, dance, etc. That means we're paying a lot more than for an adult-type young lady, but it's paying off for us." 

Peach threw a party for retailers at Caesar's Palace's Rain Room on Tuesday night, which was reportedly well-attended.

We talked with another veteran softcore distributor, Wolfe Video, which concentrates on gay material, but which has recently delved into theatrical distribution for its titles.

"Online is our next one that's coming into theaters," noted company president Maria Lynn, "It's all about online sex and how people meet over the Internet and access sex over the Internet. There's lots of stories going on — some straight stories; there's a very sweet gay story; there's a lesbian story going on in there, and we're struggling over which image to use for the artwork, since it appeals to so many different people." 

"Friends and Family will be next," Lynn continued, "which has the tag line, 'Meet the real gay Mafia.' The story is about these two hit men for the mob, and it's no secret that they're gay, but their parents don't know that they're really mobsters. They think they're caterers." 

Right next door to Wolfe was TLA Releasing, an outgrowth of the popular online and brick & mortar retailer TLA Video. The company has several entries from its own International Film Festival that it's releasing on tape, including Between Your Legs, a sexual thriller; The Bathers, tracing the lives of six women who work as dancers in a Parisian peepshow; and Bastoni—The Stick Handlers, a humorous look at the Japanese porn industry.