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[contrary_wise]

While looking online for a replacement for a vibrator that died recently,* I discovered that Good Vibrations is no longer a worker-owned cooperative. I got their catalog in the mail for ages before I finally bought my first sex toy from them about ten years ago. And their coop business model was a fantastic example of feminist anti-capitalism in

Comments

[gordonzola]

I could talk about this for hours. Unfortunately, the local co-op newspaper just folded which was to have an article on this.

My personal opinion is that they didn't trust themselves enough. They convinced themselves that they needed "experts" to manage the company. (I actually personally really like their long term GM, this is not about personalities) Then of course, they had to pay them better than other workers. They did little to promote from within, historically speaking.

The loyalty argreements that they convinced themselves they needed killed a lot of the co-op spirit. It did result in us hiring about 10-15 of their best workers when they quit Vibes (over a period of years). but overall it just made me sad.

We have about 220 workers. We have our problems, but none that will make us stop being a co-op any time soon.

[contrary_wise]

I would love for you to dish on this one. I'm interested in Good Vibrations and Come As You Are in particular because I do research on sex-positive feminist discourses and these stores figure heavily in that. I'm also generally interested in coops as alternatives to dominant capitalist economic structures. I've done some organizing and volunteer work with collectives and I'm trying to sort out the differences and the overlaps between collectives and coops as I contemplate become more heavily involved with a local food collective. I'm also on the executive of a TA union and we spend a lot of time talking about our work practices. I'm the token radical so I'm always trying to articulate different ways of doing things that are potentially more equitable and less structured along strict boss-worker lines

[gordonzola]

I wanted to write more, just haven't had time. sorry

[mycrust]

Crowe commissioned a survey that showed - a surprise to the staff - that the customer base was mostly 35- to 45-year-old straight women with $50,000 incomes who were in relationships.

I wonder who they thought their biggest customers were. As much as I am a fan of sex toys, they are something of a luxury item; if your top priority is putting a roof over your head or food on your table, I doubt you'll be buying many of then. As for straightness, well, let's be frank, there are a lot of straight people in the world. Maybe a better way to present that demographic would be as the ratio of the fraction of their customers who identify as straight to the fraction in the general population. I bet the difference is pretty noticeable.

[contrary_wise]

My issue here is more with the response to this survey about their customer base. They could've started asking questions about why their customers were predominantly suburban middle class straight women and how better to cater to other groups of people. Instead it sounds as if management said "See, it's all heteronormative types who buy from us anyway. We should become super corporate to better cater to this huge desirable market segment. Give up your hippie dreams, coop people!".

[mycrust]

Perhaps I should have read the context that that quote was embedded in. The way I read it was like, "well, Good Vibrations has failed in its mission anyway..."

[contrary_wise]

Well, yes. But why assume that's irreparable failure? Why not ask questions about how to attract different kinds of customers?

[signifier]

Well, "normative" depends on what kind of norms you're talking about--the "clean, well-lighted place" rhetoric, I'd bet, was meant to distinguish them from your garden-variety grotty unpleasant porno shack, physical or virtual. The cultural norm at play wasn't "sex is dirty" so much as "places to buy sex toys are something you have to hold your nose and endure to get what you want." I suspect the mail-order Wal-Mart that their mail-order Little Local Hardware Store was meant to contrast with was something like Adam & Eve.

[contrary_wise]

The cultural norm at play wasn't "sex is dirty" so much as "places to buy sex toys are something you have to hold your nose and endure to get what you want." I think "sex is dirty" is pretty firmly associated with the kinds of sex stores where you have to hold your nose. And for good reason. I'm not saying those spaces were/are fun or even safe places for women to shop. When Good Vibrations opened in the mid-70s, they were a bricks-and-mortar (funny that has to be specified now) store trying to provide an alternative to the grotty porno shack. The Silverberg abstract I linked to goes into a little more detail on that history. I'm less clear on the context for the start-up of their mailorder business. I know it came much later but became the big moneymaker

[signifier]

It's hard to enact radical social change, period! But yeah: good points.

[signifier]

...Although, actually, maybe where they ended up positioning themselves was more like Restoration Hardware (upscale!). Which of course opens up the issue that Restoration's doing just fine, Wal-Mart's doing just fine, and little neighborhood hardware stores are getting squished...

[contrary_wise]

They actually hired several of Restoration Hardware's former upper management to run the business over the last few years. So I think it's less that they were like upscale like Restoration Hardward but that they want to becomeRestoration Hardware. I know that once Amazon started selling sex toys, the women-friendly shops (and probably other kinds of sex toy shops too) took a big hit. What is more clean and well-lit than Amazon in the world of online retail?

[mycrust]

What is more clean and well-lit than Amazon in the world of online retail?

This is an exacellent point and illustrates the irrational power of branding. As far as I can tell, Amazon is highly unselective in the sex products they carry and so, while shopping at Amazon may give you a nice, clean sanitized feeling, you may well end up with a depressing, sleazy product. Like those plastic anal beads with the seams on them from the molding process. Why do those even exist??

'tis ms. bee, your buddy

[anonymous]

Intersections of oppression! Further proof that the worker's revolution is out of sight because even the workers cooperative still caters to the working class... and gender still creaters an...errr... cleavage.
Dissillusionment. But you're still my hero!