The common wisdom is that porn, along with tobacco and booze, is recession-proof. Early evidence of that claim was on display recently in a press release claiming that tax rebate checks were boosting online porn revenues 30%. Unfortunately for those in the porn business, the survey and research accompanying it ended up being not, shall we say, fact-based.
Instead it looks like the porn business is truly suffering (Wired):
"From my experience, as long as I've been in this business, this is the first time I can say that we're absolutely feeling the effects of the economy," says Steve Orenstein, president and founder of Wicked Pictures, and a 29-year veteran of the adult-entertainment industry. "There was a line we used to use about this business being recession proof. When people talked about the economy, we'd say our business is fine. But look, now you'd have to be blind and deaf not to see that there are problems."...
We haven't laid anyone off or cut any salaries, but we're trying to be smarter -- cut the things we probably should have cut ten years ago," says Orenstein.
The list of problems facing the porn industry is long and include:
- a glut of professionally-made product (15,000 new releases this year alone)
- an astronomical supply of free, amateur videos across the web (especially from user-generated sites)
- soaring oil prices, which are negatively affecting several facets of the industry, such as transportation for consumers to rental stores, distribution of the movies and the production of the DVD cases (which are an oil-based product)
But never say die. If there is one thing that is true about the porn industry, it is innovative:
[Online rental business] SugarDVD has also stayed ahead of the curve -- the site launched a streaming service two years ago -- roughly a year before Netflix. It also offers a pay-per-minute service, which, depending on the movie, starts at 7 cents per minute.
See Also:
Where The Government Stimulus Checks Really Went: Porn
Meet YouPorn: The X-Rated YouTube
