A sex store can run the gamut from tasteful and pretty to dirty, smoke-filled filth. Middle ground is the sex store in middle class and working class towns and smaller cities. Generally, I’ve found that these stores are usually owned, managed, and run by women. I will concentrate on this class of sex store after a brief description of the aforementioned two types. At the top of the quality list, is Eve’s Garden, on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. You may, at first, mistake it for a Bridal Shop or a high-end accessory boutique. The first of our senses, smell, is pampered by a calming sweet aroma (redolent of pheremones?) Our sense of hearing is taking in a low volume of classical music. Our visual and tactile senses are satisfied by the pink and white interior and picking up an unboxed toy or lingerie. The sense of taste may not abide here, but you can purchase products of infinite tastes (chocolate body paint, oils, etc.). This is the top-rank sex store, and conveys moneyed Manhattan luxury.
Down and dirty, a sex store is, in a word, disgusting. I guess the revolting aroma is a mix of cigar smoke, and old men, all of whom make no bones about openly staring while you breeze (as quickly as possible) around. Sometimes they voice unsolicited graphic opinions about your choice. Dusty and generally unclean, maybe their purpose is housing nasty old men.
Although they are far and few between, there is a sex store in my rural area, and I like it. One half of the sex store is solely videos, DVDs, magazines, stuff I call “media sex toys.” The other half is lined with deep, varnished wood, and one panel, if you will, is a floor to ceiling display of oils, body paints (chocolate and other flavors), tubes of enhancers, and perfumes (those pheremones again). Two key words regarding this particular sex store are orderly and neat. There’s a corner for those who need or to render punishment, with hand and ankle fur-lined cuffs, soft suede fringed whips with a suggestive metal holder, black studded belts, black furry paddles, and my personal favorite, a leopard skin covered paddle. There are a few “My First…” small kits. Firsts include anal sex (which has its own extensive section), jeweled nipple clamps, erotic strands of pearls and an interesting little hammock-looking belt used to raise your partner to maximum exposure.
Astounding is the amount and variation of vibrators and dildos. Name a fantasy, and there is an accompanying vibrator for you. How does this sex store cram so much product so attractively, into a small shop? There’s not much you can do to bring class to oversized rubber vaginas, huge breasts, and buttocks, but, to its credit, this sex store restrained itself to one O-shaped mouthed inflatable doll. Once past the body parts there is an entire four shelves of surprisingly high-priced anal sex kits. The most elaborate kit, priced over $100.00, contains three vibrators with alternate tips and their batteries, a cock ring, a small device that once inserted into the orifice of choice, can be air pumped gradually, into a balloon, a bullet, and a magnifying glass. Wall displays are of nipple clamps, feathers, elaborate blindfolds, strings of anal pearls, a set of three increasingly thick butt plugs, etc.
The female owner is casual, friendly, and objective, with no leering or comments on purchases and no add-on sales were mentioned. As were the other, mostly male, shoppers who weren’t interested in the least why I was in a sex store, suggesting that a sex store such as this may eventually become mainstream. Or that I’m particularly self-conscious.
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