I’m sure I don’t need to explain to anyone in the online sector of the adult entertainment industry the complexities and rapid changes inherent to today’s market. In recent weeks, we’ve seen major acquisitions take place, more lawsuits announced, an obscenity indictment in Florida, concern over Pornwikileaks’ assault on performer privacy, and of course, the continuing consumer exposure to large amounts of free porn, with or without the permission of the rights-holder of that content.
In light of all the turmoil, several people (including a few within our company) have asked me how I feel about Pink Visual’s place in the market, and our prospects for the future.
These conversations remind of similar discussions I had about four years ago when the industry was also changing very quickly as we saw more tube sites popping up, conversions worsening, and companies turning to billing scams to recoup diminishing revenue. Four years later, the same questions, “What are you guys doing?” and “Isn’t this so unfair?” and the same feelings, “I hate XYZ Company” are surfacing all over again.
I have to say this time around it’s much different for us at Pink Visual. We really have no particularly strong emotions around anything or anyone else, other than our own products and our own company, and we have full confidence in our strengths.
These strengths are simple, and for the most part have been strengths of ours for years -- without us even realizing we had them. By identifying them more clearly, though, these strengths have helped us realize our shared vision for the company, and helped us through rocky times, as well. I’m choosing to share some of our strengths and how we view things, not as a means of boasting about Pink Visual’s success, but in the hope that other companies may look at themselves more positively and start to identify some of their own strengths to focus on.
So, in no particular order, here are a few of Pink Visual’s strengths that I immediately think of in weighing all of our decisions and the opportunities that come our way:
1) We’re a responsible adult company. Among other things, this is a trait that we have built upon through maintaining a positive business relationship with our customers and our peers in the adult industry, and by ensuring through diligent 2257 record-keeping that our products are made by adults for adults. We do these things despite knowing that some other adult companies scam consumers to bolster their bottom line, and some other companies distribute content without keeping 2257 records, facts that some may argue gives those companies a competitive advantage over more responsible studios. In our view, however, any advantage gained through irresponsible corporate conduct is shortsighted, and often short-lived, as well. Pink Visual prefers to build its foundation on legally sound practices, not only because it is the right thing to do, but because responsible behavior mitigates risk and liability, and gives us confidence in our future. Being acknowledged for showing responsibility also opens up publicity opportunities and greater prospect for doing business with ‘mainstream’ companies, as well.
2) We’re a small company. For Pink Visual, a 50-60 employee operation is the perfect size. At our peak size, we grew to over 100 employees and it simply didn’t work. As a smaller unit we are more responsive to change and we can identify issues more quickly. We also raise the bar for performance expectations by reducing the amount of management required and increasing the amount of decision-making and know-how required for each of our roles.
3) Our people create our passion. What we do here at Pink Visual really reflects the ideas and passions of most of our employees at the company. Everyone contributes; it’s not the ideas of solely one person that make our operation successful and because of that, it’s difficult to replicate.
4) We are aggressive legally. One of the best decisions we’ve made in the past few years was the hiring of in house attorneys and the use of the right outside counsel. Whatever we’re trying to accomplish in the marketplace our attorneys help us achieve those goals. From securing deals to combating content piracy, our legal team makes sure that we not only defend our legal rights as a company, but that we can effectively go on the offensive when appropriate.
5) We’ve been through all of this before. Pink Visual has survived and even flourished during some of the rockiest times the adult industry has faced over the years, and the rough times are where we learned the most. From eliminating wasteful spending, to investing intelligently and choosing to lead instead of follow, many of our best realizations have been driven by necessity. So, when a new obstacle pops up, or things start getting a little trickier, these days we immediately move to how we can intelligently navigate the surging sea of challenges, instead of copying others or denying that there is stormy weather ahead.
Four years ago, when as a company we may have been a little “lost at sea,” we looked around at what everyone else was doing, even though just about every other company was also lost , or, in some cases, were the ones causing the waves in the first place. Dwelling on what others were doing simply proved unproductive for Pink Visual. What finally worked for us, and what continues to work for us, is to identify our core strengths as a company, and then look for ways to apply our company’s best assets to master the challenges the market puts in front of us. Doing so has given us great confidence that as changes come to the market – even unprecedented changes – we’ll be able to weather the storm and emerge stronger than ever.
