All that is changing now, as The Movie Place is slated to shut down at the end of the month, the result of changing neighborhood demographics — and possibly an indicator of a significant market shift toward acquiring gay erotica via the Internet, according to store owner Mark Adams.
“We’re going because the neighborhood has changed,” Adams told Bay Windows, a GBLT newspaper that covers the New England region.
Adams said that when he first moved his store into the area, the neighborhood had a thriving gay community. In recent years, however, the gay community has been moving out of the area, driving down sales for The Movie Place.
“It’s not leaving, it’s pretty much gone,” Adams said of the local gay community. “If you go up and down Tremont Street, you’ll find very few businesses that are catering to a gay clientele.”
According to Bay Windows, in recent years storefronts adorned with rainbow flags and products targeting the gay consumer have gone up in smoke, including the GBLT bookstore We Think the World of You, and the gay-friendly gift store Tommy Tish.
“There’s really nothing left, except the Eagle,” Adams said, referring to a nearby gay bar on Tremont Street. “Whether that’s good or bad, I don’t know.”
Adams said that the changing demographics of the neighborhood combined with a less visible factor affecting his sales; the growing number of people who obtain their adult entertainment online, rather than trekking to their local adult shop for videos, DVDs and other adult products.
“It’s too bad, but these things happen,” Adams said. “It’s time to move on.”
Adams also drew a parallel between the migration of the gay community out of Boston’s South End and the migration of adult entertainment consumers to new technologies — a comparison inspired by the results of the clearance sale in progress at The Movie Place.
“The only thing that we have quite a bit left of are VHS movies, which nobody seems to want anymore,” Adams said. “People have abandoned VHS, sort of like the gays have abandoned the South End.”