SAN FRANCISCO — Nenna Joiner, founder of Oakland, Calif.-based Feelmore boutique, is lobbying for the San Francisco International Airport to make its Terminal 3 Pop-Up Shop Retail Program more accessible to “true mom-and-pop shops,” including Feelmore.
Joiner told the San Francisco Examiner that the terms of the airport’s small business program is standing in the way of SFO’s first sex toy shop. According to the report, small businesses are rejected for not meeting the annual revenue threshold of $250,000. Joiner is lobbying to lower the requirement to $150,000 in gross sales.
“This is a way for The City and county to reach out to smaller businesses,” Joiner told the SF Examiner.
The retail program is intended to provide opportunities for small businesses to enter the airport business community. For those that are accepted into SFO, that means exposure among the airport’s estimated 55 million annual passengers.
According to the SF Examiner, Joiner pitched their case on Jan. 16 before the Airport Commission meeting but understands that a sex shop might be considered “too radical.”
“It’s not like an olive oil store,” Joiner told SF Examiner. “We definitely wouldn’t sell handcuffs in the airport,” adding that a Feelmore airport pop-up would concentrate on lubricants and pleasure products that are discreetly packaged.
Joiner says the shop could serve passengers flying to San Francisco for the annual BDSM-themed Folsom Street Fair, LGBT Pride Parade and other adult-oriented events.
“As a sex store, fighting for this is different than a shoe store fighting for this,” Joiner says. “Pray for more, but be grateful for what you get.”
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