Size matters: How I discovered the first Condom in the country
Under the heading "Business" We introduce readers to women who have managed to launch unexpected, well-known or innovative commercial projects and successfully develop them. In this issue, we talked to Yesenia Chamonina, the owner of the only Russian store specializing in barrier contraception. She told us how to understand whether the project will become popular, what is the problem of the Russian market for sex products and who produces condoms in Kuban.
Amsterdam and music festivals
I always knew that I would have my own business - it just felt that way. That is why even before the "Condom" I tried to develop organizational skills. I tried to make my own music festival (unfortunately, it was planned for the summer of 2010, when all of Moscow was in smoke, so it was not very successful), and also was a manager at the rink. I got into the red light district in Amsterdam, just when I was thinking about what kind of business I want to open. There I spotted the idea of a condom shop. Before that, I wanted to open a mini-golf and café in the same room, but rather quickly it became clear that it would rise in too large a sum. But to run a venture with the sale of condoms could have been less expensive.
I came up with the name alone literally in one day. The second option was "Shop-rezin", but the current one, in my opinion, sounds much better. "Condom" as a store has been around for five years, but the project itself has recently turned six. At first, we traveled with a tent with condoms at music festivals - at first she was not very pretty, and then a familiar artist painted her well. With this tent, I visited the "Invasion", "Empty Hills", "Kuban" - in general, I spent the whole weekend at festivals. People reacted very well, so in the fall I launched an online store with a pickup point. After that, another shock festival summer happened, during which time I managed to save up money to rent a room and make repairs in it.
Magnetic condoms and Instagram
The room for the "Condom" managed to find just a month. True, he recently changed ownership, and had to agree to a noticeable increase in rent, but most importantly, he managed to stay in a naked place. Under the new project, I am looking for a room for a year and a half, and so far without much success. Apparently, in the case of c "Condom" luck has worked.
I almost thought up the design of the room myself - the magnetic board, to which the condoms are attached, seems to be especially interesting to me, as if on a refrigerator. Inside each pack there is a special magnet that allows it to stick on the wall. I’ve been working with an artist for quite a long time, who first painted the festival tent with “live condoms”, and then this design moved to the store.
In our store, the windows are not curtained so that you can immediately feel the difference from the sex shop. In addition, people see that there is already someone in the store, so do not hesitate to go inside. Our visitors are mostly passers-by, often visiting couples or companies. Some are embarrassed to get into Condom for the first time, but sellers are always ready to take a tour of the store. There are many regular customers with discount cards that employees already know by sight. On the worst day, we have about thirty-five customers, on a very good one - a couple hundred people.
The "Condom" team - five people, including me, but often old employees come to help on a particularly busy day, for example, before the holidays. Of course, we have no particular career prospects, so turnover is inevitable. Although one of the sellers has been working for four years, the other three are a year and a half.
At some point, I decided to start promotion in social networks and paid a lot of money to a specialist who didn’t really do anything. But now I myself have been disaccustomed to the SMM-manager, I understood how it all works, so that in the near future I will work on social networks myself. It quickly became clear to me that contextual, targeted advertising or even product placement in celebrity instagrams in the case of "Condom" does not work. We recently tried to work with a popular YouTube blogger for a charity project, and the exhaust was almost zero. So only word of mouth helps us. If people really like our store, they themselves will write about it on social networks. Periodically, friends send me links to such posts.
"Right" condoms and Japanese chic
In the “Condom” one can find far from all the versions of condoms available in Russia: we do not pursue quantity. The first question I ask the new distributor is: "Why are your condoms better than others?" We do not sell goods without chips, they must be at least something different - whether it is a velvety surface or triangular pimples.
The store has four categories of goods: condoms, lubricants, so-called products for the art of love and gifts on the erotic theme. Condoms are divided into two types: classic (we call them "familiar") and "for the curious." The latter have all sorts of lotions like balls or antennae that stick out in all directions. It is difficult to call them full-fledged goods from the sex shop, but still they help to experience new sensations. Classic looks quite normal, but German and Japanese are especially noteworthy. In Germany, doing a completely brilliant piece - condoms of different sizes, even produce special disposable ruler for the control measurement. Men are very different and constantly come to us with complaints that condoms rub, shake or fly off. And it turns out that before they simply could not find the right size.
Japanese condoms are both durable and thin. Recently, condoms were invented there six times thinner than usual, but for one such condom you will have to pay about seven hundred rubles. Usually people take a couple of pieces to try, but there is one customer who sweeps several boxes at a time. Probably, they are really worth it. And so a good pack of condoms of three pieces will cost us 220-250 rubles, of twelve pieces - around a thousand rubles. German with different sizes are a little more expensive - about 280 rubles for three pieces.
Lubricants are a very important attribute of sex, and most are accustomed to using familiar options from a pharmacy or a supermarket, not realizing that they choose a rather bad and uncomfortable product. We are fighting for a good consumer taste and we want people to use something soft, pleasant and hypoallergenic.
Creams, enhancing sensations, massage oils are included in the “products for the art of love” - all so that sex seems like a fairy tale. You can also buy gifts with adequate variations on the topic of sex: designer postcards, magnets, soap, lollipops. No laughing penises and pillows with a female breast from sex shops from the time of the 90s.
At one time we tried to apply drawings on condoms on our own, but the quality suffered greatly. In general, the market for the production of condoms in Russia is quite modest - just one and a half plants in the Kuban. Some of them - by the way, quite high-quality, albeit cheap - are produced under the brand name "Eros". The second plant makes the product in very small batches - these are condoms with balls. But, of course, there are Russian companies that buy condoms in China or Malaysia and sell them under their own brand, for example, the well-known Hussars.
Franchises and lectures in sex shops
Selling condoms, it seems to me, perfectly normal - just a little cooler than anything else. And I have never treated business as making money, although, perhaps, with a different approach, the proceeds would be much greater. People periodically ask me about the Condom franchise, but I almost always refuse.
They wanted to open an analogue of the “Condom” in Voronezh, but the guys didn’t succeed. At first they wanted to get our franchise, but the price in the region of a thousand dollars seemed too great to them. And this is despite the fact that franchises of conditional pizzerias cost almost several million rubles. Unfortunately, it’s not enough to have several hundred thousand rubles in hand to open a store, and some major businessmen have not become interested in our project. In addition, the atmosphere is very important to me. Sometimes I look at people who want to buy a franchise, and I understand that they are either only interested in money, or in principle they feel very badly the spirit of this shop.
After the appearance of "Condom", I became more responsible and serious in financial matters: I learned how to weigh everything and spend money wisely. In addition, I try to work so that there is still time for myself and the planning of new projects. My parents have been doing business since the early 90s and working literally all the time — I can't do that. It is very important to delegate responsibilities and organize the work of the team so that it copes well with its tasks.
I cooked for a long time in the market of sex shops - not only because I worked with distributors of condoms, but also traveled around the country with lectures. I explained to owners and sellers how to tell and promote products correctly. It quickly became clear to me that for modern adults there are no sex shops where they would feel comfortable: most of them resemble markets. So pretty soon I'm going to open a sex shop with the same relaxed and friendly atmosphere as in Condom, the main thing is to hire the right people. In the average Russian sex shop, the employees just want to cry. And in the near future, I will launch a non-commercial digital project that will help to establish sexual relations with both myself and a partner.