Porn Valley- Steve Lane, who’s obviously a better novelty goods salesman than he is a football prognosticator, tells me there’s no truth to the rumor he and Serenity were holding this big dildo garage sale in Vegas this weekend. But this week, Lane and Serenity did announce the sale of their company Las Vegas Novelties to Pipedream Products.
“We signed the deal last week,” says Lane. “We’re out of the dildo business. ” I tell Lane this sounds so final. “It’s a mad scramble to our last day next Friday in the building, to put this altogether and get it down to Pipedream,” he says. “It started off as light conversation last year at ANME. It picked up in the Fall and really accelerated in the December-January area. And then it was done.”
Asked what prompted the light conversation and the feel-out procedures, Lane said he always had the theory when he owned his niteclub back East that any business he’d start would, technically, be for sale the next day. “As we started getting towards Serenity’s retirement and thinking about a family, it crept into my mind a little bit more about selling LVNI,” says Lane. “Over drinks with Nick [Orlandino] we broached the idea. There was interest and that’s kind of how it happened. We’re moving more toward the family aspect of everything.”
I tell Lane it sounds like he must have made a shitpot full of money to be making those kinds of comments. Lane laughs. But I warn him against thoughts of becoming a professional gambler or football handicapper.
“It’s nothing to retire on,” says Lane. “And I couldn’t retire now at the age of 39, anyway. I’d go nuts. We’ll start another business, probably in the Fall. And we’ve started the little rumblings of that.” Lane offers a hint to say that it would be right up my alley but in the non-adult field. And Lane follows that up to say it ain’t wrestling.
Asked about daddyhood, Lane said he’s enjoying it more than he thought he would. “It’s a fascinating thing that goes on and something new every day.” I mention to Lane that it was never made clear whether Serenity gave birth to a son or a daughter. Lane says it was left purposefully vague. “We didn’t throw the sex out there in the public forum or the name,” he says. “We pretty much kept it at that, protect the innocent. But I’m enjoying it and it’s a calming effect. When the baby came it was a different perspective on what you’re doing. I’m going to enjoy the summer doing all sorts of different things. And one day going on those teacups we used to make fun of at Disneyland.”
Lane at one time owned a music club in Providence, Long Island. “I was in radio for five years,” he explained. “After getting together with a promoter we bought a niteclub and ran that for three or four years. I relinquished that to my partner and moved on to help Serenity start her adult career. We went out here when she was being managed by Lucky and was an original Lucky Girl. When they parted ways I reluctantly took over the job of running her career for the last eight, years.”
I ask Lane the obvious question concerning how he and Serenity met. “It’s a story we won’t be able to tell the baby, unfortunately,” he laughs. “I was a deejay in a strip club and she came in during amateur night. Back ten or fifteen years ago the strip clubs were a lot more different and a lot more fun. We kind of hooked up and were best friends about two years before we ever got together.” Lane said he made the initial mood. “She was a tough chick,” Lane recalls. “I was an absolute horror back then.” Asked to render an idea of his smoooooooth approach, Lane said the deejay had the power in the stripclubs. “But she was a pretty smart cookie. She didn’t fall for the bullshit until I made her spaghetti over my house one day and the rest was history. That was 15 years ago. We’re one of the longest couples in adult.” Lane and Serenity have been married for 9 1/2 of those years. “But we’ve been living together for 14.”
Lane says he and Serenity shared a lot of common interests. “It was a lot of fun back then,” he remembers. “I had my niteclub and there was a lot of partying and music and hanging out.” Lane is quick to point out that several porn people have come from the Providence area, that he and Tony Tedeschi have roots together. “I’ve known Tony forever and a day- we used to deejay together.” But Lane is quick to point out how the adult industry has changed. “It’s a lot different now than it was five years ago. In fact in Jimmy D’s article yesterday he really hit it right on the nose. It’s not as fun as it was, that’s for sure.”
I ask Lane why he was never tempted to start up a video company. He says he had been for awhile but dropped the idea. “We looked into that about 2 1/2, 3 years ago,” he says. “It would obviously have been a line under Serenity’s name. You talk with your friends in the industry and smaller companies and you hear the prices that DVD’s were going out at, and people were crying they got to pay $2 or $8 for a new release. And you look at what movies have to be made for now and your return on them. Back when, movies were going out 2,500 to 3,000 units out the door. Now if you get 800 units out the door you’re doing great. To me that’s okay. We put enough money into LVNI and that chance going up against two giant manufacturers in Topco and Doc Johnson. People said we’d be out of business in six months. It didn’t make economic sense.”
A pop Lane the question that if LVNI was doing that well, why move it. “This was a lot of work out of the businesses that we’ve run and I count Serenity as a business,” states Lane. “This was a lot of work. We bought out a partner in the beginning. And we had a chemical problem a couple of years ago that crippled us in the Summer. And the recession hit for two years. You could see the acquisitions and the people going out of business the last two years in adult. Distributors had been there for 30 years as well as video companies. It was difficult. Thankfully, we’ve had a fantastic last eight months. But prior to that it wasn’t good and anybody who tells you any different is lying to you.”
I wonder if national news stories such as those addressing prosecutions in Alabama regarding the sale of dildos or the recent story about the woman in Texas prosecuted for holding the dildo equivalent of tupperware parties has any negative fallout where LVNI is concerned. Lane says no. “I wouldn’t say it has a negative impact on sales,” he states. “I think it’s more of a concern for me and Serenity being officers in the corporation and selling to various states. I think it’s more that than sales dropping off. I think sales dropped off more across the adult industry more because of the recession and less disposable cash. [Wait till gas goes to $3 and $4 a gallon.]
“In the roaring late Nineties, everybody was making money and everybody in the novelty industry were best buds,” Lane goes on to say. “Now it’s cat scratch fever out there right now. But it’s a great time to be a store owner because the prices are so low and they’re marking them up 2 and 300%.” Lane said he’d have different advice to someone who were starting up a business today as opposed to when he started up six years ago.
Lane says he has 15 people under contract. “Pipedream purchased Las Vegas Novelties, Inc. Nothing changes,” says Lane. “It’s an asset of Las Vegas Novelties. They bought the corporation and they get everything here and we’re going to get them up and running on rubber manufacturing which they have not done in the past. They’re able to take it to a much bigger level than we would take it because of the volume they do. Their distribution is incredible. They’ll do a massive volume of manufacturing. Ultimately Serenity is under contract to Pipedream Products at this point.”
I make a wiseass comment about rubber dolls, and Lane says the company never really got into them. “There was so much on the market and we really tried to do some different things that weren’t out there like the pulsator or the clit tingler,” says Lane. According to Lane the pulsator was their big mover. “The vibrating touch-activated cock ring- it broke the company open three years ago,” Lane adds.
“People pretty much thought of us as a dildo company. But when we came out with that we really picked up steam when that came out. And it was the particular talent that went the extra mile. I’ll single out Jacklyn Lick. She was an incredibly hard worker. Jewel De’Nyle, Ron Jeremy, Chloe, Kylie- they really worked hard when we didn’t have a building and we were less than a year old. They stuck with us and believed in what we were trying to do. We weren’t going to be the biggest company and they weren’t going to get the biggest checks from us. But they worked hard and kept in touch. Obviously there were a couple of bumps along the way with some talent. We released them. We didn’t hold them hostage for five years even though we could. That wasn’t part of the makeup of Serenity.”
Lane says aside from Serenity’s site, there will be no more adult business. And, at the end of the day, that too will end. “That’s pretty much 20 years in adult,” he says. “I ask Lane if there’s thoughts to moving back East. He says that remains to be seen but won’t make a decision until late summer.
“We’re going to sit at her parents’ farm in the woods and relax with a nice bottle of Australian red, clear the head and figure what we want to do. There’s more children in the future.”