The Last Laugh: cannot accept credit card orders anymore (very sorry)

[The Last Laugh]

Hello everyone,

This may not be entirely relevant to this particular forum, but this is a critical issue to me and I really need to mention it. Thank you for understanding.

Last year I lost my credit card payment system because PayPal unfairly closed my account. I eventually got a new system, but due to circumstances out of my control, it appears I lost it again. Believe me, no one is more disappointed about this than I am. At the moment I don't see any alternative. It's getting harder and harder to find decent online billing services willing to do business with adult-related stores, even one as tame as The Last Laugh. Quite frustrating. So I'm afraid that I will be unable to accept credit card payments for some time to come. I'm very sorry for the inconvenience.

On the other hand, payments by cash, money order or check are just fine. Just visit the "Place an order" section of my website to get ordering instructions and to access the order form. I realize not everyone likes ordering by mail, but truth is, as long as the payment is well hidden in the envelope (say inside a couple folded sheets of paper) it's really a safe method, and such orders don't take that long to get to me. Plenty of people have ordered videos from me this way without any problems. Also, I'd like to mention that while checks do take some time to clear at the bank, I still process such orders as soon as I get them, just like any other order. So there's no additional clearing delay. I think it's a convenient and safe payment method. The only problem is that I can only accept checks from American and Canadian customers. Of course, cash and money orders are just fine for all customers.

Thank you for taking the time to read this post, and sorry again about the inconvenience.

 

[HOLLYWOOD]

the hollywood brother hopes this will not affect your business as you produce some great tickle videos

 

[The Last Laugh]

the hollywood brother hopes this will not affect your business as you produce some great tickle videos

Thank you Hollywood Brother. Unfortunately, if the three months I spent last year without a credit card option are any indication, my business will definitely suffer from this. Not to the point of having to shut down, I don't think, but I expect sales will go down by nearly half. That's quite a nasty blow.

This is happening at an especially bad time because I recently found several neat new models for future videos. I need money to hire them, and if sales do go down due to the credit card thing I'll have a hard time recovering from the hole in my bank account the new shoots will create. Frankly, I can't help but feel I'm acting very unwisely, even stupidly, spending even more money on future videos when my finances are so low right now, especially with no credit card payment option anymore. I don't even know if The Last Laugh has a real future. For all I know I may be wasting money that I'll never make back. If I were reasonable I'd wait until things get bettter before hiring more models.

On the other hand, I'd really hate to lose these new candidates, so against my bettyer judgement I'm trying my best to find the money to pay them. I can only hope that the resulting videos will eventually pay for themselves one day, after I release them more than a year from now (I have many videos in reserve, enough for at least a year, which makes hiring more models even stupider on my part).

 

[nessonite1]

Man you just can't catch a break! How I wish I had the money to buy one of your videos! I ask Santa every year for one but he never delivers!

 

[bobbtklr]

If the problem is with physical videos (like you stated on your website), why wouldn't you switch to non-physical ones?
After all, most of your competitors do this, out there. And even if it'll need a few time to be functionnal (like having every hardware and software needed to encode the videos), that would be easier for you than starving until you find a new credit card payment system, wouldn't it?
And I'm sure more people (especially here, in Europe) will buy your videos if they're downloadable, since it was really a pain to get them.

 

[nessonite1]

I don't know if you could convince people to pay be mail for something downloadable...and then he'd have to run around like TC does trying to keep people from sharing them.

 

[HOLLYWOOD]

perhaps the hollywood brother got a idea on this. why not sell the vids in stores or through some type of retail envirnoment. The hollywood brother has noticed that in pa and new york there are many adult stores but one one chain that has a few tickling videos. This chain are not the best price but people likethe hollywood brother go there because they can pay cash, check, debit or credit card and can walk right out with video. The hollywood brother would think that you would just sell to the stores and get checks which should be easier for you. This is just a idea. to try this just go to your local adult stores and see if they will sell your fine products

 

[nessonite1]

That's a good idea, HB...Last Laugh is so unique that it would either fly and be super popular for being so different and new or it wouldn't do well at all because it IS so different and people who shop in those places may be looking for plain old boring porn stuff. Worth a shot I say!

 

[bobbtklr]

I don't know if you could convince people to pay be mail for something downloadable...and then he'd have to run around like TC does trying to keep people from sharing them.

If he does something downloadable, he would be able to use the same kind of online store than TC Video and others (well, bad example since clips4sale seems to be broken twice a week, but that's the idea).

For the sharing thing, I think it's a non-problem. People leeching videos from Kazaa-things aren't the same than people buying them. And leeching people wouldn't become customers, even if they can. Anyway, it's just my opinion...

 

[The Last Laugh]

Man you just can't catch a break! How I wish I had the money to buy one of your videos! I ask Santa every year for one but he never delivers!

That's quite alright. While I certainly enjoy making sales, I also appreciate positive feedback like yours. It's good to know I have people's support.

 

[The Last Laugh]

The issue of downloadable clips often gets brought up, and with good reason. It's obviously where this market has the most potential. I'm personally not very fond of that format. I prefer DVDs. But I'm realistic and realize that I could benefit from taking the plunge, as many other vendors already have. However, it's not that easy.

The obvious solution is clips4sale. In fact, I've seriously considered taking that route. I might still do it, actually. But C4S has been hit by the banks' and credit card companies' obsession with rejecting adult stores and is in the process of changing its billing system. Besides the possible loss of tangible product transaction support, which may result in the permanent loss of videos4sale, clips4sale's "sister" site for videos (the reason why I lost my own video stores), it's hard to tell what the new payment system will be like. Nothing sure right now. They're working hard on it and it's pretty likely C4S will eventually get back on its feet, but I prefer to wait and see what happens before deciding anything.

One of the big advantages of clips4sale is that it's been running for a few years and is a tried-and-true system. It's not perfect, I suppose, but it does work, and as far as I know it offers great service. That's why I may very well do business with them.

However, I can't deny that I would like to have my very own store. I'd like to have more control over my own material and transactions. But I don't know how to create such a store. I discussed it with the people in charge of hosting my website (which are based only 5 minutes from my place), and it seems they could do it for me. But since they haven't actually done it before, there's no way to know for sure if the system would work well enough. My website hosts don't have the experience the C4S people have. I might invest a large sum of money only to find out customers run into to many problems for my store to be viable. It's a gamble I'm not sure I'm comfortable with.

Then there's the whole issue of the billing system for a clip store. Other vendors use companies like CCBill and the like. But considering how credit card companies are cracking down on adult stores, even really tame ones like The Last Laugh (the reason why I lost my PayPal account last year), I don't know if I'd trust them. Plus I understand that one needs to pay a lot of money each year simply to have access to Visa, unless things have changed. For someone like me who knows very little about computers and online businesses, opening a clip store represents a lot of risks, trouble and money. Possibly more than I can afford.

As for clip piracy, well, I certainly wouldn't like that to happen to my own work if I opened a clip store, but it's something I'd be ready to live with. It's an unpleasant phenomenon, but it wouldn't stop me from taking the clip plunge.

Even if I do open a clip store one day, I'll still have a credit card payment problem, because I'd really like to keep selling physical videos, at least DVDs. Thing is, even though some billing companies like CCBill seem a bit more tolerant of some adult stuff (but for how long?), many only support electronic product transactions, like clips and images. Not videos. So I probably couldn't use my clip billing system for my DVDs or videotapes.

I appreciate the suggestion of distributing my videos through actual adult stores. But it's not something I want to do. I've changed my mind about a number of things over the years, but one thing that hasn't changed is that I don't want my videos sold in public. First, I prefer to keep some level of control over the distribution of my own material. I like to be able to take care of at least part of the process myself, as well as deal directly with customers. I much prefer the personal approach. This would be lost if stores stocked my videos.

Second, customers would have to pay more for my videos, which I'm totally against, or the stores wouldn't make any profit, which doesn't make any sense.

Third, I know that most of my models would be very uncomfortable if their videos were sold in public. It doesn't matter that it's almost impossible that someone who knows them would see the videos. It's the possibility and the principle of the thing. I'm pretty sure most of my models wouldn't even want to pose at all if they thought their image would be sold in public. Besides, I make a point of telling my models that I only sell my material online, which seems to reassure many of them. I have to respect that.

Fourth, well, the thing is that even though I guess my videos are ok enough as amateur productions go, the actual packaging isn't very professional. My research has indicated that using paper labels can sometimes make DVD-Rs unreadable (which I don't want to risk), and I don't have the equipment to print directly on the DVD-Rs. I do use printed cardboard jewel case inserts, but the discs themselves are very plain, with only part of the titles written on them (like "ALPHA" or "BETA"), just enough to identify them. It seems to me that my DVDs might not look so good on a store's shelves. Not sure store owners would be happy about that. Then again, I may be wrong, but even then my other reasons are enough for me not to distribute my videos that way.

 

[nessonite1]

I dont know what the volume of your sales are but you may want to look into hiring professional printing companies. They'll make your dvds and screen print the title right on it for you. Though just having "alpha" or "beta" written on the disc would be a real plus for people who may not want anyone who sees the disc to know it's contents.
I can't believe there isn't SOMEONE out there who offers a Paypal like service for producers of adult material. You'd think there would be enough of a demand for it! Creating an online storefront isn't terribly difficult. It helps if you have mega php skills (unlike me) but I stumbled my way through it once.

 

[The Last Laugh]

I dont know what the volume of your sales are but you may want to look into hiring professional printing companies. They'll make your dvds and screen print the title right on it for you.

Oh my, no, I don't sell nearly enough copies to afford something like that. Besides, while the idea of offering printed DVDs is certainly appealing, I don't like the idea of depending on someone else to produce them. I prefer to create them right here at home on my own time whenever I need them.

Though just having "alpha" or "beta" written on the disc would be a real plus for people who may not want anyone who sees the disc to know it's contents.

I guess so. But it's still just a word written by hand on a ordinary DVD-R, DVD-R brand name and all. It looks very homemade. Although I do use a stencil to make the titles look a bit better. At least it's functional.

I can't believe there isn't SOMEONE out there who offers a Paypal like service for producers of adult material. You'd think there would be enough of a demand for it!

There is, but the problem isn't with the billing companies. It's with the credit card companies. It's not very advantageous for new billing companies to start business and accept adult stores when the credit card companies are so tough on this sort of thing. It's just not worth the risk.

Some do try, but the system isn't as convenient as PayPal. For instance, there's this company called YowCow. Overall it works very much like PayPal, And they specifically say that they accept legal adult businesses. However, to avoid chargeback and fraud, which are apparently the main reasons why credit card companies and banks are too hot about dealing with adult stores, they require customers to send them a fax to confirm that a payment was made before the transaction can get through. I suppose it does make things safer, and I realize it's a good way to convince the credit card companies to do business, but the process doesn't sound very convenient for the customers to me. It's really too bad, because otherwise I'd definitely would have gone with YowCow.

Then there are billing companies that seem fairly tolerant of some adult businesses and that are used by some tickling vendors, but that don't support physical product transactions. Like CCBill. They're fine for clips, but since I only sell DVDs and videotapes, it's no good for me. Even if I start selling clips I'd still like to sell something tangible, so I'd still have a problem.

By the way, I'd like to mention that while I'm obviously very pissed at PayPal for what they did to me last year, at least they released the money I had left in my account after the outrageously long 180-day period that's part of their policies. I was worried of never seeing my money again. I'm glad I was wrong. Though I do wonder why my account I still limited and cannot be closed. I mean, they won't let me use my account but it can't be closed. What's the point?

Creating an online storefront isn't terribly difficult. It helps if you have mega php skills (unlike me) but I stumbled my way through it once.

It might not be that hard, and I do have people who can help me, but I'm worried about how efficient the system would be. There seems to be a lot of customer complaints when it comes to downloadable clips, a lot more than with physical videos. Among the potential problems, there's slow download speeds. I'd hate to go to the trouble and expense of having a store create only to find out that my customers are unhappy with the performance or some other issue. It's a gamble. If I weren't worried about this I would have opened a store a long time ago.

Besides that, I'm also uncertain how to create my clips. I mean, I know how to make them, but I'm not sure what size to make them. Several vendors are now offering 640x480 clips. I'd really like to do the same, but the file sizes and bit rates are very high, which makes me worried about download times and playback performance on older computers. I'm also not entirely satisfied with the level of quality I get with such a large frame size. I'm much happier with smaller frame sizes, something between 400x300 and 480x360 (the smaller frame sizes looking better than the large ones, of course). I'd love to offer 400x300 clips, which seems like a very nice size to me, but I can't help but worry that some people may be spoiled by the larger clips some of the other vendors are offering and feel that my clips are too small. I wish I knew how important frame size is to clip consumers in general.

 

[laughingboy2000]

I want to pipe up and say that I would support any move to downloadable videos Francois. They are a lot easier for the customer because we dont have to deal with a strange package comming to our doors.