1. Can you share the story behind the founding of your business and how it became connected to the BDSM and Leather Culture community?
Back in 2010, I was running a regular kink munch and a close friend of mine was a regular attendee at that munch. He had recently started making toys out of recycled bike tube rubber and leather. I had started making candles in a little pitcher because I could not find any candles on the kink market that had both a handle and a spout.
In early 2011, we were encouraged to attend a lifestyle convention in NJ and set up a booth. We combined our wares, came up with the Agreeable Agony business name, and attended the event. We did surprisingly well at that show and started booking a few events a year. Over time the company grew from a part-time hobby for both of us to a full-time job for us and a number of other people.
2. What unique products or services does your business offer that cater specifically to the BDSM and Leather Culture community?
We make a variety of hand-made kink and fetish merchandise. We have always specialized in custom impact toys made out of fun colorful materials like leather, recycled rubber, silicone, etc. As mentioned before we also designed our style of wax play candle with a handle and a pouring spout. For many years we have also offered one of the largest color selections for bondage rope in the industry.
3. How has the BDSM and Leather Culture community influenced the growth and evolution of your business?
We have grown a lot because of our community. From 2011-2019 we attended kink events of all types and sizes. Over the years we grew from local events to attending events nationwide.
4. In what ways do you foster inclusivity and diversity within your business, considering the diverse nature of the BDSM and Leather Culture community?
We have always been a queer-owned and run company. Our staff in the office and at shows has hailed from all sorts of backgrounds. We are also always enthusiastic about more queer and trans visibility/representation in kink products.
5. Can you discuss some of the challenges you've faced as a small business owner serving a niche market like the BDSM and Leather Culture community?
Probably our biggest challenge over the last decade was when the COVID-19 pandemic hit in early 2020. In 2019 sales at conventions were around 70% of our business, we were going to over 20 events around the country. We had dozens of events already scheduled for 2020 and had to cancel all of them. In many ways we got lucky with timing; our website had been growing fast already. We were able to market our website and Etsy stores and utilize our new warehouse space to fulfill a massively increased shipping volume. We transitioned nearly fully into an online and wholesale fulfillment shop. These days we ship over 800 orders a month all over the world.
6. How do you approach community engagement and building relationships within the BDSM and Leather Culture community?
A lot of our community engagement in the past was the conventions I mentioned before. In addition to booth sales, our staff would often do education classes at conventions. With our pullback from conventions, we have focused more on working with retail stores, educators, community groups, etc. We may return to conventions slowly, but probably never at the volume we did pre-2020.
7. What role does authenticity play in your business, especially when dealing with a community that values individual expression and identity?
Our team is an assortment of artists and kinksters who like to experiment with their art and express themselves in fun ways. We value having a laid-back environment that allows us all to create fun and interesting things that speak to our varied identities in the queer, BDSM, and Leather communities.
8. How do you navigate the balance between running a successful business and maintaining the cultural integrity of the BDSM and Leather Culture community?
We have always valued only selling products that we believe in. This often means passing over high-margin mass-produced items to sell books from small creators, handmade goods we make ourselves, etc. Whenever possible we work with local artisans and maker spaces to create things we cannot create in-house. We always prefer to sell toys that we have used and would want to play with.
9. Are there any initiatives or partnerships your business has undertaken to give back to the BDSM and Leather Culture community or support related causes?
We are not currently participating in any specific initiatives. In general, we make a variety of monetary and product donations throughout the year to both larger community causes and small community organizations.
10. Looking ahead, what goals and aspirations do you have for your business in terms of serving and contributing to the BDSM and Leather Culture community?
We are hoping to be able to go back to more community events as the world gets safer for such things. We all miss being able to do more face-to-face education and interaction.
Company Bio:
Agreeable Agony (https://www.agreeableagony.com) is a small BDSM/kink company run by a collection of crafters, artisans, and kinksters from the Northeast USA who build beautiful handmade floggers, dragon tails, wildly weird rubber and silicone toys, slappers, pitcher candles, claws, pretty colored bondage rope, and other unique kinky toys.
When we're not crafting, vending, or brainstorming for clever bios, we help to educate our local & regional communities through munches and classes. With experience both building and running communities pop, we hope to forge a more tolerant and understanding future for our kink communities by providing for them.