At first glance, Self Serve might look like a boutique for vintage clothes, but it’s stocked with vibrators, rental porn, lubes and condoms.
Warm-colored walls of red, brown, purple and green give the single-room sex shop its intimate feel. The elegant white leather sofa and wooden coffee table in the center of the room invite customers to sit down, relax and spend some time picking out their goodies.
Customers circle the shop several times, stopping at each shelf for a couple minutes, then circling back around about 10 minutes later. The plants in the entrance give the room life while the frosted front window affords privacy for shoppers.
“Every day here is really different, and I feel blessed that people are willing to share their secrets with me,” said co-owner Matie Fricker. Molly Adler is the other co-owner. Both women work in the shop about three days each week. Fricker makes a point to greet each customer who walks in and give them the rundown of the shop.
“Our motto is ‘We have bad sex so you don’t have to,’” she says to all first-time customers. A woman in her 40s walked into the shop with a group of women. She was obviously shy at first, but after speaking with Fricker for a couple minutes she relaxed and shared intimate concerns and questions with her. Fricker tells the customer that the store has gift registration for any occasion. One of their favorite occasions to do gift registry for is “independence day.” But it’s not the Fourth of July. It’s the day someone’s divorce is final and official.
“There’s a lot of expectations about what’s normal and what your life is supposed to be like, and we know, based on our experiences and the experiences of our customers, that life really isn’t that linear,” she said. “And so a lot of people feel lonely and hurt about life changes and divorce is a big one. A lot of people feel like it’s the end of the world.”
Fricker said the store has a best-selling magnet that says, “Divorce is expensive and freedom is priceless.” Fricker said this small magnet has had a profound impact on many customers.
“We had a woman come in once and she started crying when she saw that,” she said.
What makes Self Serve different from other sex shops in Albuquerque is that it’s sex-positive and promotes healthy body image and self love. Both are qualities that Fricker says are crucial to having satisfying sex. It offers educational information for people of all genders and sexual identities. Fricker and Adler said they want their customers to have a different experience than they’ve had at other shops. And the difference is noted by customers. One college-age girl, who wished to remain anonymous, came to shop looking for her first vibrator, she was obviously nervous.
“I was going to go to Castle, but then my friend told me, ‘No, you should go to Self Serve,’” the girl said. “The atmosphere at Castle is kind of freaky, and it’s just so much nicer here.”
One customer said sex shops have a reputation of being slimy, exploitative and fake in the products they sell. The porn DVD covers at other shops often have plastic women and greasy muscle men. The porn at Self Serve tries to defy the unrealistic expectations seen in much of porn by educating people about how to have all types of sex, Fricker said. The store has books, DVDs and pornumentaries of different topics such as “Whipsmart” and “The Technology of an Orgasm.”
Self Serve doesn’t try to sell every sex toy put on the market. It discriminates between the good, the bad, and the poisonous. Self Serve has volunteers test the sex toys before they go on the shelves. All the toys sold at Self Serve are phthlalate free (phthlalates are substances used to soften plastics).
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Fricker obviously likes her job because her face lights up every time the door opens. Every customer that comes in qualifies for a discount — they have 18 possible discounts — and she makes sure everyone has the bare necessities for good sex, such as lube.
As customers make their way up to the cash register they pull out their wallets to pay, and end up staying there for about five minutes because they open up about their sex lives.
“People think sex is simple and that they’ve figured it out and that they’ve got it,” she said. “It’s so much bigger than we give it credit for.”
