CEO of Sydney-based, ASX-listed Sharon Austen Limited is hoping the Valentine's Day launch of a new Sydney-themed product will spur an influx of international orders in the days closely following February 14th.
The company is teaming up with US women's erotica site CAKEnyc.com and experimental Webcast residency We Live In Public to launch the new product at a Webcast party in New York.
Austen said the Valentine's Day party was expected to draw Web traffic of some 50,000 visitors online - hopefully leading to a spate of international orders.
And it's fitting that the vendor of online erotic products is visiting the US for the launch. She estimates that more than one-third of the company's customers are women who live in the US.
The company has access to warehouse space in Los Angeles through major shareholder German erotic products supplier Beate Uhse, but Austen said her company fulfils most orders from its Sydney office.
-It's not much longer (from Sydney) than it is from the West coast to the East coast," she said.
Austen was reluctant to put a figure on the etailer's business leading up to, and after, Valentine's day.
-E-commerce is still relatively new. We expect February 14, 2002 to be our biggest day ever," she said.
Head of marketing at Perth-based erotic products etailer adultshop.com, Mark Loveridge, was more willing to put a figure on the adult industry's biggest day of sales.
He estimates sales in the week leading up to Valentine's day were up around 50 percent from sales in the week leading up to Christmas, the etailer's next biggest day.
The final day of order placement with adultshop before the Valentine's Day deadline, February 12th, saw sales soaring around 110 percent higher than an average sales day, he said.
-Valentine's Day is our Christmas," he said.
He said Valentine's Day shopping presented the online erotic etail industry with a challenge because Valentine's Day gift shoppers typically left their shopping until the last possible moment and their shopping was typically -less preplanned", he said.
