Business As Usual

Remember last fall when I told all you guys that the parlor crackdown would end by election day? Well I was more or less right. I mean, what's the point of raiding a place if it's too late to help anyone get re-elected?

A bunch of girls and "mama-sans" were arrested. Now they're finally making their way to court and having their wrists slapped. I'm sure most of the girls arrested will start showing up at other businesses pretty soon.

According to my customers, possibly 2 or 3 different Asian Massage Parlors (AMPs) busted last year are now back up and running. I don't know if they're in the exact same locations or moved or whatever, but the rumor I hear is that the competition is back in town. And believe me - it's a lot easier to reopen than you think.

After a shutdown, the owner just pleads in court that "I had no idea" and will get the OK to start up again with the remaining girls who were NOT arrested. Then they'll just rely on Regulars for a couple months until the whole thing blows over. Heck - that's kinda what we did when the crackdown was in full swing.

Actually, let me back up and here and point out that a business isn't necessarily ordered to close it's doors AFTER a raid. Just because 2 scared girls got hauled away in handcuffs in front of a news camera in the morning for offering a handjob to an undercover cop, doesn't mean the afternoon shift gets the day off. In fact, an owner will want his place to stay open to prove to a judge later that it really is legit, and the girls who got arrested were just BAAAAAAAD girls.

My girlfriend who runs her own place was lucky enough to avoid the crackdown. But in her neck of the woods, the towns are hitting them with new ordinances to limit their hours, force inspections and review their hiring records. Basically it's the same crap they're supposed to be doing but just never botherws to. Any parlor that's halfway careful (like us) won't have any problems.

In other words, the new laws won't do shit. The girls are returning to work. The busted AMPs are reopening. And it's business as usual. Nice job guys.

CJ

Update, Correction and Apology

Between all this talk about crackdowns and raids, Audrey decided to close The Business for Saturday and Sunday.

Well, to be more truthful, it was between all those Halloween parties that we closed up shop. Trina and I had way too much to do this weekend with all the costume shopping and beer runs and whatnot in preparation for a weekend of Halloween festivities. Cindy was willing to work, but both Audrey and I agree that she wouldn't know she was servicing a cop even if were in full uniform, with a badge and carrying a video camera. "And I thought he was doing a role play..."

You know who did work this weekend? Maude - Audrey's dull sister. Let me tell ya something, that bitch takes her job seriously. I mean, she came in, worked the phones, and told anyone who called that we were unavailable. AND she cleaned the place from top to bottom! Personality of wallpaper, but a good worker.

Looks like we didn't miss much since there was no more news on raids this past weekend. Let's cross our fingers and see if the interest in parlors ends today.

Now I'd like to take the opportunity to apologize about my comment the other day about the clientele of full service parlors.

What I was trying to say is that WHEN a parlor's customers change over to drug dealers and criminals, that it will attract too much attention and eventually get taken down. That's what happened to a couple of places around here a few years back. I was not trying to say that EVERY full service place is patronized exclusively by pimps and dealers (however, I do have a funny story regarding that which I'll share later). The point I was trying (poorly) to make is that a parlor's worst enemy is attention of any kind.

There are 2 kinds of attention: cops and neighbors. The current crackdown is based on the attention from neighbors. A national organization fighting human trafficking has teamed up with local religious groups to identify and investigate suspicious parlors in the area (yes - I read the paper too). And I'm sure many businesses in the Delaware Valley ended up on a list of some kind that they turned over to the feds/townships/police/etc.

And this leads to the other kind of attention: cops. This is the really bad kind of attention because unlike neighbors, cops can shut you down. And cops HAVE to investigate if there's been a complaint. So after everything was said and done, they shut down about 20 Asian massage parlors and 2 American ones. My guess is that the American ones got thrown in there because they were just waaaaay to obvious to ignore.

And this is why I made that bad example of how a parlor can call attention to itself by its customers. Actually a very successful parlor (whether full service or not) will have an incredibly dull clientele. And that's the kind of business you want - not politicians, celebrities, or criminals. Sure, they may be more interesting and have more money to throw around, but there's either a reporter or a cop who followed them here taking pictures and writing down license plate numbers. No thank you.

So my apologies to my fellow masseuses out there if I offended anyone. And you full service fans - sorry if I lumped you in with the "wrong" crowd.

CJ

Too Close For Comfort

Wow - what a week.

9 parlors taken down. 8 of those were in a neighboring county just over the weekend. Busy week for law enforcement and bad news for working girls. However, since all of them were Asian Massage Parlors (AMPs), I don't feel too badly.

I tnink this pretty much illustrates what I've been saying all along about the elections. Everyone who's in office and wants to stay there will take credit for being "tough on crime" at the expense of some poor girl trying to work off her debt to her mafia owners. These raids are the kind of thing that the local news loves since they combine everything that makes for great TV:

Sex
Organized Crime
FBI
Politicians
Disgraced husbands walking with coats over their heads
Frowning girls with no makeup

Hey guys - you wanna get tough on crime? How about fixing downtown so I can walk down the sidewalk after 8pm without getting robbed? Sorry - but that kind of cleanup can't be done before voting day.

Am I getting bothered by all this? Oh yeah. It's starting to make me nervous again - especially since I thought we were in the clear. We've been seeing newbies for a couple months now, and even I'm wondering if maybe we should lay low till next week.

Speaking of which, I have a girlfriend who owns a business near where they busted those 8 parlors over the weekend. I mentioned her before - she offered me a job a couple years ago when I was tired of Audrey's bullshit. Anyway, I called her up as soon as I heard. She was pretty much hiding under a rock when I called. They're more or less shut down, simply because she can't get anyone to come to work, let alone answer the phone. Not that she wants to go to work! She's scared to death to drive anywhere near that place right now.

We talked for over an hour and I filled her in on what's been happening out here, since we've been the center of the crackdown for over a year now. I suggested that she do what we did - just stop taking new customers for a couple of months. Period. End of story. She thought that was crazy and none of the girls would go for it. But I said what better way to guarantee no narcs than only taking Regulars?

We also swapped a few tips on keeping ourselves safe in this environment. However, I would still bet money that the crackdown fades away in a couple of weeks. And another thing I'd like to point out - out of the 2 dozen places raided over the past year, only 2 of them were good old fashioned American massage parlors. It must take a LOT of complaints before the cops are forced to take one down. Just goes to show that they really don't care about business such as ours, until they're noticed by too many people.

Now if I go suddenly off the air without a trace, then we'll both know that I was completely and utterly full of shit!

CJ

Confessions of an Erotic Reporter - A Happyendingz Exclusive

Hey guys - you're not gonna believe this, but I got an exclusive interview with one of the girls who used to work at the parlor that got shut down last month. And even more unbelievable, it's courtesy of Audrey.

Apparently "Crystal" just started looking for a job and got Audrey's number. They spoke for a bit because Audrey is considering hiring another girl. Personally I don't think we need the help. The 3 of us are fine with the number of sessions we're currently doing, but Audrey is so greedy that the thought of losing a single customer because he couldn't wait 30 minutes between sessions just eats her up. Who cares if a 2nd girl has to sit around for 6 hours waiting for that to happen, as long as Audrey gets that door fee.

But I digress.

Anyway, Audrey called me up and asked "You want to talk to this girl? She's from that place that just got raided." Well of course I wanted to talk to her! The blog aside, I wanted to know what happened just out of professional curiosity. Whatever we can learn from their mistakes, right?

So Audrey put me in contact with her, with the promise that I had to see if she'd be a good fit. I told Trina and Cindy too and they wanted to know all the details when I was done.

Crystal worked at the other place on and off over the past year. She only covered 2 shifts per week and was not officially on the books. This is probably why she got lucky and slipped under the radar screens during the raid. In PA parlors it's not uncommon to have girls working under the table since the only staff you can legally have must be licensed massage therapists. For example, Cindy is not officially on our payroll. There are loopholes in the laws concerning training, experience, etc., but I won't bore you here with it. Enough to say that the new laws are designed to weed out the full service massage parlors.

According to Crystal, there were a couple other part time girls who also avoided the raid, but they have sworn off the massage business for now. The crackdown really has made a lot of local girls nervous about working.

Crystal is what I like to call "Half Service." She'll do an oral release in session (with condom) but won't do actual sex. She saves full service for a limited number of customers she only sees outside of work. Because she wasn't full service, she was scheduled to just help out on a couple of shifts per week. I explained to her that we're not full service and she said she was cool with that. I also mentioned that part time availability is fine since we're not busy enough for a full time hire (which is true).

I asked Crystal if she's heard any news or spoken to any of the other girls recently. The others who weren't caught in the raid are laying really low for now - afraid that the ones who got arrested will turn on them for the prosecutors. Apart from that bit of news, she's avoiding that part of town like the plague.

Now the danger of hiring a girl like Crystal is if her name ever comes up in the investigation of the other parlor, they may eventually track her down over here. And THAT is the kind of publicity we can't afford.

I asked if she had any idea they were about to get raided. She said apart from the stories in the paper about the crackdown, she wasn't expecting it. They thought they were careful, and they thought they had people looking out for them. Oh well - just because you have a couple local cops as customers doesn't mean the state won't target you. Especially in an election year! Speaking of which, I'll bet money that the crackdown will miraculously end this month. That's local politics for ya.

And lastly for the heck of it, I ended our interview with "So Crystal... have you had any customers lately looking for a girl named 'CJ?'" She said "no" and I have to admit that I was slightly disappointed.

When we were done on the phone, I told her Audrey will be in touch if we decide to hire her. She actually seemed nice enough - especially if she only wanted a couple of shifts. But with the crackdown going on, she may be too hot to handle right now.

CJ