Kisses and Condoms: Or, Popping My Vender Cherry

This weekend I went to the gay erotic expo in NYC, an event by and for gay men and dedicated to all things sexual. I represented MLR Press at the vender booth, the first time I’d done such a thing on my own. Well, I wasn’t entirely on my own. My fantastic husband went with me.

Because we could only be there for the Saturday events, we drove up to NYC on Saturday morning after loading the car with boxes of promo and books. It was a beautiful day, more like late summer than early fall.

We got to the venue, the Manhattan Center, about two hours before the doors opened for expo attendees, and started setting up. Then while the room was still closed to the public we walked around and checked out the other exhibitors. We saw everything from a booth dedicated to Boy Butter, a favorite lubricant of mine, to underwear companies to sex toys (these guys had some of the biggest dildos I’ve ever seen, and I mean scary big). Lol! There were also nude male dancers, an escort listing service (at least that’s what I think it was) and a booth called the XXX church which had a sign reading “Jesus Loves Pornstars.”

Then we took our places at the MLR table, the doors opened and we were off.

Before leaving home we stuffed thirty goodie-bags with all kinds of promo including bookmarks, excerpt cds, postcards, pens and anything else we had been sent. Those bags went in the first hour and a half. *g* Then, between chatting up expo attendees and watching nearly naked hotties parading around and dancing on both the stage and nearby tables, we stuffed more goodie-bags and handed them out to anyone who even paused in front of our booth.

We had a big bowl of condoms that promo this blog sitting on the table next to a basket of hershey kisses and several people smiled and commented on the connection between kisses and condoms. Not to mention how quickly both items were picked up. Everyone took condoms and candy, such an easy giveaway!

There were drag queens, leather daddies and, as I said before, little hotties wearing next to nothing all parading past our booth. I hardly had space in my brain for all the plot bunnies that came home with me. *g*

Long story long, we gave out a ton of promo, met some really nice people and overall had a fantastic time at the expo. I would absolutely do it again. And maybe next yeatr some of you will stop by and say hello.

Written by Kimberly Gardner

As early as the seventh grade, Kimberly remembers slashing her favorite rockstars and reading romance. So it’s not surprising that her two passions, romance and putting pretty boys with other pretty boys, should come together in her writing. Moliere said, “Writing is like prostitution. First you do it for love, then for a few close friends, then for money.” Kimberly is delighted to finally be doing it for money.
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