7 minute read
Inside Story: O-Products
Following the announcement earlier this year that André Visser had been appointed CEO of O-Products, Paul Smith caught up with him in order to find out more about the business…
Although I’d seen the O-Products at EroFame in the past, I’d never really taken the time to learn the firm’s history, broader offerings, or appeal to retailers. As I’d met André several times, while visiting EDC in the Netherlands, I hoped he’d remember me as I reached out for an interview. Luckily he did and kindly gave his time for a chat. I began by looking at Oproducts.eu, where I learned the company was formed back in 2006 and is based in Schiedam (a suburb of Rotterdam) in The Netherlands but asked André to fill in some blanks. He replied: “O-Products was founded by Joop Visser and his son Nick. Joop had many years of retail experience which he applied to help build an erotic shops chain. Eventually he wanted a change from the day-to-day running of the stores.”
André continued: “Because he had shops he had a lot of knowledge of what he should sell in the erotic wholesale market. As there were already many similar existing companies, he decided to start in a more niche arena, with steel, leather, bondage, and less mainstream lines. There was a growing demand for what you could call ‘extreme items’ and he is very successful in understanding that. Over time, after creating that initial niche section, he built on the range offered with more mainstream products – such as Pixey – and was again very successful. O-Products won several awards with that.
After a sip of coffee, André added: “The reason we now carry 4,000 SKUs is that, especially with cock-rings and dongs, you don’t want to offer just one size. So as far as possible we hold all available sizes, which makes our offering bigger and wider. But this is what you do when you’re committed to being a wholesaler with a broad assortment.”
The cherry on the cake
I was curious about André’s past in the industry, and what that meant he was able to bring to the role of CEO for O-Products. I knew about his time at EDC, where we’d met previously, but suspected he’d more to his history in the pleasure products world. I was right.
“Yes, I’m very privileged to have worked with beautiful companies and people over all those years. Scala, Leg Avenue, One DC – or EDC Wholesale, as it was when you visited us for ETO. The good thing is that I’ve picked up and learned with every single company, so that gave me a very diverse outlook over the years.
“This latest chapter is the cherry on the cake, and I look so forward to working in this new position with my new colleagues at O-Products. The team is very dedicated and has already worked for many years with each other, which makes my job easier when you have qualified people around you. When Joop explained his vision of the next step for O-Products to me, I was very honoured that he approached me for this great job. O-Products want to expand and needed someone who jumped on the barricade to be the running man. Joop wanted to be more active with the internal processes and the rest I do together with Joop.”
My look at the OProducts.eu website inspired my next question as it’d featured more ‘creature and monster’ inspired dildos than I’d been mentally prepared for (there’s a sentence one rarely needs to type) and I wondered what the market for them is like.
André laughed and nodded, gesturing towards a colourful marbled example. “Yes,” he continued, “that monster trend is something which surprised me as well but it’s selling extremely well. We won several awards with this range as well and the assortment keeps growing. It’s definitely a trend that’s evolving from niche to mainstream. Well, perhaps not mainstream-mainstream, but you know what I mean. More accepted. Tentacle porn has its fans and some of the appeal is an extension of that, I’d say. Besides the KIOTOS ‘Monstar’ section we have the great KIOTOS steel, leather, glass, vibes, and bondage collection, and our latest, more mainstream creation is the new series of the Pixey Deluxe. It has the mix of being extremely powerful with no shaft vibration which is very unique for a wand. Plus there’s the ultra-silence series. These are all our own brands.”
Items to fill that gap
Brands can, and do, define a wholesaler or distributor, and while you’ve ‘customer experience’ in the mix, having desirable stock at a competitive price is the obvious starting point in finding and keeping customers. My look at the website had shown me lots of high-profile names – Domestic Partner, Crazy Bull, Master Series – and ones I’ve seen in stores – KIOTOS, Sport Fucker, Wand Essentials, Tailz – plus some others I wasn’t familiar with: Heroes, Ass Thumpers, Booty Sparks, Dark Crystal…
I turned back to André and asked about O-Products’ exclusive or self-manufactured lines. He put down his coffee to add emphasis when he said: “Yes, we have a collection of popular brands we bring in, but perhaps 70% of the assortment are our own ranges. That’s part of the philosophy of being a proper wholesaler, I believe. Make your own brands so you can distribute them worldwide without price dumpings around the corner. Naturally we want O-Products to remain the one-stop-shop for niche sex products so everything that’s available in that section we will investigate. Trends for more extreme butt-play, medical fetish, kinky roleplay ideas… whatever we see as an underserved market we try to get ahead of our competitors on product development to be first to market with the perfect item or items to fill that gap.”
I pitched an idea for an electro-magnetic bondage system, utilising electronics for fans of self-bondage (a timer), easy operation (an on/off switch) and easy cleaning (stainless steel, suitable for UV disinfecting) and he listened patiently. André explained the company is very open to inventive ideas and products, after I wrapped up by explaining how the spring-loaded ass-lock could be reset and withdrawn with an electromagnet. If you end up stocking it, you heard about it here first.
A great place to shop for great lines
The excitement in André’s voice was palpable when he discussed being a key part of the future of O-Products: “I love how O-Products is a great place to shop for great lines,” he enthused. “The award-winning Pixey Deluxe – our bestselling wand line – the Aquawand, in black and white, which you can use in the shower, or the KIOTOS Monstar dildos. And so much more! I also love getting to show them off at trade events. Meeting retailers at EroFame, EroSpain, or XBIZ in LA… they’re all opportunities to exhibit a small fraction of our range yet talk about the bigger picture and connect with our customers. The whole O-Products team is eager to help and support existing and new clients to make 2024 a huge success for everyone.”
Sadly, my time with André was soon over but I’d had a chance to talk about my idea for a range of metal strap-on dildos (again, niche is O-Products’ thing) and explore the trend for jewelled metal plugs, metal collars, ball weights… We’d also talked about the company’s XX-DreamsToys trans-focused lines of breast-forms and ‘ultra realistic body forms with vagina’. And O-Products’ many glass toys, wooden humbler, insertable Champagne bottles, cock-slings and the blue neoprene dog mask. Their remote-controlled vibrating butt-plugs too.
O-Products deals with customers all over the world and the O-Products site is available in English or Dutch. The company normally uses UPS for worldwide shipments, and the minimum order value is €150.
Visit https://oproducts.eu for more details or you can contact André via andre@oproducts.eu
