READERS LIVES: Jamie O’Sullivan, area retail manager, Harmony

And this time she’s touring Europe. To kick off her adventures, our Mystery Shopper travels to the heart of Europe, or at least the EU, the historic city of Brussels…

Home to Hercule and Tintin, waffles and chocolates, three official languages, diamond trading, more than enough peeing statues and more than enough Smurfs, Belgium is more than just a country invented so Britain and Germany would have a place to sort out their differences – to quote James May.

Adam Bernstein takes a close-up view of the country elsewhere in this issue and here our Mystery Shopper spends a little time in some of the adult stores of Brussels.

Famed for its architecture, the European Council, Commission and Parliament, and Jean-Claude Van Damme - specifically, his muscles – it’s the sort of place where men still stride while smoking a pipe, where the bar with the most beer varieties (as of 2004) can be found, and where street signs are bilingual.

Hotstore Erotique

★★★

Fresh off the Eurostar, a short walk away I located this interesting store with appealing windows and buzzer entry. Surrounded by building works – and a gay sauna – I found its blue-lit stairs (to a cellar and a cinema), grey wood-a-like flooring, white stands, talkSPORT (in French) radio and good lighting restful and relaxed. Long avenues made browsing a little harder than it might’ve otherwise been, as I scanned fetish shoes and boots (€125 knee-high, €189 thigh-length), boobs in a glass case (awkwardly priced underneath), aluminium baseball bats (oh my!) and a lot of other metal toys, €119 CalExotics’ French Kiss, and some detritus waiting to be dealt with. Noir Handmade, €89 Leg Avenue dresses, a stepladder tucked beside the stairs up, Ouch! Ball gags, Dorcel masks…

Downstairs (including one giant step which almost tipped me down them), in the low-ceilinged basement I enjoyed slimline LED light panels, as well as more quirky stock: A €1,625 and €1,075 cage (take one price off, eh?), more trans lines including bum-n-hip boosters, French DVDs for anything around €45-€55, with some very specialist titles for €135 – all annoyingly displayed spine-on and doubleparked, with handwritten categories - and €349 Master Series ‘pussy pants’. Plus a €1,875 F-machine, ‘loo-seat’ seat, and a continuation of the untidy-but-interesting display vibe.

With a manager who was mostly on the phone, narrow aisles and some faded prices, I still left impressed with the breadth of stockholding and overall presentation. Tidy for another star!

Argos Shop

★★★★

Catching my eye on Google maps, this is unlike any Argos I’ve previously been in. A totally unconnected business to the Sainsbury’s-owned chain of course, it still made me smile as I looked over the three-way metal butt-plug(s), 8-prong butt-stretcher, and horse speculum in the windows. They prepared me for a more gay-male targeted store, but the very first thing to strike me was the same grey flooring as Hotstore. A related business or coincidence? Hard to say. I was soon lost in cockrings and cages, biscuit and brown walls behind dark metal mesh displays, and lashings of leatherwear. A side room held a sex seat with knee supports (display or for sale? Hard to tell again), a sex swing, fold-out restraint mat, and €115 Rude Rider harnesses in a variety of styles and colours. MOI seat and sex machine, another queening stool, and a further substantial seat. Good music accompanied my drift past some cool masks (gas, dog, urinal; the usual), €60 Colt jockstraps, and rows of Domestic Partner dildos on the floor (tut), towards the DVDs. This was another large display, but better done, with clear €40/€50/€55/€65/€68 pricing (random, but clear!) and A4 signs offering 15%, 30% and 50% o . These were colourful to catch the eye, but why the discount was printed fairly small, and off-centre, I can’t say.

I got a “Merci” as I left, which helped a little given the lack of other interaction. Ignoring Man2Man next door for now, I headed deeper into town…

Sensations

★★★★

I also admired but skipped Borisboy – another gay store – and ‘Erot’x Stars’ as I zeroed in on this adult store, which was surrounded by at least five others within a couple of minutes’ walk. I selected it over the others (one which had no obvious name) for the simple reason it was on my side of the road – a road being resurfaced. I’ll remember it for taking the ‘narrow aisles, tall stands’ to the next level. Honestly, it felt like I’d got even shorter while trapped in a sex canyon. No wonder there were CCTV cameras everywhere – You’d be invisible from the counter otherwise. I think I saw 16 ‘feeds’ on a screen there. Lots to watch at once.

€49 Rimba sink-plug gags, no DVDs, RealRock dildos, €99 Noir out ts, Cottelli lingerie (€40+) and Play (€50+) boxed lines, €18 Amorable stockings by Rimba, and toys measured in inches (12” €89) in a metric-only county all got spotted, wrapped across dark wooden flooring and black-mirror slatwall, with sections of red too, not obviously being used to highlight anything in particular. I was pleased to spot a portable step to get to the higher shelves, even though I’d need to stack several of them. Fun Factory, Pipedream’s Fetish Fantasy Series lines, big Zero Tolerance masturbators, a huge selection of Satisfyer toys, and good music pleased my rusty Mystery Shopping senses, as did more LED panel lights- very much needed in the canyon., I left via a steep ramp back onto the pavement and noted a sandwich board. Around the corner I wrote on my notes, “Overstuffed but satisfying!” and stand by that. Sometimes it’s nice to be overwhelmed..!

Sexy World

★★

I continued my odyssey to the north, by Brussels Noord railway station. A prime spot for a large store, even with half of it given over to DVD booths. However, outside I got my first warning signs; a roughly taped-up broken window, and sun-bleached stock on display. Stepping inside I was met with stained floor tiles in a selection of pink shades, blinking fluorescent lights, and water-damaged ceiling tiles. I don’t enjoy focusing on the negatives so let me quickly add I liked the bilingual info signs around the walls – ‘Girls Pump Too’ by the nipple and clit pumps, ‘Realistic Vibes, Dildos and Dongs’ by the… well, you can guess – as well as Bangers masturbators, Scandal bondage lines, and €60 Leg Avenue costumes.

Was that insulation hanging from a broken ceiling panel? I tried to ignore it, but that put my focus onto the shelving units, many of which had fixed shelves too close together for the stock on it, resulting on many hangable boxes displayed on their sides. At least the DVD deals – 7,5€ each or three for 15€, to use the signage format – were both enticing and clearly communicated. Other movies were €25 or €29, with lots of Asian titles seen, alongside ‘Fuck Device Boys’ range – something like that anyway!

Something of a missed opportunity given the size of the site, but I did appreciate aspects of this shop.

Love Shop

★★★★

I headed back towards Station Brussel Zuid and another smooth train ride with one last store to admire. I picked this one over Sensation ‘elle (toy’s with an apostrophe on the sign), L’Autre Image, and Lady Paname (sex life accessories) because the mannequin in the window had giant boobs. Sometimes it’s the simplest things. I left the busy street far behind, thanks to pale stone-effect flooring, fitted and modern-looking wooden stands, some with mirrors, and a thread curtain inside the automatic doors. This helped me feel less overlooked as I browsed an open drawer of metal plugs around €49 in gold and chrome, with round and heart-shaped jewel ends, in a selection of sizes and jewel colours. Truly something for every taste.

Deeper in, I was amused by the toothy smiles of mannequins, blue-light uplighters on top of the stands, male fetish clothing lines, Crazy Bull, and the sudden feeling I was overdressed. It was cold outside and I soon had to carry my coat. Changing booths at the rear, complete with green velvet seats for partners of shoppers to wait on, deflected me back towards the front, where I was offered 10% of toys and lingerie by the manager and saw a masturbator range from Lovetoy called Streetgirl’s, which might not be a typo. €99 Cottelli bondage dresses and costumes, Leten powered masturbators… €23 for stockings seen for €18 elsewhere though.

With a friendly “Goodbye!” as I left this light, bright, sophisticated store, I walked away smiling like a top-heavy mannequin.