The team of Orgie were very happy that, on the occasion of their five-year anniversary, they could finally return to the place where the success story of their brand had begun: the eroFame trade convention. You see, when Orgie burst out of the gate in 2017, that’s where the official premiere of the brand took place. In our EAN interview with Raquel Shaw, the company‘s Chief Operating Officer, we look back at the past half decade of Orige and the many highlights the brand has seen over the course of these years.
Congratulations on your fifth anniversary! What is the predominant feeling for you these days? Pride? Satisfaction? Or are you already focusing on the next five years?
Raquel Shaw: Thank you! We certainly feel good and grateful about the achievements and the growing recognition that our brand and products have received in the market, the media and among end consumers over these first five years. Our hard work has earned us the trust of all those who brought Orgie to its fifth anniversary together with us. Now, the anniversary party is over, and I would say that we are focused on what we can bring to the market in the next two years and to prove worthy of the goodwill and recognition Orgie has earned. We are down to earth people!
Coinciding with the anniversary, you returned to the place where it all began for you: eroFame, which is where you presented your brand for the first time back in 2017. Did that bring back a lot of memories for you?
Raquel: We were finally all together under the same roof again. To reunite with longterm partners, to meet in person those who embraced Orgie during the time when meetings and travelling were just not possible, to share a hug and some good laughs with friends from other brands. The celebration of our 5th anniversary would not have been the same had it not been the place where Orgie debuted. Luckily, it coincided with eroFame‘s much waited comeback after the two-year pandemic gap. This whole scenario was the ideal background to share memories stirred up within us and our partners, and to create lots of new memories in the process.
What other highlights or milestones in the company‘s five-year history do you look back on with a smile?
Raquel: Throughout our five-years history, we have been fortunate enough to experience several highlights, especially for a young brand such as Orgie. Its fast-growing range of best-selling products, an impressive roster of customers, the whole team that makes Orgie happen - those are some of the highlights. Apart from that, there are those small daily things that make a huge difference. For example, a couple of weeks ago, we got an email from a customer asking for an update of their order because (and I quote): ‚Everybody wants Orgie.‘ These sorts of comments may be commonplace for those who send them, but they are extremely rewarding to us. What else could we ask for? As for milestones, Orgie reached its fifth anniversary as a young, award-winning brand, receiving five important awards in five years. Our brand has entered (and stayed!) in an impressive number of markets worldwide, not to mention that Orgie was still a newcomer in markets packed with other big brands when the pandemic started in early 2020. Our most recent milestone was submitting our products to efficacy, dermatologic, gynaecologic, and/or urologic studies carried out by independent research entities. The first five products Sexy Vibe! Liquid Vibrator, Orgasm Drops, She Spot, Time Lag Delay Spray, and Touro XXXL were tested and certified with high rates of approval.
And what would you do differently from today‘s perspective and with the experience of five years in the market?
Raquel: The more than 20 years of experience in the industry that we brought from Brazil have been very useful, allowing us to establish Orgie here in Europe, and foreign markets are not entirely foreign to us, either. But that doesn‘t make us better than anyone else, nor does it make us infallible. For instance, we should have had an Orgie media kit available for our customers since the beginning instead of assisting our customers on a request basis. This year, we hired a second agency to produce video and photo content, and we put together the Orgie media kit including banners, 3D images, a whole new collection of photos of each product, product videos, corporate videos, artwork for all social network posts, magazine ad artwork, and more. This media kit will always be a work in progress as we keep adding materials, and our customers can access it anytime to download whatever they need.
You definitely had your work cut out for you five years ago. Establishing a new brand in a market that has no shortage of established brands is no small feat. How would you define the pillars of Orgie‘s success?
Raquel: The Orgie team works like a welloiled machine and is committed to reaching our common goals: creating effective, high-quality products; adding our Brazilian know-how to formulas with sensuous features; innovative ingredients; appealing branding; well-planned order processing; efficiency in post-sales assistance and customer service; and the excellent work of our commercial department. Our exclusive R&D cosmetic engineers capture Orgie’s philosophy by combining their knowledge and expertise with the creativity and innovation of our formulas. The level of commitment within the Orgie team is also reflected in the fact that we have had zero turnover of collaborators within these five years. Each one of us have our share of responsibility, and similarly, we all share in the success.
How have the demands on a brand in the sensual cosmetics category changed over the past five years?
Raquel: For Orgie as a brand, the demands did not change, they expanded. In November, we launched the Sexy Therapy and Tantric Massage Oils Mini Size collections, which was a suggestion from a French partner. Upon the launch of the pheromone booster eau de toilette perfumes Sensfeel Woman and Man, we had suggestions pouring in from everywhere, asking us to develop Sensfeel 10 in 1 body and hair lotions to go along with the perfumes. This demand was inspired by our The Secret Seduction Elixir 10 in 1 body and hair lotion, a bestseller since day one. There are requests for new products, and for new flavours and new versions of existing products. And while we filter them and respond to the demands that are workable, we are also developing new products lines. All this resulted in 11 new products in 2022, and there is more coming up in 2023!
Are there any products or product lines that have been particularly important to the growth of your business?
Raquel: There are product lines and individual products that have been particularly important to the development of our business. The lines Orgasm Drops, Touro, Sexy Vibe!, and all our other products that have the liquid vibration feature; Time Lag Delay spray, The Secret Seduction Elixir 10 in 1, and more recently the Sensfeel line. Wow! buccal spray had a rough start in the first year, but then it became a bestseller, with the market demanding new flavours.
It‘s always said that you shouldn‘t chase trends but set them. How difficult is this task? And how have you managed to uphold your brand values at all times?
Raquel: The way I see it, to chase trends has never been our primary intention, and to believe that Orgie have set any would be pretentious. We obviously look at the trends in the market, but Orgie is not strictly guided by them. We manage to uphold our brand values by balancing our decisions between market trends and the calculated risk of going in different directions.
Innovative products are important, a tightly meshed network of resellers, distributors, etc. is vital. To what extent do your business partners contribute to your success?
Raquel: I usually say that success is volatile, and prestige is a form of consolidated success that won’t fade or can‘t be taken from those who achieved it. Beyond our success, we can certainly say that our business partners have contributed to turning Orgie into a brand of prestige. No less than this.
In how many countries around the world are your products sold and which markets are on your to-do list?
Raquel: Orgie is currently being sold in more than 60 countries; actually, we are about to reach the mark of 70. Among the countries on our to-do list are the USA, a couple of markets in the Latin and Central Americas, and some African countries and Israel.
Let‘s take a look into the future: 2027 - Orgie celebrates its tenth anniversary... What position will your brand hold in the market by then?
Raquel: It is always wise to look ahead, but difficult to look further than you can see – said Sir Winston Churchill.