This month we were so lucky to have @HiThereCatsuit interview Brittany on the Authentically Kinky Podcast. The full podcast can be found at - https://open.spotify.com/episode/7cidbiv9UYtBV3jqZHvbwq?si=y9ROZkK4RsafoZbSqsIaOg

Here are some highlights

Authentically Kinky: How did The Dungeon Store start? 

Brittany: It's funny you should ask that, because we're celebrating our 25th anniversary this year. Turning 25 in 2025. We are old enough to rent a car. It was founded by my mother. 25 years ago, she saw a market opportunity and took advantage of it. The company has really morphed and changed. We've gone in a lot of different directions since then. It's been a very dynamic 25 years. It was my mom seeing a market need, in 2000. She really got her start with glass dildos. That was her bread and butter. I know that glass dildos really carried us through. We were still selling them when I started. That morphed into violet wands, fifteen…ish years ago. 

Authentically Kinky: The thing that I love about you guys is you're wonderful to the kink community, but you have so many different communities that you work with. Talk to me about what it's like to adjust to each of those communities.

Brittany: For every event, regardless of the nature of the community we're going to, we try to look at who's going to be there? What are they interested in? What does that area intend to enjoy? We try to focus on what other vendors are going to be there, because if you're going to have ten flogger vendors, you don't need another flogger vendor. You need someone who's going to bring rope. Or if you're going to have eight rope vendors, you need more of an impact representation. So we just always try to be very aware of the needs of each community we're spending our time with and selling to. Being a vendor in a niche community really means that you have to appreciate the community. You can't just be a carpetbagger and show up to their money and run away. You need to be involved. You need to care. You need to be invested in what they're invested in. We really try to at the very least just be aware of "how can being in our booth be a better experience?"

Authentically Kinky: What are the essentials to start a toy bag?

Brittany: For novice kinksters, the essential that should go into your toybag is a negotiation and consent checklist, and a pen.

After that, whatever you feel comfortable using. If you feel comfortable wielding a paddle, then your favorite paddle. Then you find the one that feels the most comfortable in your hand, and you find the one that is most fluid with your arm in the backswing. The correct things in your toybag are the ones that feel most comfortable, confident, and competent using.

Authentically Kinky: If someone is looking for a flogger, obviously, they're looking for that beautiful flow, but are there other things they should be looking for?

Brittany: Everyone should always go for an American made flogger, with American leather, or Italian leather. This is not American exceptionalism, it is that the way we tan our leather and treat our leather, is very different than what you find in other countries. Be very mindful of where your leather comes from, and what animal it comes from. A cow hide flogger, a deer hide flogger, a moose hide flogger, an elk hide flogger are going to feel like completely different sensations and have four completely different use cases. Everyone should start with a good cow flogger. A nice, mid-tier, hundred dollars, plus or minus cow flogger is always a great place to start as you learn your swing, and it puts you in a great place to assess things that you're going to want to remember... "Oh I think it would feel more comfortable with a longer handle. If these were a little bit longer…" and just work from there.

This is an unpopular opinion. Don't let your preference for color deny you of a preferred sensation. Not all toys come in the same color. I see a lot of people who will fall in love with something, especially floggers, and they'll be like "does it come in this color?" They'll say no to the orgasmic, amazing, perfect sensation they were in love with. The first bite of chocolate on Halloween. They'll deny themselves of this, because it's the wrong color.

This guy, the Hydra, we have buffalo falls into what we call DTC, deer-tanned cow. So it's cow hide, tanned as if it were a deer hide, to make it more soft and supple. All of these have angle cuts. If you catch with just these tips, it's a very stingy flogger. If you catch with at this knot point, where it's even thicker where it's woven in, you're gonna get some good thud. If you make an impact back here, let all of this cascade into the body, it's like a deep tissue massage. You can get some good, deep thud sensation going. That's what I'm a fan of.

Authentically Kinky: What is it that surprises you that it sells so well or is there anything that surprises you these days?

Brittany: We expanded into occult books, tarot decks and oracle decks. It started with books on the nexus of sex magick. It really snowballed from there to cover a lot of different pantheons. I'm the person who vets every title of the books we carry. One of the things I try to do is make sure we have a lot of every ethnic pantheon. I have Russian Black Magick. I have Scottish Witchcraft. We've got Italian Folk Magick. We've got Santeria, Hoodo, Voodoo, and all of them are written by authors of those demographics. I have been so pleasantly surprised. I suspected that the venn diagram of people into the occult and people into kink looked a lot like a circle. I'm pleasantly surprised to have been correct.

There's two I want to highlight to support this point.

"Backwoods Witchcraft" is about Appalachia folk Magick. That's so powerful because Appalachia lives almost independently, culturally from the rest of the states. Appalachia Maryland and West Virginia is different than the rest of Maryland and West Virginia, same in North Carolina, and Kentucky. Appalachia is its own culture and its own world. I love that I get to carry books on such a microcosm of a community. Appalachia just has its own different views on so many things. They are the birthplace of so many wonderful aspects of what we associate with being an American. They have their own superstition and their own pantheon.

We carry another one that's "Mountain Conjure and Southern Root Work" that's similar, and skewed towards the Southern half and covers more of that Kentucky, Virginia, North and South Carolina, and Georgia vibes… It's enjoyable to be able to hear people say "My grandmama talked about this… My nana talked about this… My mom's from… She said that her grandmother taught her to do… " It's interesting to see how many common superstitions, just with different, like roots, there are across all of these various cultures. Maybe there's more to the world than what we can see.

Authentically Kinky: How do we follow all the places you're going to go to?

Brittany: Obviously, there's a lot of events in 2025 that we're looking forward to. Frolicon is always going to be one of my favorites. Sex Down South is another one. I look forward to that every year. Dark Odyssey events are great events to check out. Some new events we're checking out are OMG in Tucson Arizona… Kinkfest in Portland is a big fun time so if you're in Oregon, check that out. I look forward to all of them. I love my job. They're all very fun. The only thing that makes some events more fun than others is how kind the vibes are. It's not necessarily about the money. At some of my favorite events, we don't do a lot economically, but they make me happy. They're just fun! It's just a good time, with good people, having a good moment.