Sex Shop

A sex shop or erotic shop is a shop that sells products related to adult sexual or erotic entertainment, such as vibrators, lingerie, clothing, pornography, and other related products. The world's first sex shop was opened in 1962 by Beate Uhse AG in Flensburg, West Germany, and sex shops can now be found in many countries. Many sex shops also trade over the internet. Sex shops are part of the sex industry.

In most jurisdictions, sex shops are regulated by law, with access not permitted to minors, the age depending on local law. Some jurisdictions prohibit sex shops and the merchandise they sell. In some jurisdictions that permit it, they may also show pornographic movies in private video booths, or have private striptease or peep shows. Also an adult movie theater may be attached.

Near borders of countries with different laws regarding sex shops, shops on the more liberal side tend to be popular with customers from the other side, especially if importing the purchased materials by customers to their own country, and possessing them, is legal or tolerated.

Almost all licensed adult stores in the UK are forbidden from having their wares in open shop windows, which means often the shop fronts are boarded up or covered in posters. A warning sign must be clearly shown at the entrance to the store, and no sex articles (for example, pornography or sex toys) should be visible from the street. However, lingerie, non-offensive covers of adult material, etc. may be shown depending on the license conditions of the local authority. No customer can be under eighteen years old.

The Ann Summers chain of lingerie and sex toy shops recently won the right to advertise for shop assistants in Job Centres, which was originally banned under restrictions on what advertising could be carried out by the sex industry. The increasing acceptance of sex shops can also be seen as the north-west England chain Nice 'n' Naughty became the first adult company to win an investor in people award.

In 2007, a Northern Ireland sex shop was denied a license by the Belfast City Council. The shop appealed and won, but this was overturned by the House of Lords.

In London, there are few boroughs that have licensed sex shops. Soho has fifteen licensed shops and several remaining unlicensed ones. Islington has several sex businesses (at least three licensed shops- Private, Adultworld and Soho Original Books- as well as three pornographic cinemas and numerous massage parlors/strip clubs, concentrated on Caledonian Road). The Euston area has extant old-fashioned hardcore sex shops, with most on Eversholt Street. In the early 1990s, London's Hackney council sought to shut down Sh! Women's Erotic Emporium, because they did not have a license. Sh! took the council to court and consequently won the right to remain open as there were no sufficient reasons for the closure.

There are also many online sex shops, selling a variety of adult content such as toys, fetish wear etc. These types of shop are often favoured by the consumer as they have less overheads and can be perused within the comfort of the home. Their discreetness is also appealing to some.

Sex shops in Scotland are regulated under the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982.