Inside Naughty N'awlins: The Rise of the World’s Largest Swingers Convention

Transcript

Speaker1: This podcast is intended for adult audiences. Over the age of 18, it contains adult language and situations. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in this podcast belong solely to us, and not of any employer, organization, committee, or other group or individuals. This podcast is not intended to be taken as professional advice. Welcome to the Swing Nation podcast. A podcast by swingers for swingers. Where we look to educate others and push back on the negative stigmas and misconceptions associated with our lifestyle. Come with us and share our pineapple journey as we travel the globe. Interview the experts. Learn and grow together. Join the nation. So Lacey, people are asking, how do they get to go to a party or an event with us? They check out swingersociety.net, you create a profile, you sign up for an event, and you come hang out with us. Super easy. That's right. If you want to party with us and the other faces and names that you know from social media and TikTok, head on over to swingersociety.net. Can't wait to see you there. Hey there, Pineapple people, and welcome to the Swing Nation podcast. We are your hosts, Northern Guy and Southern Girl. And today we have a very special episode for you. We have a guest that's probably long overdue. We were just talking about that. Yeah, we were. But we're sitting down with Bob Hannaford, which if you don't know who that is, he is the man behind Naughty Events, Naughty New Orleans, probably all of the events you've heard about. He's your favorite blue-haired swinger. I think I've seen that written down somewhere. Really? Yeah. Welcome to the podcast, Bob. Thanks for having us, guys. Yeah. So we usually like to start with a kind of tell us a little bit about yourself, kind of like when you meet lifestyle people and you're like, oh, hey, I'm Dan, I'm Lacey, I'm Bob. I know you could probably go for two hours on about yourself because you have such a long story, but if you could just give us like the five, ten-minute snippet about who Bob is. Sure. I started with Tess many, many years ago doing lifestyle parties because we moved to an area where there were no clubs. There was nothing going on. And we had to figure out how to meet people. And so we started doing parties at our house. And I love marketing. And I spent a lot of time online talking to people, chat rooms. Back then, it was AOL, America Online, if you could imagine. And pretty soon we were having 175 people at our house. And I remember Tess saying, Bob, this is too many people at our house. Cars were parked down the streets. My neighbors were coming over. And yeah, it became very interesting. And so she finally gave me an ultimatum. We had to take it out of the house. And I found a little commercial spot. And we started our very first parties a little over 30 years ago. yesterday. But over the years, we've done events at restaurants, hotels, on cruise ships, at resorts. We've done quite a bit. It's quite a long journey, and I'm very proud of kind of what we've built. And now we're kind of, now I'm kind of the grandpa of the lifestyle. That's okay for me. Hopefully retire sometime soon so I can just be a client. Yeah. But I love what I do. And I get a lot out of seeing a lot of happy faces at our events. And New Orleans has become, I think, the largest and most collaborative event of the year. And we're expanding into other places, other events, other countries. And I just really enjoy it. and love seeing people like you guys come up. I remember the first time I saw you on social media, I thought, wow, we're going to have lifestyle influencers. And I said, we got to contact these guys and get them to Naughty because we got to show them what we do. And I'm glad you're coming. I'm glad you guys. Yeah, I think this year we what, our fifth year? Yeah, we love Naughty. If people don't know what Naughty in New Orleans is, is. Can you just explain what that is a little bit to our listeners? We started as a hotel convention, right? Hotel Takeover. And back then, there was one big one in Las Vegas, Lifestyle Convention, and there was some smaller regional ones in Tampa. But everywhere we'd go, people would say, where are you from? They'd say New Orleans. And they'd say, oh my God, that's our favorite place to go. Or they'd say, that's the one place on our bucket list we haven't met. So we decided to host our first event in New Orleans. And it just took off. And now, because we've been doing it for so long, this year will be our 27th, I believe. And because it's so big, we believe in giving back to the community. We do a lot of education that a lot of events don't do. We have usually 110, 140 classes. We also do events on Bourbon Street. We encourage people to get outside of our hotel. Most hotel takeovers, you never leave the hotel. We encourage people to get outside the hotel and see and experience New Orleans. We're trying to give an experience that's not just a lifestyle convention hotel takeover, but we're trying to give them a real New Orleans experience, and I think it works. One of the things we do that's different for most is we do an actual parade, kind of like a pride parade, but for lifestyle people, really for for sexual freedom. It doesn't matter if you're non-monogamous, polyamorous, monogamous, whatever your kink is, whatever you're into. To see thousands of people walking down the street holding signs is typically my favorite time of the weekend. Agreed. Our two. It's our favorite. When we ever talk about Naughty Norms, we always say it seems like it's the closest thing to me to a national swinger convention. And I know they're used to do stuff in Vegas. And from my understanding, there's still some stuff that goes on there. But really, if you think about, you know, from our perspective, the parties that happen in the U.S., Nottie's really one of the biggest. And like you said, it's the most collaborative that we've been to, meaning that clubs and hotel takeover groups, they all send people in large groups. And there's a lot of people from the industry that get together and chat. I mean, we've made so many connections with different club owners and other hotel takeover groups and things like that. And it's all happened at Nottie in New Orleans. And I've never been to anything else. That's not even close. I mean, a lot of the splash events will bring in some people, but not to the scale and level that you see at Naughty New Orleans. So to me, I really think it is the closest thing to a national swingers convention here in the US. You know, it's interesting. A lot of other, I don't want to say competitors, a lot of other event producers like ourselves, they're so worried about everyone else. And they're so protective. And they don't want to have people at their event, having a boost because they're afraid somebody may go to that other event. I just have a completely different philosophy. And we welcome everyone and bring them in. You guys have been hosting some parties on Bourbon Street, Hoot Scoot Rodeo, topless bull riding and a balcony and DJs. And we love that you guys can do something like that. Last year, for the first time, we did a speakeasy. Like a hidden after-hours bar. And you guys actually hosted one of those parties. And so to me, having other collaborators, other people in the business, in the industry, coming in and being part of the event is, to me, is what makes it special. And I think that's why we've grown, where other people, other events have stayed stagnant, because they're worried about their competition. I invite them all in. Yeah. Here, put up a booth. And I go to their events. I go to... We've seen you at their events. Yeah. And I go to Secrets and I go on all the cruises. Yeah. You know, I... People ask me, what's my favorite event? And I say, any event that I don't have to work. Yeah. It's usually our answer. Yeah. Yeah. And so you guys get it. Yeah, we do. And I think that's the other thing. When you have all these people come together, You don't even have to explain yourselves. They all get it. They see something going wrong and me running around like crazy. They go, yep. They know what I'm in the middle of. They know I'm in the middle of a tornado and I'm putting out a fire. And I know the same thing when I go to their event. So I don't know why everyone's so protective of their brands, their events, their cruises. I don't know. I don't know why people haven't learned from us. Because I think we're doing okay. And I think more events promoters need to look at us as an example and say, maybe we should invite a few people to come co-host our events. And we do. We throw a pool party at Splash. And, you know, we do an after hours party at Purgatory. We like being involved and helping out. But we also like giving people Like Swing Nation opportunity at our event. I'm just waiting to see when Dan's going to DJ. Hey, I DJ the speakeasy. And I will say many people said that that was their favorite, their favorite part of all of Naughty New Orleans was our speakeasy last night. That is one of the highlights for me of like a lot of our lifestyle, like journey and everything. Like when, like when we got back to our room after the speakeasy that night, Dan and I looked at each other and was Was that just real life? Because it was so amazing and something that I don't know that we could ever recreate. It was top tier. One of my favorite lifestyle experiences, the speakeasy and naughty. It's funny because that was the first year that you guys have done the speakeasy party. I think you told me. How many people told you that that was a terrible idea and not to do an after party, right? Even my staff. Our team fought me on it. Look, we're always trying to do new things at Naughty. And I think that's another reason we've succeeded for so many years. The dungeon this year, I thought, was a next level step for us. And it was an amazing, I don't know, step forward. We introduced dungeons into our event 25 years ago. And back then, you either went to a BDSM event or you went to a lifestyle event. The two never mixed. And, you know, I remember the first time I told Tess about it, she's like, why do you want a dungeon? And I said, because I like it. I like the visual and I like, I just think it's a great atmosphere and vibe. And I wanted to put one in our playroom. So we just took one of our playrooms. And back then they were just hotel rooms. And I said, let's just make one a dungeon and see what happens. And it became very popular. This year, the dungeon is huge. I don't know if you guys got a chance. We did not. No, because it was in the other hotel. We just never got. We are more partiers and less dungeon people, even though we can appreciate a dungeon and we think it's really hot and cool. We did not prioritize that. We did go to all the Bourbon Street parties and stuff like that, but we could have done a better job of getting over there, at least to see it and to film some so we could share it with people. We should have done a better job. Next year, we should do a tour. of that space. Because I think it is an amazing space. The pictures and stuff that I saw looked really, really good. I go to Burning Man every year. And the first year I went to Burning Man, it was with an art car. And it was a very unique experience. And I remember coming home going, now I get Burning Man. Like, I thought I knew it before I went. But coming home, I was like, you know, now I understand Burning Man. The next year I went by myself and with a different crew. And I saw five sunrises that year. And it was a completely different experience for me. And I was like, now I get Burning Man. And the third year, again, was a completely different experience. And I stopped saying I get Burning Man because it's, you don't get Burning Man. It's every year it's different. And that's what I want Naughty to be. I want people, the first year people come, Sometimes they get so engrossed in the Bourbon Street parties, they don't even realize the classes that are available. Then the second year they come, they're like, we're taking some classes. They skip some of the Bourbon Street parties. And then the third year, they wander into the dungeon and never come out. It really is a different experience every year. We keep making changes. I think the dungeon and the speakeasy were pretty big changes this year. And we have some big changes for next year. We have the base, right? And so we can change and add things, but I want people to come every year and do things they didn't do the year before. And of course, the people you're going to meet are going to change your experience as well. But I really, I take to heart that Burning Man experience, and I try to make New Orleans naughty. different than what you see at other events. And I think we've accomplished that. Yeah. So something else I want to bring, so you've been, you know, you've been doing this for almost 30 years now. And I think even with us, a lot of people will see Naughty New Orleans this year and, you know, and they'll say, oh my gosh, look at this. How lucky are you that, you know, you got this party and it worked out just perfect. Like they think it's like instant success. Like this year's party was like the first party you threw and it's amazing. And, you know, we see promoters and different events. groups, you know, they'll go out and they'll buy a 300, 400 room hotel and they'll think in the first year they're going to throw a naughty New Orleans type hotel takeover. But it's a lot harder, I think, than people realize. And, you know, you've been doing this for 30 years now. I'm sure it all hasn't been success. You've had ups and downs and things like that. So can you just talk a little bit about what it's like to have a lifestyle business and kind of the ups and downs of all that? You know, the first year we did a hotel takeover. We rented a hotel that was 302 rooms. I'll never forget the numbers, right? We sold 176. We had to take a loan out for $40,000 to pay our hotel off at the end of the week. And we knew that going into the event. We knew we didn't sell enough rooms. We knew we were going to lose a lot of money. But we put a smile on our face and we went forward and we put on a this is such a great event. We love New Orleans. We're coming back. And so we had to make a decision. Are we going to keep doing this? And, you know, obviously we did. And the second year we sold out. But the number one advice I give to people is to not go too big too fast, right? You can always sell out and say, man, I wish we had done a bigger hotel. But the worst thing you can do is book a hotel is too big. And you have to pay for every room for every night. And that's, that eats up your profit really fast. And, you know, we did full ship charters for a while. And I remember we sold out our first ship in two months. And we were the only ones doing it. And we ended up adding a second cruise. So we're doing two a year. Now there's like six different companies. I think three of them are doing four cruises a year. That's 12 cruises with just three companies. And there's three other ones doing cruises. And now there's a lot of lifestyle groups on Virgin and other cruise lines. I remember we took a pause in 2018 and thought, there's just not enough people to fill all these cruise ships. Something's going to go bankrupt. And I decided to take a pause in 2018. We did a cruise in 2018. And I said, let's wait. and not sign a contract for 2019. And let's reevaluate. And then COVID happened. Sometimes it's better to be lucky, right? Yeah. We know all the cruise companies lost a lot of money during COVID. And lifestyle cruise business, but the cruise industry as well. I just think we have to be careful about growing too fast, having too many rooms, too many events. kind of kept everything to just one main event. We see a lot of people doing four or five events a year. And I would always tell them, do one big event and grow one really, just put a lot of effort into one thing instead of trying to grow multiple things. And I think you'll be happier. You'll work less. And you can put more time and effort to the one thing than trying to do four or five things. I said that this year we just launched our another event called Naughty Halloween but we were having an inventory problem we sold out way early last year a month early and we're on track to sell out three months early this year and so we have an inventory issue so the only way to fix that is to add more inventory so we're doing a small boutique event Naughty Halloween next year because honestly Tess and I love, Halloween. You probably don't know. We used to have a haunted house. We used to own a castle. Wow. We used to do a haunted house in this castle. And some of the fun, most fun times we had in our lives. So we're pretty excited to go back to doing it. But yeah, it's been a roller coaster. It hasn't been a straight line of success. And it's easy to see what we're doing, right? And say, oh, we're Let's go find a 500-room hotel. Right. There's not too many people filling 500-room hotels. No. Well, I think people don't realize, you know, the lifestyle is such a, the way it works is, you know, we're not just really trusting out the gate, right? If you hear of a new group, you're kind of like, who are they? I don't know about them. Let me, you know, ask a friend if they've ever been. Have you ever heard of these people? Have you ever been to their party? Is it a good hotel? Yeah, how's their party? So I think it takes a while to build up that reputation. And if you come right out the gate, you're gonna be surprised that um people aren't you know aren't quick to jump on new brands and new new things unless they know it's a trusted organization and obviously you spent 30 years building your name and reputation um so you have that now yeah but what you just said is perfect word of mouth is how we built our business it's we throw a good party for 200 couples they go tell their friends and between the 200 couples another 50 to 75 It doesn't matter how much marketing you do, how much social media, it's word of mouth is what will make you. Yeah. So I tell our team every year, no matter what's happening, put on a face and do your best to throw the best event you can, because that's the only way we'll succeed the next year. If we have one bad year, it's we're gonna feel it and last year was a really good year for us and and our sales just like crazy and but we also know if we don't bring it next year it could go back down so i think these are just some lessons i've learned over the years and we try to impart that and tell people this when we have you know last year we had a uh we always do an industry tour in fact this year we're going to a hundred house oh that's fine And we're doing a cocktail tour of a haunted house, so it's going to be pretty cool. We do it for team building, but we also do it to have these conversations, right? To inspire people, but also be real and tell people, look, this is what I did. It didn't turn out well. Avoid my mistakes. I've actually given other event planners my, I call it my book. It has my contracts in it. It has all the stuff we do for the hotels, the BEOs, everything. I'm like, here, read this. I'll let you read my contracts. For me, I think the more successful clubs and events, the better is for me. The more people are going to hear about Nani, right? When I first started this, there were some big people in business that tried very specifically to run us out of business. You know, those people that call the police, the fire department, they, you know, they do anything they can to try to create a problem. To me, those people, the ones that really went out to hurt us, they're no longer a business. They went downhill as we went uphill. I just think if you put that negative energy out there, you're going to get that negative energy back. If you're more collaborative, you know, it's, they say, All boats float in a tide, right? Let's all work together to build a bigger pie. Let's not fight over the same piece. Let's not try to get a bigger piece of pie from the same pie. Let's make a bigger pie together, and then we'll all do better. Yeah, no, 100%. We've taken that to heart because we learned that from you in probably one of our first industry meetings that we did with you, and we've really tried to embody that, you know, and we even will say that, quote, what you just said to people. Like for instance, I recently had a podcaster who's kind of, I don't know how long their podcast has been out, but they're kind of new on social media. And he reached out to me and said, hey, we would really like to go to Naughty and like have a table and bring people. What do I need to do? I immediately emailed your team and was like, hey, there's another podcaster that wants to come. What do I, you know, who do I need to send them to? She was like, send them to me. So I, you know, typed up an email, copied both, sent it on. And that, you know, and I could have been like a jerk because I was like, you know, I didn't want any other podcasters, but that's not what it's about. And he ended up coming back to me and said, Hey, I just wanted to say thank you for being so kind and so nice and connecting us and we're going. And I think you're going to be on their podcast. And I think some of your other team is going to be on their podcast too. And that made me feel good. And that's, I mean, I have to say, we learned a lot of that from you. I mean, obviously people, you want to be a good person. Like we know that. But hearing an industry professional like you, who's kind of a leader in the group, kind of say that it's been helpful for us to kind of navigate this business and a good, like, a good advice for us to, you know, kind of live by. So thank you for that. Well, you know, I found out early in my career, I think a lot of people come in with this idea that, wow, the lifestyle is amazing and all the people in the lifestyle are great. And so all these club owners must be great and wonderful too. But at the end of the day, they're just people. Yeah. And a lot of them are fantastic. And I would actually say probably a higher percentage of lifestyle run clubs and businesses are run by people that I think are exceptional, good human beings. But there's some jerks out there. Yeah, there's people doing things that Sometimes I just shake my head. I'm like, why would this person think that this is going to help them out? And I just go, and I see what happens from their decisions and their communications. And I go, yeah, this person is no longer has a crowd. This person no longer has a following. And why? Because they're just not good people. I will say there's some very successful mean people in the world but I don't want to be one of those and we all have choices to make I just think our naughty brand is something that I've tried to cultivate over the years to be something that is collaborative and something that gives back to the community but is also fucking fun our first And the first idea was we wanted something that was similar to Fantasy Fest and Mardi Gras, but a little bit naughtier. Yeah. And that's kind of where the name came from, right? And, you know, I think I mentioned to you guys before, we just created a naughty meter to kind of help our clients. If you go to our website, not only do we have our list of our events, but we have a list of resorts, cruises, other events. And we're putting a naughty meter on it to let people know this is kind of a tame event a playful event maybe a place to get your feet wet and this one has topless areas this one has clothing optional this one has playrooms how wild do you want to get and we try to be a resource we're actually going to add clubs and podcasts is the next things that we're adding to our website just to be kind of an informational hub so that not only people like you guys will have a booth at our place, but you'll actually have a place on our website that people can look up podcasts. I had somebody ask me the other day, what's a good podcast to listen to? And I probably had three off the top of my head. And then I struggled. I was like, God, what's the name of that one podcast? And that's when it hit me. Why don't I have a list? So that's something I'm working on right now before the end of the year is to make our a little more informative, because I think Nadi is, like you said, it's a national swinger convention, for lack of better word, but I think you can say that, Bob. I think it's okay. I think you've earned that title. I know there's others that want to try to claim that, but I think you can say that, and you can own that, because I think everybody knows it is that. Yeah, and that's fine. I mean, I think people look up to us for a lot of reasons, because we've been around for a long time, and the size of the event, right? Yeah. So giving all these classes is part of our giving back, I think. It's also having information on a website for things that we don't do. Temptation, hedonism, desire. You know, we even sell Groove Cruise. And now we're looking at Virgin Cruises as well. We just want to do things for adults. Yeah. The two things that really are important to us is vacations and And experiences where there's no kids. Yeah. It's a bunch of adults acting like kids. Yeah. I think that's our number one thing to get people in the door. And the number two thing is making it as safe as possible. Yeah. And I think one of the things we've done and part of the reasons we are successful is we spend a lot of time and energy trying to make our place safe. put a lot of effort into that and I think it shows it naughty and you may not understand it at first but if you come more than once you'll you'll see now if you book up one of our events you can't even book a room until you watch this video on consent it's kind of long and you have to take a test at the end and pass it it's actually genius who does that that's awesome nobody does that. I remember when we first talked about it, people in our team were like, you want to do what? You want to make people pass a test of consent before they come? And look, you're still going to have people that may not get it. But at least they watched a video and took a test. So they can't come to my event and say, I didn't know. So I'm really encouraging people to do more, not only with education, but educating their people about consent. Because there's a lot more people, thanks to you guys, there's a lot more non-swingers coming to our events. There's a lot more people dipping their toes. They have fantasies, but they've never done anything before. They don't really know how it works. But they show up at an event, and now they're in the middle of 200 naked people, and they may do something that someone else may not particularly like. And it's important for them to know what's okay, what's acceptable, and what's not. No, that's great. Are you okay? Yeah, I'm good. There we go. Got it. All right. Well, I think with that, Bob, now's the perfect time to take a little break and hear from our partners and sponsors of the Swing Nation podcast. And then when we get back, I want to dig back into it. We've got a lot more questions for you, a lot more questions about Naughty, and maybe some of the plans, some of what you've got upcoming. Maybe you can tell some of our listeners about that. We'll be right back, guys. Lacey, the question we get asked on social media and TikTok more than any other question is how do I find lifestyle people, lifestyle events, lifestyle parties, lifestyle cruises, lifestyle people? I think I already said that. Yeah. In my area. Basically anything lifestyle you need. How do I find it? You need to get on a Swinger website. is one of our favorites. It's really big here in the Southeast U.S. for sure. Yeah. And it has all the clubs listed. It has all the parties listed. You can find information on cruises. You can find our podcasts on SDC. Yeah, you can. And if you want to try it completely risk-free, we have a free trial link for you. We do, yeah. So how do people go and find that free trial link? If you go to theswingnation.info and scroll to the bottom, you're going to find some of our favorite products and brands, and you're just going to click on it. that link and go straight there. All right. If you guys want to find lifestyle people in your area, go sign up for SDC. Completely risk-free. Yeah. And see if it works for you. I agree. All right, guys. Go check it out. Lacey, one thing I don't leave home without when going to a swinger event is my ED medication. That is correct. Performance anxiety is 100% a real thing. Having sex in an orgy room with a 100 people in there is way different than having sex at home in your bedroom. It is. So I like to have what we call little insurance policy and have some of that ED medication in my pocket. Shameless Care is who I use for that. And they actually just came out with a new product called the Shameless Duo. Yeah. Which is a combination medicine that has Viagra and Cialis in it. So that one, you can be ready whenever. But also it's got that dose that you can take when you're, you know, you're getting ready to go to the playroom and you need that to kick in yeah so i love it i mean i used it at hito for the first time and that that combination pretty much switched to that haven't you basically what i use all the time now yeah so if you're looking for ed medication if you're new to the lifestyle uh and you're going to an event you might want to get some and have it just handy in case you need it kind of thing and the really cool thing about shameless care is they don't set you up on a reoccurring plan so you're you're not going to get all of this ED medication that you have in your nightstand built up. When it's time that you need more, you'll get an email from them and they'll ask you, hey, are you ready for another round? And you can respond back. Yes, please refill it or no, I'm good right now. Thank you. So it's really cool because you don't end up with all these extra pills and spend a bunch of money that you're not, you know, you don't need to spend. Yeah. And my favorite part is you don't actually have to go into an office and talk to your family doctor or a military doctor. you can do it all right online from the privacy of your home you just go to the website you fill out some forms the doctor reviews it approves you disapproves you and you move on from there so if you would like to get some medication you can go to the swing nation dot info click on the little recommended apps and products scroll down to the shameless care icon click on that and that's going to take you over there there's some discount codes there for you so you can get a discount off your first order but I highly recommend it That is correct. What one doctor thinks is a full panel, another doctor may have a completely different version of that. And being somebody in the lifestyle and engaging with multiple partners, what you should be getting tested for is probably, if you're not telling your doctor that, what you should be getting tested for is probably different than what they're thinking. Yes. In their head. Yeah, because they don't know your lifestyle. Or even if they do know your lifestyle, there's a like, for instance, there is a new one called MGen. And we just recently met a doctor at a lifestyle party and said that she had never even heard about it. And so she was awesome that we had educated her on that. So a lot of these doctors don't, they don't know it all. Right. So if you are going to participate in the lifestyle, you probably need to get tested from people that are meant to do this. Yes. So we use I Know My Status. It's the same people behind Talent Testing who are the, it's a company that tests all the porn stars. to testing people that engage with multiple partners. They know all the latest on what STIs are, you know, coming up and spreading and they track all the stats. I mean, they know how to test people for STIs. They're the experts. They are. And if someone that you engage with, you know, if they have used I Know My Status, they can actually give you a QR code and you can scan it and you can see their results right on your phone so you can confirm everything that they're telling you. Yeah, 100%. So please, if you're getting tested, get tested the right way. We recommend using I Know My Status. You can go to theswingnation.info, recommended apps and products. Scroll down to the I Know My Status icon and you can get a discount off your first test. But please, if you're swinging, if you're engaging with people in the community, please be safe about it. Go get tested. Yeah, because we want you to fuck like a porn star. For sure. All right, guys. Welcome back. Welcome back. Thank you for listening to our sponsors. We love our sponsors. We do. All right. So we're back with Bob talking all things naughty in New Orleans. Now, I was curious, Bob. We get this scrutiny a lot, and I wonder if you do as well. You know, people look at us and our podcast, and then they start seeing our events, and they're like, Dan and Lacey are charging money for these events. They're just making money off the lifestyle. They're using the lifestyle to make money. We get that criticism all the time. And I always like, well, don't you? You guys want to go to places and party and have fun, right? And like have a safe environment to explore. Like we have a full-time staff at this point. We, you know, to rent out an event like Secrets or some of these clubs or hotels, that all costs money. Like I don't understand why people think you're trying to like take advantage of them. And that seems to me to be something kind of unique to the lifestyle because nobody goes to like a normal vanilla bar owner and says like, oh, you're taking advantage of people that drink. How dare you charge money for alcohol? Or anything like that. So I guess, what is that? Why do people have that scrutiny about lifestyle events? Part of it's jealousy and part of it's just not understanding. You know, I wrote an article a long time ago. Tess and I had a full-time club for a while. And I remember we used to have our parties in our house and they were free. I said earlier in the show, we had like 170 people at our house one night. And she's like, this is too much. So we went and found a place, but we had to rent it. We had to pay for it. And it was a restaurant. So I said, can you put out some food for us every night? They gave us a price for food, had to hire a DJ. Anyway, I charged $40 for that party. And our numbers went from 176 to 40. Wow. Our first night was 40. And I remember some people that came to every single house party I ever threw. Probably 20 or 30 house parties. Never, ever came to one of our events ever again. As soon as it was $40. And it's very interesting. You find out who your friends are. It's very disappointing sometimes. As long as you're getting something for free, they're your friends. But the minute you're charging, It's not. There's no more support. The reality is it costs. You're in a really nice studio there. Yeah. I'm sure that's free as well. Yeah. Totally free. We have four full-time employees and we have a warehouse office that we maintain. And we spend quite a bit of money. I think if people saw our production, you know, just our lights, in sounds, we spent over six figures for one event, just for lighting and music and speakers and lasers and all those things. People don't understand what it costs. And the article I wrote a long time ago was from my experience. We noticed that a lot of people didn't come the minute we started charging. Eventually, years later, we opened the club and we had it for a while. And we decided to close the club for various reasons. And there was a couple that came to that last. We were only getting maybe 40, 50 people a night at the club. And we decided to close it. And we had one big bash. It was a Halloween party. And we told them when we were closing, this would be our last party. And we probably had 250 people show up. three couples looking around going 250 people and adding in their heads how many people how much that was times they didn't realize i probably comped 50 people in that night that i hadn't seen in a while and i said why don't you just come out for free and they didn't see all the champagne that we bought and gave out for free that night because it was our last night it didn't see any of the stuff that we went through to get to that point they just said wow these people are making making a killing. Do you guys know many people that are rich? That run a lifestyle business? I probably know three that are doing what I would say pretty well. I literally made more money 27 years ago. I was a vice president of a company back then. And I left that to start this business. I make less today than I did 27 years ago. I get to travel. I get to do amazing things. I get to write them off. I live a much better life now than I lived back then. But there's not many people getting rich off of this. And I suspect you guys aren't either. Yeah. Most people in our industry have real jobs and do this on the side. Well, you're right. We're not getting rich off of this. Most of our income comes from Lacey's OnlyFans. And in a lot of ways, we use our money, the money from that to subsidize this part of it. So like, just like you're saying, that first party, you know, you ended up paying 40 grand for other people to come out and party at a hotel, right? Like, you know, we've had events like that where we're basically, you know, we throw a party and at the end of the day, we have to write a check to that club that hotel and so I think people don't like you're saying they just don't understand the margins and like you said there are a lot of other ways to make a lot more money than in this space and in this space there's actually a lot of unique challenges you know try to get insurance for for these parties that's it's a hard challenge you know try to try to get a hotel for one of these parties you know I mean you're going to pay a premium because you're a swinger. They know who you are and what you're doing, and they know that it's hard for you to get business other places. So you'll pay as much for a crappy three-star hotel as other groups and organizations might be able to get a five-star hotel for because of the nature of the business that you're in. Yeah, try to get credit card processing. Yeah. It's just, look, I do this because it's a passion, and I think probably 90% of the people in our industry do. I'm not ashamed that I now earn a living. I didn't for many years. But I now earn a living doing what I do because I work 365. I work year-round. And I'm not ashamed of making some money for putting on events. Which is ridiculous that you even have to say that. We shouldn't feel shame. We shouldn't. Like, we are providing a service and we're working our asses off and there should be no shame. If anything, our friends and the people that come to the party should be, like, happy for us. Does that make sense? Like, it's sad that... Well, and most of them are. Like, to be fair, most of our friends, your actual real friends are. Yes, real friends are. But there definitely is people that will still criticize us. Yeah. Okay. Next thing I wanted to ask you about, and I think it's something maybe people don't know about you, and, you know, we learned about you, I think, from going to those industry meetings and stuff, is you have a military background as well. So I was in the Army, for 21 years. You were in the Navy, I believe. And I think the lifestyle... I started in the Army. You did you? I was at 81 Echo, which you probably have no idea what it is. And I ended up going over. I was a reservist. And I ended up going into the Coast Guard full time. And so most of my military career was in the Coast Guard. But yeah, I used to jump out of helicopters. It's all part of me, right? It's all part of our history. Whenever Dan, like something bad's happening or we're stressed, he's like, it could be worse. I could be getting shot at. I could be. He always keeps it in perspective. Like you said, whenever we meet unique challenges, I sometimes have to say, like, at the end of the day, we're throwing, you know, swinger parties. I don't like to use sex parties, but whatever. You know, we're throwing parties. That's what we're doing right now. And we're stressing over that. Maybe it kind of brings a little perspective in. But one of the reasons I bring up your military service, Coast Guard, I didn't realize that. For some reason in my head, I had the Navy in there. But it's all boats and ships. Yeah, Navy Rescue Service School. Yeah. And one of the reasons I bring that up is you're quite an advocate for the lifestyle and sexual freedom and stuff like that. And we were out the last year or so I was in the Army. was going to get to the wrong person and that was going to affect our career. I know there's quite a large population of swingers in the military space. I've been around to enough bases and checked the SLS listings and stuff. There's quite pockets of those people in those areas. Can you just talk a little bit about what you feel about the military and non-monogamy and kind of, you know, advocating for people to be able to practice this lifestyle freely? Well, I think it's a shame that any career would have any issue with what we do in the privacy of our own bedrooms. And as you know, just being gay was a major issue being in the military, you know, until not too long ago. And now, once again, The military is me looking at different sexualities and, for lack of better words, punishing them for how they love, who they love. And I just think it's ridiculous. I actually lost my career. I didn't retire. One of my Halloween parties, I made a very bad decision of wearing my flight suit to my Halloween party. And I did remove the Coast Guard patch and the unit patch and all that kind of stuff. And my name tag said Dick Fitzwell. And we had a couple other military guys bend over. You know, we had big name tags and we thought it would be cute showing up in this military because there's a few chicks that like military guys. I've seen. A couple of them. I know one. They did a undercover TV special with hidden cameras at that particular party. And my commanding officer started an investigation. And luckily for me, the person that ends up on his desk was a friend of mine. And he knew it was me. And he called me up and said, Bob, you know this just landed on my desk I'm gonna leave it on my desk but if somebody calls up and says that's Bob Hannaford there's nothing I can do and so I spent six months like you're talking about absolutely terrified that I was gonna lose my career and I got picked to be on a court martial as a bailiff and I had to swear everyone in all rise courts now in session judge so-and-so's And I watched a young man get sent to Leavenworth for a year's hard labor and dishonorable discharge for next to nothing. And one of the things they threw at him was this carnal knowledge thing, that he had slept with someone that wasn't his wife, and they added on all these charges. And I immediately drove from that court-martial and went to a place where Tess worked at the time. And I said, I need a job. And the guy hired me. And I put in my papers the next day. And I got out. How many military people do you know with 15 and a half years? There's not many of us. But I made a decision, a conscious decision, that I was not going to live another four and a half years worried about what I do in my own private life. And possibly end up in fucking Leavenworth. I don't know if I can. No, you can. Absolutely. But I just thought that was crazy. And so I left on my own terms. I never got brought up in charges. Never, you know, never went anywhere. Right. Only because you had a commanding officer that had your back. Had that been a different person whose desk that paperwork had landed on, you could have. Well, the commanding officer was trying to find me. He went. It was CJ. It's like, it's like, it's a Coast Guard investigation department. And that was my friend. The CO was trying to find me and prosecute me. And for wearing a flight suit, you know, and, and to be honest, I shouldn't have worn it. Yeah, I honestly shouldn't have worn it. But when I did our cruises, couples cruises, for a formal night, we had people dressed in full military outfits. I've seen, we've seen it before, too. Yeah. And I don't have any problem with it. I don't see why that would be a problem. But it was a problem for me. So I lost this career based on I couldn't be open about my sexuality. And that's one of the reasons I do the Sexual Freedom Brand. It's one of the reasons we do all this stuff with industry and National Coalition for Sexual Freedom and Woodhull Freedom Foundation and open. We work with those organizations because I am, crazy. I've lost two careers because of the lifestyle. And the second time I got fired as a vice president of this company that Tessa and I work for, because we went to hedonism. And we wouldn't tell him where we were. And he thought we were somehow opening up a new business to compete with him. We just didn't want to tell him we were at hedonism. Right. And so he fired us. And I told Tessa, we will never ever work for anyone ever again. And so it was hard. It was tough. And for many years, we had to sell a bunch of stuff and move out of the house and, you know, but it's because we were making good money back then. Like I said, better money than I'm making now. Right. But it's totally worth it for me. You know, I don't regret for one minute. I love serving our my country. I love I loved doing what I did. I loved jumping out of helicopters. I was a medic, so I jumped in to help people out of the ocean, out of boats, people that were hurt, people that were sick. It was a great job, a great mission, and I don't regret it for a minute. I wish I could have finished out retired, but I never probably would have been doing what I do now. So everything in our lives is a journey, and it all brings us to here and who we are. And so I've always been happy. I've never regretted anything. And when the show's over, you'll have to see if you can figure out what an 81 Echo is. I've never had a single person in the Army ever guess what that is. But that's where I started out in my military career. And I enjoyed the Army, too. I'm kind of a hippie, blue-haired, lazy, freaky guy that most people don't see as a military guy but i really enjoyed it i was kind of like forrest gump right i i just listened to what they said and did what they said i was really good at but uh but since then i've had quite a forrest gump life outside the military and uh very happy that i've stumbled upon this path yeah so do you think we're on the path to a point where swingers and non-monogers people can be open about who they are? Without a doubt. I mean, when we first started doing our swinger parade, our, sorry, sexual freedom parade, a majority of the people wouldn't even get on the street. And they would tell me, like, I can't march in this parade. What if someone sees me? We've had people say, friends of ours have said that. And then this past year, said friends, We're on a float in the parade. To me, that in itself shows the journey that things are changing and it's a little bit more acceptable to be a part of it. I have people come up to me crying this year. It happens every year. Oh, for sure. I get emotional. Look, I'm blue-haired Bob, right? Naughty Bob. I've been doing this longer than most people. I still get emotional every single year. It's because I have my own history of losing my military career, losing another career that was a very important position for me in a company. And personally saying, I'm never going to let this happen to me again. And now I'm marching down the street with a banner and a sign. To me, it's an incredible moment that transcends all the Burma Street parties and the playrooms and whatever. to say, this is who I am. And you may not like me. And you don't even have to accept me. But you're not going to change me. I'm going to walk in the street and I'm going to be me. I think it affects me and Lacey every year as well. And then even particularly this last year, as opposed to marching on side roads around Bourbon Street, we marched down Bourbon Street. And one of the bars shot off the streamers. And there was women and children and people on the side of the street. the road cheering and clapping. It's so fun. And I don't even know if they knew what they were cheering and clapping for. They didn't care. But they were just happy. That's just to be, like you're saying, out there and representing your community is one thing. But then to have people lying in the street and cheering you on is another thing that I don't know if I ever thought we'd experience in this community. I think people definitely, I mean, first of all, we have a giant banner that says free and brave. And then, I don't know how many hundreds of signs. Yeah. And people are, this year when you come, look at the faces of the people as we're walking by. They're reading all the signs. They're looking at the people's costumes and all the pineapples. And every once in a while you see a face like, oh my God. Yeah. But most of them are not that way. Most of the people are happy. They're like, hell yeah. They're giving us thumbs up. They're giving us rock star signs. They're giving us okay signs. And they're just, they're clapping. And, you know, that's the way it should be. We shouldn't have to worry about having the government in our bedroom. We shouldn't have to worry about our employers or business in our bedrooms. You know, if you go to that same employer that say, oh, my God, you're a swinger. I don't know if we can, you know, have that in our company. I want to just turn it around and go, do you like anal sex? Is that something you want to talk about? Why would I care about that with you? Why would you care about this with me? The thing that drives me the most crazy is the fact that there's probably several employees in that same bosses that works for that same company. There's several employees that are cheating on their spouses and everybody in the business knows that's happening. If you went to that boss and said, hey, Jimmy's cheating on his wife, he would say, well, that's really none of our business. As long as he's still working hard and still showing up and getting his work done, that's really none of our business. But then if you go and say, hey, Dan and Lacey are consensually hooking up with chicks on the weekend, he'd be like, oh, my God, I can't have that in my business. You're fired. How does that make any sense on planet Earth that those two things can coexist? And I would say in the majority of businesses where people are getting fired for being being swingers, the opposite is absolutely the case where people are cheating on each other. And that same person would say, well, that's none of our business as long as they're doing their job. I've wanted to go find, I know the name, of course, of my CEO back in the day. And the guy that fired us in New Orleans, it was a graphics company. Tess was the director. I was the vice president at the time. And when Tess started working there, it was a small little tiny company. And by the time we got fired, the company had grown exponentially under our leadership. And the one thing is it taught me a lot about business, right? And I use that every day even today. But I've thought about going and finding that guy and saying, you know where I was? I'm going to tell you. But I wouldn't give him the satisfaction. I did when I left. We came to collect our things. And he called me in the office and he said, you know, maybe I did something rash. Maybe I, you know, we should have talked about this more. I had a six month contract. He had to buy out. So I didn't want him at that point to give me another chance. Right. I told him, listen, you made the greatest mistake that you'll ever make in your business career. firing us. And six months later, he had lost 60% of his clients. The art department had Tess and five artists. In six months, there was only one artist left in the graphics department. And eight months after we left, he sold the company. And it just went downhill. And I told him, this is the greatest mistake you've ever made. But the greatest gift you could have given to Tess and I. And it was. And it was hard. But we took that as a challenge. And it gave us a lot of inspiration and dedication. I worked so hard in the military. I mean, number one, you're putting your life on the line. But the training it took me to get to that point, we had an 80% washout rate. Like, it's just so hard to get to that point. And I felt like I gave 100% of myself. And to potentially see that wiped out, to me, was so insulting. And then it happened again at this other time. I said, no, this is, I'm never going to do this again. I'm not going to put myself through this. And I say to other people, prepare yourself. we were not prepared you can either have the shaggy defense it wasn't me right and just stick to that but but i saw you you're you're on tv at the swingers event it wasn't me you know just be ready at all times to be shaggy and say it wasn't me what happens a lot of times is people say oh my god i saw you on facebook you had some kind of swinger profile and people are just like this You can just say, that's not me. I don't know what you're talking about. Or you can say, so what? What were you doing on that site? What were you doing there? But you have to be prepared. You have to know if it comes up in your family, if it comes up in your business, if it comes up with friends, how are you going to deal with it? And a lot of people aren't. They end up with that deer in the headlights, which is basically Basically, they're saying I'm guilty. They're also saying, and I'm embarrassed and I'm ashamed. And I think that's the saddest thing of all this is, okay, it sucks that you get fired from a job potentially or potentially lose a career. But the fact someone would have to be ashamed about who they are, I just think it's ridiculous. But to wrap it up and answer your question, we're probably 15, 20 years Behind the LGBT movement. And there's a great book, Making the World a Better Place for Gays and Lesbians. I read that book. And there's a quote from someone in it that said, our secret weapon is coming out. The more Dan and Lacy's that people see, the more blue haired Bobs, the more people can connect to us and say, I was in the military, you know, I have fantasy. The more normal we are to society, the more people will give this a try. And the more people accept it. Harvey Milk said coming out is our secret weapon. And until people know someone's a swinger, they'll always judge them. Back in the 60s and 70s, people didn't know gay people. They were all in the closet. Harvey Milk is like you need to come out of the closet and people are like no. When you have a gay son, daughter, brother, uncle, when you have someone that's LGBT that's not only in your family but works in the cubicle next to you or serves next to you in the service, it's so hard to hate and be discriminating against people that you like and know and that's of your family. It's really easy to discriminate against people that you don't know at all. If you've never met a trans person, it's super easy to be transphobic. But I have a trans, one of my grandson is trans. And I don't understand how anyone can be transphobia. This is who this person was born. I knew from probably two years hold on that our grandchild is going to be different. And why do people like to judge everyone? It's what you said earlier. You're making money off the lifestyle. It's more than just jealousy. It's judging. And I think our world, especially right now, has become so easy to judge other people and point fingers at you because they're different. If you don't know an immigrant, it's easy to hate immigrants. If you don't know someone from another race or color or creed, it's very easy to think, oh, those people must be bad. But it's that old adage, walk in their shoes, learn about those people, break bread with those people. That's what I feel is the Christian-like thing to do. guy, but I'm a very moral, ethical person. And I think if we run our businesses and our events in a very moral, ethical way, we have a lot less to worry about than these haters. Couldn't agree more. The haters will always be there. They will always be there. All right. Well, we're almost out of time, Bob, but I want to give you an opportunity. You know, we get it. Bob's got me tearing up over here. I think we got about 100,000 people a month that listen to this podcast at this Go to Swing Nation. They have a book with them because we collaborate with people like Dan and Lacey and they host events and do special things. So if you book through Dan and Lacey, you'll get some cool things from Dan and Lacey. We always say support the people that support us. And we really appreciate you guys. I tell Tess all the time, you're like our kids, right? You're a little bit older than my kids and my son, but not a whole lot. And I love seeing your generation coming up. And we have some people on our staff that are even the next generation after coming up in the 20s. And I have a lot of faith in the next generation. Non-monogamy is just natural for kids nowadays. When I went to college, if two women kissed, it was a big deal. They got you an R rating in a movie and people talked about it. Did you see wild things? Oh, my God. Two women were kissing. Nowadays, it's nothing. Yeah. So I think the future is bright for us. I think I think non-monogamy is going to be so big in 20 years from now. People, the word swinging will go away and it'll just be natural and events won't be swinger events anymore. It'll just be festivals like EDC and it'll be more erotic. and sexy. And I think that's the future. I couldn't agree more. I couldn't agree more. Yeah. And definitely go check out Naughty Event. What did you say? Naughty-Events.com. That's your website? You can just Google Naughty New Orleans, Naughty anything. We're there. Naughty Swinging, Naughty Native. Google Naughty Bob. I'm not part of it. Yeah. And then also I want to say, you know, there's a few people that really stick out to me and Lacey when we look at, you know, that we want to emulate in our path and our journey in all this. And, you know, you and Tess are definitely two that stick out. I think you guys have definitely helped pave the way for this community. I think the way, you know, you always keep like Woodhull, NCSF, you know, you guys, you're not just there making money. You're advocating for the lifestyle. You're pushing the ball forward, you know, for everybody. And I don't think everybody necessarily knows that or understands that. But you and Tess are definitely, for us, high on that list of people that we look up to as kind of mentors in this space. So I wanted to thank you and Tess. I know she's not here, but for everything that you guys have done. And definitely, if you're looking to go to an event, Naughty is one of the best ones out there. It's one of our favorites of the year. And it's one definitely to put a little mark on your calendar. And we'll be there next year. We'll keep throwing them. We'll keep coming. Definitely go check them out. But thank you for everything that you guys have done. We appreciate it. Thank you guys for having me on board. Of course. All right. Well, I think with that, in a world full of apples. Be the pineapple. Be the pineapple, guys. Bye. Bye. If you've enjoyed our podcast and want to support us, we have a five-star review wherever you're listening. If you want to see more of our content, you can find links to Snapchat, Twitter, Instagram, OnlyFans and more in the show notes. Come join the conversation with us and other Swinger content creators on our Swinger Society Discord server. If you have questions or feedback, email them to us at theswingnation at gmail.com. Make sure you head on over to theswingnation.net and keep up to date on all things Swing Nation. We thank you so much for joining us and we'll see you next time. Goodbye. That's so hot.