Japan’s soap industry is losing its lather
Because of Japan’s rapidly aging society and negative population growth, the charmingly-euphemistically-named Soapland* industry is going limp so to speak.
New Yoshiwara soapland targets lusty middles
The Tokyo Reporter – August 6, 2008
…more businesses springing up which appeal to men in their 50s and over. (Who have their own bulges with which to contend, both above and below the belt.)
Sure enough, Shukan Taishu (Aug. 18) reports, a “soapland” in Tokyo’s Yoshiwara red-light district recently opened to cater specifically to the postwar baby-boom generation…
…The standard rate for a two-hour session with a masseuse in her 20s costs 25,000 yen — quite reasonable … presumably include a sudsy full-nude washdown on an air mattress and the usual foreplay, play and …more...
As I mentioned before, I’ve seen estimates that the sex industry in Japan made up at least 12% of the GNP. That was probably an underestimate in the “Bubble Years” before 1992, but now that figure may be accurate. Important for the the older crowd is that Japanese “Soapland” is good for the heart .
*Note that Soapland (ソープランド, pronounced sopurando) is the term for a type of brothel where male clients are bathed by female “companions” (prostitutes). However, the Japanese definition of prostitution does not extend to a “private agreement” reached between a woman and a man. Also legal as long as there is no genital penetration that results in the client reaching “happy-finish” (orgasm). [See Wikipedia.]
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