Making sure that the shelves of sex shops are stocked with quality skin flicks is a hard job, but somebody's got to do it. At Queen West's Come As You Are, that person is Holly. For two years, she's been watching about 20 pornos a month, putting together a well-stocked wall of movies that are totally dirty yet adhere to the store's non-sexist, anti-racist, queer-friendly ethos. Here's how she does it.

So do you actually watch every minute of every movie?

What we do here is, it's more about the dialogue. So I listen to every word, to make sure that there are no discriminatory comments, nothing derogatory towards women, no racial slurs. I can fast-forward through the non-talking parts, but I still have to note if there's an any anal, or facial ejaculations.

Do most of the movies make it onto the shelves?

No, a lot gets thrown out. A lot of places let the suppliers pick—they'll get a box of 250 titles and rent every one of them. Everything gets the thumbs up. We've got a high standard. At this point, I've got a good eye. I do a lot of research before ordering a review copy, so only about one in 20 get tossed after I start watching.

What else are you looking out for?

We want good production quality—not crappy five scene porns that take place on one couch with one light. A lot of customers want a connection with the films that they can associate with their own lives, so we have a section called "Not so Plastic," those are movies with more real bodies, not your typical porno bodies. We like to carry movies that are independently made. We like to carry Canadian as much as possible, but we won't carry shitty Canadian stuff.

What's new and interesting lately?

There's a lot of really great independently made lesbian stuff, where the people are really having a great time. There's a company called S.I.R. Videos that put out movies like Sugar High Glitter City—it's so refreshing to be able to sell this stuff, you can't get it at the big porn shops.

There's a lot of great indie stuff coming up, like Hookin’ Up—that's full of big name people in the alt porn world. Alt porn is great industry within an industry. I love being able to offer that to people.

Tell me a bit more about how you categorize things here.

We carry a lot of stuff that's a little bit harder, rougher sex and dirty talking. It's not all soft focus. Everything is going to offend someone, so we have an explicitness rating. It starts off with "Light and Breezy," which means no anal, no closeups on genitals, no external ejaculation. That goes up to "As Hard as We Want to Be" which means lots of group sex, really tough and rough. We also categorize by director, and we have sections for educational videos and for classecs. "Deluxe Productions" are typical big budget, Jenna Jameson-type porn, while "Supersexed" is harder, with no plot. We've got "Porn Verité," which is more gonzo, with the director holding the camera, and both indie and big budget lesbian and gay porn. We also carry a selection of trans and bi porn.

How does watching all this porn affect you?

When I started this job, I was really interested to see what would happen, but it hasn't changed anything I still look at porn personally the way I always have. I do have more of an eye for quality, and I know the actresses more. But when I watch it at the office, it's not like I get crazy and have to go home and have crazy sex with my boyfriend. It's like any other movie.