Afternoon Delight: Half-Price Sex for Senior Citizens at German Brothel

Germany's largest brothel is offering a 50% discount on sex to senior citizens.

From Spiegel Online-- If you have to get old, Germany isn't a bad place to do so. As well as generous state pensions, German senior citizens enjoy a host of benefits during their twilight years. Now, in addition to discounted rail travel, cut-price cinema tickets and cheap museum entry, Germany's old folk have a new perk to take advantage of: a 50- percent discount at Germany's largest brothel.

Between noon and 5:00 PM, the Cologne brothel "Pascha" is offering this half-off discount for sex to senior citizens 66 years of age and older. Some seniors would probably agree that this is far superior to the early bird special at the neighborhood restaurant or the senior citizen discount at the movies. Senior citizen patrons of the brothel are required to show proof of age.

The 12-story Cologne brothel is trying to tap into the growing pensioner demographic in Germany. It test-marketed its half-off services by offering the early bird senior discount once a week. This marketing strategy proved successful enough for the brothel to introduce the discount every day of business. Europe's largest brothel, Pascha claims to be the world's only brothel with a money-back guarantee for dissatisfied customers.

The brothel's managing director, Armin Lobscheid, spoke to RTE News-- '"All clients need to do is show us some proof of age," he said. He added that a matinee session with the senior discount would cost €25. The regular session cost is 50 euros ($84).

There is even an ad campaign to promote the new deal, featuring a motorcycle rider and the phrase "Life begins at 66!'"

"There's been plenty of demand and people have certainly been taking advantage of the offer," the brothel director Lobscheid said. "Older folks are more active than you think."

Prostitution is legal in Germany. Cologne is a worldwide leader in the sex industry. Home to approximately 1 million, the city taxes prostitution at a flat rate of 150 euros per month. Cologne earned 828,000 euros in 2006 when the "pleasure tax" on sex services was first levied in 2005.

About the monetary success of the afternoon delight marketing strategy, the brothel managing director commented, "We don't earn as much money, but we're establishing ourselves across a broader range of age groups."

As an added incentive, the German brothel is offering its senior citizen clients a discount for the brothel's nightclub, which opens at 9PM. Is this yet another savvy business decision by the Paschal brothel? Some will say yes, as 9PM may be past the bedtime of many senior clients who've indulged in the brothel's matinee sex discount.

Subsidized Sex: German Brothel Offers Fifty-Percent Discount to Senior Citizens, Spiegel Online, http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,471907,00.html

Finally, something good about being old, Reuters, http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=oddlyEnoughNews&storyid=2007-03-15T130611Z_01_L14520560_RTRUKOC_0_US-GERMANY-BROTHEL-PENSIONERS.xml&WTmodLoc=NewsArt-R2-Today-9

Brothel offers 50% pensioner discount, RTE News, http://www.rte.ie/news/2007/0314/germany.ht