I know the customer service guys at Five Star will drop you a note periodically with back-order status. If the order is unfulfilled after 30 days there's an automatic notification to be sure you would still like to wait.

Empire has a nice online order tracking system. If your order still has not shipped you can cancel it online after logging in to your account. They'll even let you add items to your order if you wish.

DVD Exotic will automatically split up your order into multiple shipments in the event that an item is back-ordered. Some forum members have stated that they have receieved free shipping on the additional shipments. I'm not sure if that's a standard company policy but it's a nice plus.

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It may be because Empire has more "clout" with their suppliers being a fairly big retailer, but I'm only guessing here.

I have used Fivestar but not recently and have found popular titles tend to go out of stock quickly especially if they are on sale or special offer.

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Retailers outside of the greater Los Angeles area tend to carry far more inventory than those located in the San Fernando Valley area. (That's where 95% of all porn is made in this country.)

What does this mean for the consumer? Stores in The Valley can have a slight advantage in filling your orders if they don't happen to have an item on their shelves. Many of the online retailers have full-time drivers that make daily rounds to all of the studios to pick up the items they need to fill orders. This system works really well as long as the studio has the item in stock. The downside in this system is that many adult studios are notorious for having no concept of inventory control and production planning. That means you don't get your DVDs shipped out the same day you place your orders. (It takes some studios 3 - 5 days to get an order filled for an online retailer. Some of them don't even have computerized inventory systems. Their inventory counts are kept on a piece of paper in the warehouse!) What really sucks for teh consumer is that some of these retailers make the assumption they can get an item from a studio within hours of taking the order and therefore list the item as 'in stock' on their web site.

Stores like Empire and Five Star don't have the luxury/aggravation of sending a driver out twice a day to pick up a box of porn. They have to plan their purchases and account for shipping time and costs. This results in them carrying higher inventory levels. It has the side-effect of making it in their best interest to report real-time inventory status on their web sites. There's no temptation for them to inaccurately state something is in stock because they know they can't pick it up within a few hours time. Since these types of companies have to plan their purchases and manage their inventory more efficiently they tend to have superior automation in their back-office order fulfillment systems. It's not uncommon to place an order at 5:00 pm and have it ship the same day.

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If you're looking for the best stock on a website....Adult DVD Empire has the best and Adult DVD Now also has the best.

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DVD Advantage's stock system works in a similar fashion I believe.

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