The Story of Bond Con®
Our story is a long one, lasting 19 years now, but our roots began as a small bondage focused get together we called Bond Con back in New York. Genesis Lynn, Vesta, and Mike – three of the original founders, had the idea to create this weekend long “get together” where bondage models from all over the country, and world, could meet bondage producers and spend a weekend networking. That dream became a reality in October of 2001 when we opened the doors to Bond Con at the Crowne Plaza LaGuardia in Queens, New York. We were literally walking into the unknown, because just a month prior 9/11 happened in NYC. Everyone was reeling from the pain and loss that happened not only to the city, but to the country as well. No one wanted to fly, and people in general were scared to travel, but we forged ahead with the event we had been planning for so many months, and we are so happy we did! Our first year we welcomed over 500 people into the small ballroom we had reserved. We kicked off our inaugural event with Guests of Honor, Stacy Burke, Darla Crane, and Eve Ellis at the show. There were panel discussions, live bondage demonstrations, vendors and website owners exhibiting, models, producers, and fans networking too. In the blink of an eye, we were all quickly pulled into the whirlwind of the weekend, and that was the birth of our trade show.
We had a few bumps along the way, a difficult split with a former business partner saw the three of us (Genesis, Vesta, and Mike) shifting gears to put together what would then be known as Bond Con NYC (under the domain bondconnyc.com – which we were able to recently acquire again) for an additional two years in Queens, before we all decided a fresh start was what we needed. With the decision made, we all packed up and moved to sunny Florida just after our 3rd trade show in late 2003. While we settled into our new lives in Florida, the show was put on hold. We actually didn’t know if we would continue doing another one at all, until our wonderful friend, Stacy Burke stepped forward in early 2004 and gifted us the name Fetish Con.
Fast forward to 2019 and eighteen fantastic trade shows, and we could say the rest is history, but this is where our story takes a turn… in 2007 Peter Acworth, the founder of Kink.com, acquired the domain and rights to the name Bond Con. They held one trade show in San Francisco in 2014 at the SF Armory, the then Home of Kink.com. Peter also trademarked the name in 2014. Fast forward again to about three weeks ago (February, 2019), when we received a message from Peter asking if we’d like to have the Bond Con trademark and domain name back. To say we were speechless is an understatement. Our answer was a resounding – YES!
Not only did Peter give us the chance to have our original and beloved name back, but he gifted the domain and trademark to us as well. As we have told Peter and Kink.com, we can not begin to thank them enough for their generosity and kindness. We of course went right to work thinking about how to marry Fetish Con with Bond Con. The answer was so simple, we added a bondage challenge called the BONDAGE BATTLE to the events!
Thank you, Peter and Kink.com for making our dream once again become a reality.
See you all in August!
Genesis Lynn, Vesta, Mike and Si