An Interview with Kristel Penn – Advocate for Mental Health, Warrior for the Industry

Penn is Grooby’s Creative & Editorial Director, Trans Erotica Awards’ (TEAs) producer, the CEO of her own marketing company, Ikagai, and the brain behind TikTok’s Sad But Rad Club whose goal is to “change the narrative on mental health.” With 75K followers and over 1 million likes, I think she’s definitely making some headway.

With a focus on making mental health not only available, but specific to sex workers and their unique needs, a passion for promoting how trans gender is portrayed in adult film in a positive light, and a desire to create a warm inclusive place for everyone to gather to celebrate nominees and winners for the TEAs, Kristel is a true advocate for performers.

Read on to learn more in this interview about how Kristel is working to make the adult industry a better place, how she manages to sanely wear so many hats, and what her plans are for the future.

How did you get your start and what brought you to adult?

I started back in 2007 when the Grooby office was still based in Hawaii. It was on accident, honestly. I was in the middle of my quarter-life crisis and taking photos at the local newspaper as a side gig. In my free time, I took nightlife photos at events around town. Our accountant knew I was looking for a job and asked if I was familiar with Photoshop. She told me it was for an adult company, then clarified it was a trans adult company.

I was originally hired as a photo retoucher, and I was…not great at it. Or at least, my photoshopping skills were not high enough to be retouching buttholes, in my opinion. On my second day of training, Steven Grooby (the company’s owner) recognized that my skillset was better suited for writing-related tasks. He immediately changed my job description, and I started working on blogs and website text. I worked my way up, went back to school to get a marketing certificate, and am now the Creative and Editorial Director at Grooby.

For the past few years, I have also been working toward my MA in Psychology to become an MFT (marriage and family therapist). Because a large part of my job centers on community outreach, this felt like a natural steppingstone to better serve our performers. The framework of therapy and resilience is something that I’ve used to inform and structure many of our philanthropic endeavors.

You have a career at Grooby, your own marketing company Ikagai, run the Trans Erotica Awards, and also juggle going to school. How do you balance all these endeavors and have time for yourself? Suggestions for others?

I haven’t quite figured it out yet, to be honest.

It’s a tricky balance for me because my natural inclination is to be a workaholic and there are also many things I’m interested in doing creatively. My best advice is to block off your schedule based on task/job.

I set time aside to work on certain projects and for my brain, my schedule also includes blocks of time for rest/re-charge. I also try to be mindful of what fuels me and what drains my energy and plan my scheduling accordingly. I also try to take care of easy tasks first to help give me momentum to complete harder/bigger tasks.

What was the impetus for the TikTok’s Sad But Rad Club and how has the response been?

I created Sad But Rad Club at the beginning of the pandemic when we were in quarantine.

Originally, I used the account as my work persona (Kristel Penn) and planned on posting content related to the industry. I honestly didn’t understand TikTok as a platform and I didn’t think much about it. I did a tongue-in-cheek video about my own therapy session, and it received over 100,000 views. I soon noticed that my mental health related videos performed consistently higher than anything else I was doing, so at a certain point I pivoted my account to be Sad But Rad Club.

The response has been phenomenal – and it was something I couldn’t predict or anticipate.

In addition to the mental health videos I do now, I also use my platform to talk about my work in the adult industry. Many of my followers are cis straight women in their 40s-70s (a surprise to me) and have no reference point to SW other than what they know from media, so this has been a great opportunity to educate a community outside of my own. I have to use a lot of coded language to avoid getting flagged (which is something SW community deals with as well), but I have found personal stories about my work in the industry have helped to present a more three-dimensional, humanized view of our industry.

What unique mental health issues do those in the industry face, and what is your advice for keeping a positive outlook?

I think, in addition to problems that affect civilians (individually and systemically), sex workers also have to deal with the fear of stigma and discrimination within the mental health field. This is in addition to the fact that many mental healthcare providers are not competent enough about the industry and also have their own biases and misconceptions about sex work. SWers are hesitant (and rightfully so) to disclose about their work because they don’t know if the therapist will be non-affirming and/or ignorant, in addition to fears about confidentiality.

It’s understandably discouraging, but what I can say is that there are ways to advocate for yourself to find competent and affirming care. There is a free psychoeducation workshop I’ve been doing for the past few years to help SWers find a SWer-affirming therapist that includes a lot of practical tips and workarounds to help folks navigate the system.

Community mental health centers like your local LGBTQ Center are run by trainees, like me, but are under the supervision of a licensed therapist. Many SWers already utilize services at these organizations, so many have direct experience with SW community. Additionally, if cost is a barrier, organizations like these operate on a sliding scale, pay-what-you-can model.

What is the most misunderstood thing about creating adult content for the transgender space?

As much progress as we’ve made in our industry, there are still misunderstandings about who consumes trans adult content, what will sell, and how this content should depict trans men and women. With the popularity of fan sites, however, trans content creators who have not necessarily shot with a production studio are able to showcase wider diversity in identity, presentation, and expressions of sex and sexuality on camera. I think this helps to dispel misassumptions and misunderstandings about trans erotica.

What are you most proud of in your career so far?

I’m extremely proud of the growth of the TEAs (Trans Erotica Awards). The TEAs were not my idea, but I have been honored to be the event’s Executive Producer for a large part of my time here at Grooby. The show started as a casual online competition and has since had several incarnations at smaller venues around town and is now at the historic Avalon in Hollywood. It’s a beautiful space and it makes me happy to hear guests describe the event as “the funnest” awards show.

We purposely price our sponsorships at tiers that are affordable to the community because, at the heart of it, this is a community show. I am honored by the adult and non-adult specific companies who buy-in and show up in these spaces year after year.

What are your three biggest goals for the next five years?

One big goal is to further cultivate the growth of the TEAs.

When I reflect back on the show from five years ago to now, it’s amazing to see how far we’ve come. I don’t think the TEAs will ever be as big as the other major adult shows and that’s okay. What I’d like to focus on instead is continuing to make attendees (new and old) feel like this is their show and one that feels like a family reunion. I’ve unofficially dubbed the TEAs the “Goth Table” of the adult industry because I want it to feel like we’re a bunch of misfits hanging out and everyone, and I do mean everyone, is invited and welcomed to join us.

My second goal is to focus more attention and energy on Grooby Camp, which is a free virtual conference I created during the pandemic.

Some of our industry’s biggest players, both in business and content creation, donated their time and expertise to educate others about navigating our industry. I think I’d like to see Grooby Camp as a hybrid event in five years because I do think the in-person networking component of a conference is SO important and I want to make sure a virtual component is also included for those who are unable to attend.

My third goal is a personal one – I have been cooking up an idea for a YouTube series called “My Hot Friends and Me.” I even bought the domain name to hold myself accountable to this dream project. In this series, I’d like to interview my SWer friends and do an activity together, preferably something that brings them inner child level joy. Although the name of the series is kind of silly, my hope is that these short videos would showcase a side of my “hot friends” that not a lot of people get to see. I think there are some wonderfully wholesome aspects to our industry and the relationships I have forged within our industry, and I would love to showcase that to a larger audience.

Follow Kristel on her Twitter @thekristelpenn, @groobydotcom, and sadbutradclubxo, her Tiktok @sadbutradclubxo, and her Instagram @thekristelpenn and @sadbutradclubxo. All her links can be found at @kristelpenn.com.