Marc H. Bell, CEO of Friendfinder Inc.—which owns the Penthouse adult entertainment brand and a string of sex web sites—got a nice pay raise last year. His total compensation rose from $314,000 to $818,000, paid almost entirely in cash.
The raise was curious because FFN underperformed in 2011. Revenue sank to $331 million from $346 million, subscribers to FFN's adult sites also fell from about 951,000 to 828,000. Ad revenue at Penthouse was negligible.
The company was unprofitable, again. The stock launched at $8.30 in 2011 and was trading in pennies by the end of the year.
The half-million-dollar raise came with other benefits. Bell doesn't actually work full-time for FFN. The annual report says he devotes 10 percent of his time to managing ARMOUR, a residential real estate investment trust (see page 42).
Bell does pretty well in the real estate business. FFN doubtless searched diligently for a location for its Boca Raton, Fla., corporate headquarters but by amazing coincidence found that the best deal on the 8,000-square-foot space came from Bell himself, who rents the space to his own company for $150,000 a year.
Here's the compensation chart (click to enlarge):
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