Yandy.com CEO Chad Horstman on why his 'sexy' Halloween costumes are so ridiculous

Yandy.com normally sells lingerie, but it also offers a range of so-called sexy Halloween costumes that cater to outrageous tastes

The CEO of Yandy.com said that the more niche the costume, the better it sold

Bored of being one of the multitudes of cute cats that come out every Halloween? A US mail-order retailer called Yandy.com has a whole range of alternatives.

Yandy.com normally sells lingerie, but it also offers a range of so-called sexy Halloween costumes that cater to outrageous tastes.

Everything from a half-white, half-blue “what is the colour” dress for $46.95, inspired by the viral dress that different people thought were different colours, to the Donald T. Rumpshaker Costume, featuring red cap, tie and tiny, tiny hotpants.

Somehow, the options only get weirder. One, called “pizza rat costume”, is taken from the viral video of a rat stealing a pizza, with with pizza pockets and rat ears on the hood. Or you could just go as the pizza.

Maxim tracked down the CEO of the company to ask, simply, why?

Chad Horstman, CEO of Yandy.com, said that Yandy.com started in his garage in 2007, when he and his brother descided to collaborate on a mail-order lingerie business because of lack of competition in the market. They requested Halloween costumes from all the manufacturers they worked with in their first year, and found out that the more niche the costume, the better it sold. “We immediately noticed that the more unique ones did exceptionally well. They had one back then that was called Tina Taxi Cab Driver [laughing], and that was the bestseller. That first Halloween just went crazy,” Chad Horstman, CEO of Yandy.com, told Maxim. The company now employs 200 people.

He said that sometimes Yandy will work with an LA manufacturer on a costume idea and others, it is just luck. This year, Yandy was in the process of creating a lion costume for women when Walter Palmer, an American dentist, sparked outrage for hunting one of Zimbabwe's most treasured lions. So they named the costume Cecil after the lion and decided to give 20 per cent of the profits on sales to charity.

The Cecil costume is among the top sellers, which are all furry, Mr Horstman said. But they also sell SWAT costumes 10 or 12 at a time, because women buy them to go to festivals dressed the same.

He also has a message for people who take offensive to the sexiness of the costumes. “Um, mostly: LOL,” Mr Horstman said. “If you didn’t realise that a sexy lobster is funny, come on.”