OnlyFans management companies have become the new suitcase pimps.

They work with many of the adult industry’s top creators. But their practices are often nothing short of predatory and in many cases, downright criminal.

Due in large part to the pandemic OnlyFans has become a household name. Content creators of all shapes and sizes have hopped on the platform to make a living, and it has freed women in the adult industry from having to work with predatory agents and directors. No longer are they forced to do things they don’t want to do, for someone they don’t even like. Now they can make money on their own, from home, with their cell phone.

The problem is, where there are large amounts of money to be made, creepy guys are standing in the shadows wanting a piece of the pie. In the adult industry, we jokingly refer to these low-life predators as suitcase pimps – but the rise of platforms like OnlyFans has taken these men to a whole new level.

But running a successful OnlyFans account can be time-consuming, between answering direct messages, and producing new content to make sure your subscribers are happy and stay around.

The more popular the girl is, the more complicated it can become. Imagine trying to answer hundreds of messages yourself, while still having the time to film new content, edit it and still have time to do other things in your life, like eat, sleep, and clean your kitchen.

Managing a popular OnlyFans account really is a full-time job on its own, so oftentimes porn stars will hire management companies who promise them the world.

“If you sign with us we’ll double your income within 30 days.”

“If you sign with us we’ll garuntee you’ll make $30,000 a month.”

But part of the success rests on the shoulders of a hidden army of “account managers” who ghostwrite responses to messages that fans send the model. While it’s true not all people on OnlyFans use these management companies, but more than a few do.

Many of these OnlyFans management companies have a very pimp-like mentality. They talk down to the talent and blame everything that goes wrong on them – and girl after girl is scared to walk away due to fear of the unknown or due to being manipulated by their OnlyFans managers.

They even make them sign confidentiality agreements that if violated the model would owe their OnlyFans managers $5 million.

Social Media influencers and reality TV stars also employ OnlyFans management companies. One particular company “Unruly” boasts a roster that includes Tana Mongeau, Daisy Keech, Charly Jordan, Abby Rao, and Netflix’s “Too Hot to Handle” star Harry Jowsey.

In 2020 Tyga started his own OnlyFans management company called Too Raw.

It’s no surprise because OnlyFans is big money – not just for porn stars but for mainstream too. Tyga is rumored to make more than $7 million a month with his OnlyFans account. Blac Chyna is reported to make $20 million a month with her Onlyfans account. Megan Barton Hanson, who is a Love Island reality TV star is said to make just over a million per month. Cardi B makes an estimated $9 million a month, while former Disney star Bella Thorne brings in an estimated $11 million a month.

However, these stars are busy with their own lives and it’s OnlyFans management companies who maintain the account for them. Although those management companies don’t always have the best interest of the content creators in mind.

BuzzFeed and Business Insider ran similar stories about the exploitive nature of these OnlyFans management companies.

Trying to survive as gig workers in a pandemic and locked into contracts they couldn’t get out of, clients and former workers said they faced a dilemma they hadn’t prepared for: tolerate conditions they didn’t know they’d signed up for, or face threats and retaliation ranging from losing their job to getting sued by the company.

Six creators told BuzzFeed News that they have struggled to get out of contracts with Unruly, a Los Angeles–based operation that also runs Behave, another content management company. Four contracts for clients of Unruly and Behave that were reviewed by BuzzFeed News included automatic renewal provisions that locked clients in for three years or more unless they provided written notice within a window ranging from two weeks to two months. The Behave contract included a provision that gives the company the right to take out life insurance on the creator and requires them to be available for medical examinations and share medical information with the company if the carrier declines to issue a policy.

“It’s almost like a Frankenstein of the worst provisions I’ve seen put together in one contract,” said Robert Tauler, an attorney who represents two Unruly clients suing the company. “I think it’s an unlawful contract, and it’s used only to manipulate. … It’s used strictly as leverage to maintain dominion over the lives of young women who are in this predicament.”

A mainstream model who planned to post bikini photos is now suing the company after she discovered that Unruly sold an image that showed her exposed breast and had been taken without her consent or knowledge while she was changing during a photoshoot organized by the company. She said she had been clear with the company from the beginning that she didn’t want to do nude content.

“I don’t even know how much they sold it for, who they sold it to — if it was just the one person or thousands of people,” she said. “I was crying for so long.”

Porn star Amia Miley had her own experience with Behave. In October 2020 she agreed to sign with them after they told her they would increase her income to at least $25,000 in their first month of working together.

This is a common practice with almost all OnlyFans management companies. They lure clients in with promises of big numbers.

When they didn’t make her account the money they promised, Amia Miley left.

The OnlyFans management company however wasn’t having it. They now claim that Amia Miley owes them $300,000 for breaking her contract with them.

“They have such a big company, I just would have never imagined that they’d be so desperate to trap anybody,” Miley told BuzzFeed News . “I don’t know how they’re still in business, probably because they just scare so many girls who don’t speak up or know who to say something to.”

After joining OnlyFans in 2016, Amia Miley developed a loyal following that netted her around $10,000 to 15,000 a month just before she signed with Behave, she said. But Unruly’s Niknejad projected that the company could help her earn five times her revenue, according to emails reviewed by BuzzFeed News — an income boost that would more than make up for their 25% fee.

Amia Miley, who was pregnant at the time and glad to lighten her workload, thought the offer sounded good.

But things quickly turned sour. Behave’s first move was to make her account free, effectively erasing the reliable paid-subscriber base she had spent years building. Her income would be dependent on tips and sales through direct messages, which can be much more labor-intensive. The company had told her that they typically structure their accounts this way, she said — and two workers corroborated this. But the result, she said, was that she ended up losing money for the duration of her time working with the company.

“I said I’m not comfortable with that. I’ve spent years getting these numbers up, and this is residual money I count on,” she said. I’m gonna have a baby any second, she thought at the time. These people are ruining my life.

Without warning, the company switched out the banking information on her OnlyFans account, replacing Amia Miley’s bank details with their own, she said. One other former client said in a lawsuit the same thing happened to her. Rather than receiving the income on their OnlyFans accounts and paying Unruly for their services, the women would now rely on Unruly to pay them the money they had earned, they said.

“They put me in a position where I was like, ‘I can’t leave now — you have my money, you haven’t paid me yet,’” Miley said, noting that the company was regularly late with payments. A former account manager for Behave said that she often got messages from other models saying their money was also late.

Amia Miley is hardly the only person in the adult industry who has had troubles with OnlyFans management companies.

OC Modeling, Brooklyn Chase, Johnny Castle, and Kevin Casali are all involved in multiple OnlyFans management-related lawsuits. What many in the industry jokingly refer to as “pimp wars”. The fighting between that group has become downright scary.

The dispute arises over Johnny Castle, and his business partner at the time Kevin Casali, apparently luring away performers who were signed up to OnlyFans through an OC Modeling studio account. Then of course there is also the lawsuit between Johnny Castle and Kevin Casali who now run competing OnlyFans management companies.

In the end, it’s the models who suffer from all of this turmoil and abuse and as OnlyFans remains the most lucrative means of income for an adult model, the predatory practices of OnlyFans managers will no doubt continue.

*** Please note Brooklyn Chase’s ex-husband, Michael Morgan who runs the company Liberty Risk Consulting, would like me to go on record as saying that to my knowledge, unlike the other previously mentioned OnlyFans management companies, any complaints levied against his company by former clients have yet to result in legal action.