Thurston County, WA Business Licensing & Operations: Adult Entertainment (2026)

80 does not regulate or license sexually oriented businesses of this type, it bans them. 64, advertised or represented as a body painting, model, sensitivity awareness or sexual therapy studio, clinic or service, or anything conveying a similar meaning, that leads to the reasonable belief a fee will buy the opportunity to paint, massage, feel, handle, caress or touch the unclothed body of another person, or to be touched, or to observe, photograph, film or videotape such activity. 030 defines an "on-premises dating service" in nearly identical terms, a fee-based dating or studio service rendered on-site that leads to the reasonable belief the same touching activity will be furnished, minus the body-painting language.

Both definitions are broad enough to sweep in nearly any storefront advertised around touch-for-fee services that is not a legitimately licensed massage business. Because the chapter prohibits rather than licenses, there is no application, fee schedule, spacing requirement or hearing process to describe, the entire regulatory scheme is the ban itself plus its definitions and penalty.