LAS VEGAS—Warming, cooling, moisturizing. Tightening, prolonging, healing. Flavored, colored, scented. There's a lube for every person, every reason, every occasion. There's even one that glows in the dark.
But for Timothy Killian, there was something missing. And that's what drove him to start a company called Weverse Technologies.
AVN came across the Seattle-based entrepreneur at last month's International Lingerie Show, held in Las Vegas. Killian was there to promote his brand-new product, Shower Jerk. Which will, as the name suggests, make getting off in the shower a much more pleasant experience.
"Shower Jerk is the first and only lube that actually gets more slippery in water, rather than less," Killian explained. "It's designed and developed only for wet environments. You can't use it outside of a water environment. So for the shower or full immersion in a bathtub or a hot tub or a pool, it's designed to stay on and be slippery until you take it off with soap."
OK, that sounds intriguing. And Killian was more than happy to tell us more. "It's silicone based," he said. "We use a higher viscosity of silicone, though, that actually requires water to unlock the slippery properties. So whereas other silicone lubes will stay on, their slippery feeling will degrade very quickly; they will become tacky. This does the opposite. As water hits it, it becomes more slippery."
Asked how he came up with the idea, Killian raised an eyebrow. "Well, I was in the shower—and you can fill in the rest." Ba-dum-bum.
"Actually, here's what happened. In my previous life for 25 years I have been a political consultant. So I figured since I'm already greasing palms, so I might as well start greasing palms in a different industry. And the politicians were always getting into hot water. So I took one and married it to the other."
Insert laugh track here.
Seriously, Killian said, "I've seen a need for this product my whole life and I thought, 'Somebody's going to develop it.' And nobody did. I tried everything. I started using the olive oil, the coconut oil, and nothing worked. So I went and developed it."
Killian mused, "I thought it must not be possible to do—otherwise the big boys would have done it. So when I got the final formulation, I was really pleased. I've only had the product for three weeks, so we're brand new."
Armed with samples at his ILS booth, Killian demonstrated how the lubricant works. Indeed, it did seem to get slipperier as he added moisture—yet it washed off clean with a little soap.
The lube comes packaged in a black bottle with the Shower Jerk logo. However, it's also sold in a discreet bottle with the initials "SJ." It looks as innocent as a bottle of body wash or shampoo. As his marketing material notes, "A man can leave the discreet bottle in his shower without concern that his mother-in-law will think less of him than she already does."
In terms of his marketing and sales plans, Killian said, "We sell directly. At this show I've been meeting distributors and having that conversation and I'm still trying to make that decision whether I want to go through distribution or go directly. It just depends on who I like and who I'd like to work with. But I'm mostly interested in getting it out in people's hands."
In addition to premium silicone, Shower Jerk also contains organic vitamin E. Each 3.4-ounce bottle contains approximately 50 applications, and it can be purchased online at ShowerJerk.com.
"This is our first unveiling of it to the industry, and to that end it's going great," Killian said. "And now we're just trying to get the word out that no longer do you have to go squeak-squeak-squeak in the shower—you can actually enjoy the experience."
