CHATSWORTH, Calif.—During AVN’s Adult Entertainment Expo, panelists advised aspiring sex toy inventors about the pros and cons of bringing a new product to the market. The panel, called “I invented the best adult product! Now what should I do?” featured sex toy development industry pros with combined decades of experience in the field.
The panel was moderated by Kim Airs, who owned a brick-and-mortar shop and now owns an online store, and herself invented products unique to her customers. Panelists included Scott Watkins, VP of Sales & Marketing for Doc Johnson; Rob Phaneuf, Vice President of Product Development at Pipedream Products; Ted Leger and Larry Lentz, owners of lube maker HelmetGrease.com; and Maureen Pollack, inventor of the WaterSlyde (“the aquatic stimulator”), a bestselling sex toy for women designed to make bathtime much more fun.
A great sex toy comes from a great idea, all of the panelists agreed, but that’s just the beginning. Airs asked the question “What should we tell the creative inventors out there?”
“Do your research,” stressed Watkins. "The number of ideas we get on a weekly basis shows that they haven’t googled to see if there is a product like that on the market.”
“Get a provisional patent," advised Pollack, ”to protect your concept and idea. Call a patent attorney. You have to file, but it doesn’t happen overnight.”
“We research the demographics," said Lentz, whose company Helmet Grease makes an “assortment” of products “by men for men.” “We see what people are using and grow the line to that gender. We also did a detailed business plan: what you can produce in the future, who your demographic will be, what would be good in the future.”
Air recalls coming up with a menopausal lube product after realizing that nobody had touched that market. “I thought, something like that has to be made.” The product was popular at her store in Boston. “Yes, these are the things to think about,” agreed Lentz. “What’s my market?”
Next, Airs asked, “What are the layers and costs that are needed to get a product to market?”
“Make sure you have an experienced company, you want to make your prototype,” said Watkins. "Yes," said Airs, "3D printers are a game changer.”
“I gave myself $50,000," revealed Pollack, "I wouldn’t have been able to sleep if I didn’t try this. But now you can go to the local library and use a 3D printer there. It costs about $250 to get a prototype. It took two weeks to develop the WaterSlyde. Then I went to an injection molding site for a mold for $10,000, the next step. From that I made 15,000 units, my starting point.”
“We have an in-house sculpting department and rendering department, then we take it to China,” said Phaneuf. “We’ve had 3D printers for a while now, they prototype everything in China with 3D printers. Our dildo factory is a whole process.”
The panel also addressed the pitfalls of sex toy making. Lentz and Leger warned that people should include the price of packaging into the final price of the product. Pollack said, “My product retails for $35. When it came to shipping it, I realized if I made it an inch bigger the shipping would be more expensive.”
And for the best advice an inventor could ever get, even if they don’t have $50,000 to invest: “You can contact a contract manufacturer like us, Doc Johnson,” said Watkins. "There are a lot of people who can benefit from being our manufacturing partner. We will walk you off the cliff.”
For clever sex toy inventors out there who have the next great idea that they can’t take to Shark Tank, the four panelists provided their emails:
Rob Phaneuf: [email protected]
Scott Watkins: [email protected]
Maureen Pollack: [email protected]
Larry Lentz: [email protected]
Ted Leger: [email protected]
View the archived video of this panel for free in the @AEExpo Clips Store on AVN Stars here.
Photo by Anna Shvets/Pexels
