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The Fifty Shades of Grey movie may not be scheduled for release until February 13, 2015, but according to LELO, the kinky sex revolution is already waning. According to sales figures of LELO toys, tracked across their top 20 leading markets, sales of BDSM accessories such as whips and teasers reached a plateau in the last quarter of 2013, compared with a 50% increase over the same period in 2012. Meanwhile, sales of premium couples massagers and vibrating couples’ rings worn during intercourse have increased by 82%, compared with the same period last year.
This is not your parents’ “vanilla sex,” it should be noted! According to research, 58% of global toy owners expected to use premium personal massagers with their partner up until September 2013, compared with 72% in the last 3 months of 2013. In other words, if their buying habits are to be believed, it would seem couples are less concerned with reenacting their Christian Grey and Ana fantasies, and more concerned with intimacy and equal-opportunity pleasure in bed. We’re clearly talking full-fat, homemade, creamy vanilla, here — not your generic supermarket brand.
LELO defines “couples’ sex toy” as “an intimate massager suited specifically to enhance foreplay or intercourse.” This kind of toy typically does not feature “the phallic designs typical of so many sex toys currently on the market.” In other words, it’s not the pink plastic penis that got tossed around the room at the last Bachelorette party you attended.
Examples of couples’ toys include the Ida, LELO’s newest release, a couples’ massager that is worn by women during lovemaking to increase pleasure for both partners, and the remote-controlled Hula Beads, worn by the woman during foreplay to provide gentle vibrations within the vagina.
More research on trends in sex is due from LELO later this month, when they will release the results of the 2014 LELO Global Sex Survey.
