OK, I confess. It’s not Week 5 at all, it’s actually week 7. Or possibly even 8. But it is at least part 5 of my step-by-step guide to inventing a new sex toy. Much has happened in the last 3 weeks, not least a trip to the Venus sex industry trade show in Berlin, where we met up with the UK company that’s organising the Chinese manufacture of Product X…
Over beers in an inordinately smokey German hotel bar, we discussed the finer points of the finances of the project. And haggled. If you were going to design a sex toy yourself, here’s what you’d be letting yourself into…
The first cost is in the design of the product itself. If you’re inventing an innovative new product that has a unique new shape, you’re into a lot of 2D drawing and 3D design work. On mate’s rates this might cost you £500 to £1,000, but for seriously heavy-duty professional work, you could be looking at £5,000 worth of spinny-rendered CAD work.
Which is right your you depends on your level of amibtion and budget for the product. If you think it’s going to be the next rabbit and you’ve got the investment to match (maybe via an appearance on Dragon’s Den), then by all means spend the money and get the design done perfectly – it will save you money in the long run.
With Product X, we knew we wanted a straight lady-finger classic vibe, so our back-of-the-envelope sketch was good enough.
The next cost is getting the first mould made in the shape of your vibe – this is what the manufacturer will eventually use to make it, so it has to be right. If you have a separate controller, then you’ll need a mould for the vibrator and a mould for the controller. Moulds cost upwards of $3,000 a piece depending on complexity.
We saved money by adapating an existing vibrator for Product X, so we didn’t have to pay for a mould at all. Nice. The vibe we’ve chosen is phthalates-free, waterproof, super-smooth and generally super-ace. Even nicer.
So what is going to make our finished product different from the version of the vibe that is already on sale? The USP is a genius on-body embellishment that will give the vibrator a whole new meaning, purpose and function (which could be the same thing three times, but I’m not counting if you’re not).
The other decision that we’ve made is that we’re going to make it in 2 sizes, for reasons which will become evident when you see the finished item.
If the first samples that are made with your moulds aren’t up to scratch then there could be some to-ing and fro-ing having moulds remade. That’s when it can start to get (even more) expensive.
Another consideration if you’re having your product made from scratch is which motor to put in it. One company, which supplies some of LoveHoney’s higher-priced vibrators, went to great lengths (well, Hong Kong) to ensure it had the quietest, most powerful motors of its range of vibes. And then it found that the company put a totally different motor in its products. D’oh.
But again, we’re buying off-the-shelf, so it’s not a major issue for us. We know that the product is good, reliable and quiet – tried and tested if you will – so we’re happy. It’s more important to us to keep the development costs down and make the product available to consumers at a pocket-pleasing price.
Then there’s haggling over what you actually pay per unit to have the vibes produced. Coyly, I’m not going to reveal what each version of Product X will cost (commercially sensitive!), but suffice to say, the more you buy, the cheaper the unit cost gets.
After that, you have to add on packaging costs and packaging design. A simple plastic clamshell might cost you about 40p a unit including the card insert. A fancy box with a plastic insert would be a bit more expensive, but not a lot more.
You also have to pay a graphic designer to design the packaging. We use a super-ace designer who I used to work with on .net magazine – he’s a friend and he does a lot of work for us so we get a decent rate. At least, I think it’s a decent rate.
For a simple two-side full-colour clamshell card, you can expect to pay from £500. It very much depends on how strong your initial idea and brief is – if you’re asking the designer to come up with the total concept from scratch, then you can quadruple that.
Our designer has also produced the unique embellishment that is going to make Product X the talk of 2007. Ahem.
The designers we used for the Tracey Cox range did an amazing job. Costs were higher because we commissioned our own photoshoot with two models to produce the photography for the packaging. If that’s what you want – and you want it done properly – don’t expect much change from £10,000. Clearly, that’s only an option if you’re using the pictures on a range of products and can spread the cost.
So, after all that and if you’re still in the game, all you have to do is work out how much it’s going to cost to ship your finished products to the UK from where they’re being made (China, most likely). If they come by boat, which is much cheaper than airfreight, it will take 20-25 days. Cost depends on weight and volume, but for a decent quantity (5,000 units) you can expect to pay around £1,500.
And when the shipment lands, you have to pay VAT at 17.5% on the cost of the products, and (depending on how the product is classified) import duty, which can be anywhere between 5% and 10%. Remember that VAT and duty have to be paid to HM Government as soon as your shipments lands, which adds 20% or more to your up-front costs.
Throw in charges for handling, customs clearance, delivery to your final address in the UK and storage, and you have another tear on the face of the world’s financial mother.
So there you have it: how much it costs to design, mould, make, package, ship and store a new sex toy. I must admit I haven’t been keeping a running total…
Any takers?
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