Tokyo:
An hourglass-shaped sex toy casually glides along a conveyor belt through a spacious new store in Tokyo. This is Japanese manufacturer Tenga's latest attempt to sell adult products without the usual shame.
At first glance, you wouldn't know that the stylish and colorful products on display are sex toys popular with men in Japan, but the store has been attracting a steady stream of couples and tourists since it opened earlier this year. .
Customer Masafumi Kawasaki (45) said, “I was surprised at how open the company was.And I felt a little embarrassed because I had a “naughty'' image of the company.''
“You might have thought this was some kind of cosmetics store,” he added.
Japan's Tenga brand is best known for its disposable male masturbation aids known as cups, but it has grown into an intimate empire, selling toys for men and women, family planning and people with sexual disabilities. We provide support to.
Yano Research Institute estimated its value at about 209 billion yen ($1.3 billion) in 2016, making it a central player in Japan's adult goods market.
Tenga items are sold in dozens of countries, and nearly half of the company's annual sales of 10 billion yen (which has doubled in the past six years) come from overseas.
Founder Koichi Matsumoto, 57, told AFP that he had been working for years to dispel the stigma around sexual pleasure.
Sex toys for men have been around since before Tenga, but their crude designs that mimic genitalia have kept them underground, far from the mainstream image his company projects.
Matsumoto recalled seeing such products hidden in the corners of stores, with the packaging depicting porn actresses or, in some cases, girls' manga.
“Those products seemed to be saying, 'Use them to make us feel lewd and lewd, because that's what masturbation is,'” he says.
“I thought that message was derogatory and wrong, because it is a fundamental and important human desire.”
“Lonely Single Man”
With a desire to create something more “positive, friendly, and safe,” Mr. Matsumoto quit his job as a car salesman and embarked on a mission to take the auto industry “from the back streets to the high street.”
Tenga products are designed to look different from the blatant artificial vaginas and vulvas that Matsumoto claims objectify women.
The company's marketing team describes its products, which include distinctive bright phallic cups, vibrators and other toys, as “artistic.”
But despite creative collaborations on products like fashion-forward T-shirts, prejudice remains around the company.
Mei Kamiya, 26, a staff member at Tenga Land's new flagship store in Tokyo's trendy Harajuku district, says the Tenga Cup is still sometimes misunderstood as catering to “lonely single men looking for a female replacement.” It is said that there are many.
However, she said masturbation is “normal for everyone” and that other Tenga products, such as vibrators, can deepen intimacy between partners.
Like many developed countries, Japan is suffering from declining birth rates, which is fueling an impending demographic crisis.
However, Mr. Matsumoto denies the suggestion that TENGA products promote sexlessness.
“In fact, I think Japan is doing the opposite of encouraging a decline in the birth rate,” he said.
“It’s less taboo.”
Tenga sells sperm monitoring kits for couples trying to conceive and tools for couples struggling with erectile dysfunction.
According to Mikiya Nakatsuka, a professor of reproductive medicine at Okayama University, some doctors recommend the company's health care products as “an option” for treating sexual disorders.
However, she told AFP that in Japan, there is a tendency to avoid sex-related topics such as menstruation and contraception, in part because of conservative school sex education.
“Are we going to see daytime TV commercials about Tenga in the near future? I don't think so,” Nakatsuka said.
Still, Tenga's “stylishness and medical utility help reduce the taboo of this type of conversation.”
Going forward, Tenga hopes to target Japan's aging population, whose needs are often overlooked.
The company's research has found that some older people feel that they are automatically considered too old to even have sexual desire.
Some are afforded little privacy because they live with their adult children and are financially dependent on them.
For older women, Matsumoto says, “There was a time when it was considered shameful or unfeminine to be open or active about sex.”
“We tell them it's good and it's healthy.”
