• Musings

    Why you shouldn’t buy sex toys on Amazon

    Lightning-fast shipping, a staggering selection of products, and extremely competitive prices make Amazon one of the most popular online shopping websites in the world. It isn’t surprising, then, that consumers would consider Amazon an option for sex toy purchases. However, according to a recent article by Vanessa Marin on Lifehacker, buying a sex toy…

  • Musings

    The havoc toxic toys can wreak on the body

    The sex toy industry is largely void of any sort of regulation, so unless you shop with a trusted retailer like us, you don’t know what kinds of chemicals might be lurking in your toys. We know that unsafe materials like jelly can degrade, melt, off-gas, and harbor bacteria. And we’ve definitely heard…

  • Musings

    Dildology: material verification of sex toys!

    Did you know that the sex toy industry is largely unregulated? It is much more of a wild west than most consumers realize. Companies can actually make their toys out of any mish-mash of material they want, then slap false claims on the packaging such as “100% silicone” and “phthalate-free” — with no…

  • Musings

    The crusade against phthalates and toxic toys

    When Jennifer Pritchett opened The Smitten Kitten, her goal was to run a sex-positive, feminist adult retail store. But that mission expanded when she discovered the issue of toxic sex toys. She had never heard the word “phthalates” before, but three days before the store’s grand opening in August of 2003, while opening…

  • Q&A

    “What are phthalates?”

    At She Bop, every sex toy we carry is completely body-safe and phthalate-free. But what on earth are phthalates, and why do we want our sex toys to be free of them? Besides having a perplexing name (pronounced “thal-ates”), phthalates are a family of chemicals used to soften hard plastics. In the realm…