Tariffs are coming for your sex toys

Trump's massive tariffs on China are going to hurt your sex life. Most sex toys sold in the U.S. are manufactured in China, and production can't quickly shift stateside.

This month, the president has made a slew of announcements and backtracks on global tariffs. This has led to an escalating trade war with China, with current tariffs on imports at 145 percent (as of this writing), and the administration hinting that they can balloon to 245 percent.

As many products sold in the U.S. are made in China, many industries and customers will likely suffer. Sex toy companies aren't any different, and if these tariffs continue, your bedside drawer might look a lot emptier soon. 

Why are sex toys made in China?

"Pretty much all toys are made in China," said Carolyn Eagle, owner of the online sex toy shop Betty's Toy Box and others. 

Factories in China have the manufacturing capabilities and decades of knowledge to make toys, particularly vibrators, which have small electronic parts like motors.

This wasn't always the case, though, according to sex historian and journalist Hallie Lieberman. In the early twentieth century, vibrators were produced in the U.S. — and companies were proud of it. "Pretty much all toys are made in China."

"In the early 1900s, the U.S. [...] Racine, Wisconsin marketed itself as 'vibrator capital of the world,'" said Lieberman, author of Buzz: A Stimulating History of the Sex Toy. "We were making electric motors and vibrators in Wisconsin […] the Midwest was that production capital, because we were making small electric motors here. They had the infrastructure, they had the factories."

In the decades since, Lieberman said we've "gone from doing vibrator production in the U.S. to completely outsourcing it." Why?

Why does the U.S. outsource vibrator production?

Firstly, these Midwestern-made vibrators weren't marketed for sexual purposes (even though that's what they were used for); they were sold as products for health and non-sexual uses — even vacuum cleaners. 

Around the sexual revolution and women's liberation movement in the 1960s and 70s, vibrators did become more associated with sex, and women's masturbation in particular. This contributed to more stigma around the toys. American companies like Hamilton Beach, which produced vibrators at the turn of the century (you can find some on eBay), focused on other household appliances instead.

Meanwhile, the iconic Magic Wand vibrator (formerly known as the Hitachi Magic Wand), which isn't produced in the U.S., debuted in 1968. By the time Vibratex, the wholesale distributor of Magic Wand, took over distributing and managing the vibrators in 2000, Magic Wand was manufactured in China. The switch from manufacturing in Japan to China happened in the late 1980s or early 1990s, CEO of Vibratex Ken Herskovitz told Mashable. 

Vibratex, which launched the also-famous Rabbit Pearl vibrator, also shifted production from Japan to China (unrelated to Magic Wand) around that time because of the reduced labor cost and larger manufacturing infrastructure, Herskovitz said. "Shenzhen and Dongguan are where, I would say, about 90 percent of all sex toys are made."

Today, it's difficult to determine how many vibrators and other sex toys are produced in China and imported into the U.S., Lieberman said. These products don't have a NAICS (North American Industry Classification System) code, so they're not categorized like retail or agriculture products. 

Despite the lack of official statistics, Lieberman and business owners Mashable spoke to made it clear that the vast majority of sex toys sold in the U.S. are made in China.

"Shenzhen and Dongguan are where, I would say, about 90 percent of all sex toys are made," Alexandra Fine, co-founder and CEO of sex toy company Dame, told Mashable. "They are experts there at making this type of product."

Certain aspects of vibrators are particularly difficult to make, Fine continued. She used an example of not being able to use high-temperature silicone around electronics because it'll melt the electronics. 

"There's nuance. They're hard to do, and this is where the experts are, and how we can make quality product," she said. 

"The manufacturers in Shenzhen are exceptional at what they do," wrote Polly Rodriguez, co-founder and CEO of sex toy brand Unbound, in a blog post about how tariffs are impacting the company. "There is no other region that can match their quality of raw materials, technology, safety standards, manufacturing processes, speed, and price."

Can sex toys be made in the U.S.?

One stated reason for the tariffs is to bring manufacturing back to the U.S. But in the case of many products, including sex toys, it's not easy.

Two variables are the ability to make products at scale and cost, according to Michael Topolovac, co-founder and CEO of pleasure jewelry company Crave. Currently, supply chains that companies need to make an array of products at scale (meaning, a lot of them) don't really exist in the U.S.

"For example, batteries and motors. They're not manufactured in the U.S. anywhere," said Topolovac. "Not for these kinds of consumer products. They just don't exist. Could you build battery and motor factories in the U.S.? Sure, but that's a five-year problem." "Could you build battery and motor factories in the U.S.? Sure, but that's a five-year problem."

"When you get to electro-mechanical products, and the scale at work that we're doing it, it's just not feasible in the U.S. currently," said Ti Chang, co-founder and creative director of Crave. Crave does its design, research and development, some assembly, and quality control in San Francisco, but its parts are made in China. 

The other problem is cost. Rates for labor, construction, real estate, and basic living costs are higher here than in China. "Even if you could build up the supply chain, it would be materially more expensive," Topolovac said.

So, are sex toy prices going to go up?

If nothing changes with the tariffs, yes. "People are going to have to really raise the prices of vibrators," Lieberman said.

Sex toy brands are responding to this potential reality in different ways. 

Unbound and Dame posted blog posts about the tariffs, pledging transparency to their customers. When the tariffs were set at 20 percent, Dame instituted a $5 "Trump tariff surcharge," which Fine told Mashable wasn't enough to offset the increased cost on the company's end. 

Last week, Dame updated the charge and the blog post, stating, "We've updated our prices to reflect a ~50 percent tariff. Because we just don’t think it will stay at 145 percent." Dame's "Trump's tariff surcharge" is currently $15, and Dame and Fine shared more about the company's math on Instagram.

Vibratex sells wholesale to retailers, and effective immediately, there's a 10 percent tariff offset fee, which also wouldn't fully cover the increased cost, Herskovitz said. As of this publication, beginning in May, there will be a 20 percent tariff offset fee; in June, 30 percent; and in July, 40 percent. Vibratex aims to cap this fee to its customers (retailers) at 40 percent.

Vibratex has also controlled order sizes so one retailer doesn't stock up on all their inventory before prices increase.

Meanwhile, Crave stocked up on extra inventory before Trump's tariff announcement, given his history of imposing tariffs on China. In an email sent to customers and forwarded to Mashable, Crave stated it's not raising prices for now, but urged customers to buy something if they're eyeing it.

"[O]wing to the extreme tariffs and their apparent likelihood of being maintained, it is unclear how long we can keep our current pricing," Crave's email stated.

It's difficult to say how much products will cost if manufacturing eventually shifts to the U.S., Topolovac said, but he estimated prices can go up 300 or 400 percent.

Hurting businesses and bodies

The escalating tariffs are causing chaos in the markets and businesses.

"If one's intent — I use that word very broadly — was wanting to eviscerate very large swaths of small businesses in America, this is precisely how you would do it," said Topolovac, CEO of Crave. "I feel a little apocalyptic about my vibrators right now."

Multiple business owners told Mashable that the instability of Trump's decisions has made it difficult to decide what to do. Across industries, from beauty to children's toys to furniture, business owners feel, as the Wall Street Journal reported, "stuck in limbo."

"I feel like I'm dancing with chaos," Fine said. "I feel a little apocalyptic about my vibrators right now."

"Everyone's on edge," Herskovitz said of the Vibratex team. "This current situation feels very unpredictable. We don't know. It's why I'm doomscrolling all day."

"Even if the tariffs continue on for another couple of months, companies are going to start going under," said Eagle. "They just won't be able to afford to produce and bring over the product that they need to bring over." 

These impacts will undoubtedly affect consumers, and not just their wallets.

"It's easy to look at it and say, 'Oh, it's just frivolous, whatever,'" about sex toys, "but these are products people use on their genitals, inside their bodies," Lieberman said. 

"People are always going to want to masturbate. They're always going to want to provide pleasure. They will find a way to get the cheaper product, even with the surcharge, the Shein product, or the whatever product that may have dangerous chemicals in it that may break, that may be harmful to them."

What makes matters worse is that this is happening alongside a years-long attempt to stifle online sexuality. Twin laws FOSTA-SESTA, which Trump signed into law in 2018, were outwardly to curb online sex trafficking, but in reality have pushed sex workers (and educators, and other people in the sexuality space) off social platforms and the internet. This makes them less safe and also makes it harder to find credible information online. 

Sex toy companies, especially women-centered ones, aren't exempt from this. In 2023, Unbound showed that Meta rejected its toy ads until it marketed to men.

Additionally, around a third of the U.S. is now subject to age-verification laws. These laws typically require identification data (in the form of government ID or facial recognition) for visitors of sites with over a third of explicit content. Despite free speech advocates and researchers saying age-verification doesn't work to stop minors from accessing porn sites, they persist. 

And age verification is coming for sex toys. Last month, Texas introduced a bill to require official proof of age to buy sex toys online.

"Current struggles impacting toy businesses with the new tariffs remind us of challenges we continue to see faced by advocates, researchers, and educators like ourselves in the broader field of sexual rights," COO at sexual freedom nonprofit Woodhull Freedom Foundation, Mandy Salley, said in an emailed statement to Mashable. 

"Restrictive policies on who can access sexual content online, increasing censorship of sexual expression on social media, and regressive human rights policies contribute to the censorship and stigmatization of consenting adults' access to sexual content."

It's unclear whether the 145 percent tariffs will last long after this publication or for years, and how sex toy companies will respond. One thing for sure is, they're killing the buzz in more ways than one.

Keep checking Mashable for our latest tariff news and explainers, from delayed Nintendo Switch 2 preorders to reports of iPhone 16 panic buying.