thestar.com

If you hosted a sex-toy party in your home, you probably wouldn't invite your mother. But not only did Dawn Montgomery invite her mom, whom she lives with and who cleaned their house in Accokeek, Md., for the party, but she also asked three aunts, a cousin and a slew of friends and co-workers. She had a caterer friend make pornographic chocolates that were given out as prizes at the end, after the partygoers had viewed all the colourful battery-operated objects for sale but before they had lined up to buy them in the privacy of Dawn's mother's bedroom.

In other words, she is the perfect hostess for a sex-toy party -- the phenomenon born in the early '70s that has swelled surprisingly in popularity and profits. Inspired by the Tupperware party and the Avon lady, sex-toy party companies hit pay dirt in the late '80s and early '90s. Now anywhere you live, chances are that if you don't find one of these companies' headquarters you'll at least come upon a few distributors. There's two sex-toy party companies based in Tennessee, for Heaven's sake.

It's a question you direct to your guide -- in this case, Mary Alice Hill of Bowie, Md., whose husband, a fire equipment purchaser, helps her set up for every party and whose Ford Bronco boasts "Tasteful Treasures by Mary Alice" with an 800 number, and whose home answering machine proudly announces her work as a distributor for the Virginia Beach, Va.-based company. Mary Alice makes $41,000 US a year in her full-time work as an inventory control technician, but raked in $12,000 last year from eight hours a week at sex-toy parties. Last year she used her profits to help buy her husband a Corvette and a motorcycle.