Challenging the idea that high-end products in the adult toy industry are the domain of Europeans or Americans, the Australian brand Nu Sensuelle has taken on some of the best brand names in the world and is making a significant impact
The quality Australian designed brand of vibrators and stimulators Nu Sensuelle, currently taking the world by storm, are designed by the Australian Manufacturing and Production Engineer Thao Luu-Brinberg and her partner.
We asked Thao how someone educated as an engineer ends up with an adult toy company?
My dream at a young age was to have my own business so I made it my job to learn every facet of the business, not just Engineering, in every company that I worked in. So when the time was right, I would have all of the knowledge required to run my own business.
When I met my partner in 2007, I knew that the timing was perfect to get out of the fashion industry, I suggested we start our own brand of adult toys in Australia.
Novel Creations Pty Ltd was born in 2009 and started selling to stores towards the end of 2010.
Our first brand in Australia was S-Wet and later we developed Nu for our mid-high range products. Nu Sensuelle was created a couple of years ago because we felt that the Adult Toy Market was missing quality rechargeable products at a price point that was affordable for everyone.
Our aim was to always create products that had additional features to toys that were already out on the market, without having to inflate our prices for these special features. Our products allow everyone to introduce quality toys into their life.
The name Nu Sensuelle was chosen because ‘Nu’ means naked and ‘Sensuelle’ means Sensual in French, which is sexy without being over the top, which is what our company is about.
When asked what the processes behind the design are Thao responded:
“I work with engineers at our factories to come up with the internals. The process takes months from the initial idea, internal and external designs and finally materials and packaging. A handmade prototype is created, which we test and re-design if we are not happy with the result.
The process is then repeated until we have a product that is ready for the market. I am very hands-on from the first idea to the final production of our toys, probably because I am a bit of a perfectionist (read: control freak) and like to have a handle on everything.
There is just no point in creating another rechargeable toy that has the same design as another product. So we have chosen to come up with our own designs and work with our factory engineers rather than using existing factory designs, which gives all of our products their own unique features.
For instance, we wanted to be the best in the world so we created a rechargeable bullet (The Point) with such power and functions that no other products could compare. We ended up winning an award for that design.”
2014 was a watershed year for Nu Sensuelle, with the incredibly powerful Point winning the StorErotica Award for “Hot Product of the Year” and the Impulse winning the X-Biz Award for “Toy of the Year (Powered), both awarded in the United States. This was followed up in 2015 with 3 category nominations for “Sex Toy of the Year”, “Sex Toy Company of the Year” and “Boutique Pleasure Product of the Year”
Ask Thao about the future of the Nu Sensuelle Brand and she replies:
We time our new product launches to coincide with major Adult Industry shows. So always have products in the works 6 months in advance of the shows.
To be honest, we are both artists so our ideas come sporadically, sometimes in the middle of the night, while driving, reading or running. We keep them in the back of our minds until we feel we can turn it into an actual beautiful product.
We have had discussions about creating a different type of massager and incognito products, and a brand new rabbit vibrator is currently in production launching in the next couple of months.
Since the creation of the Nu Sensuelle brand in 2010 there have been hundreds of thousands of items exported directly into the US, Europe, China and New Zealand. Truly a success story from the most unlikely beginnings, where Nu Sensuelle will go from here is anyone’s guess, but for sure the sky is the limit.