Buying onaholes and sex toys from Amazon, and especially Amazon Japan.
Amazon – The worldwide titan of online shopping. I like them. They’re convenient, price-competitive, and they often offer items that you may not be able to purchase in your own country. I use them to buy many things. Heck, I even have an Amazon Prime account.
Using Amazon for buying sex toys, however? Not for me! Allow me to explain why-
Packaging
I recently purchased a few sex toys from Amazon, Japan. Look at this fucking packaging. It’s abysmal. There’s no paper, and everything is just squeezed in together with a few bubble bags. Comparing this to some of the onahole specialists I’ve bought from in the past, it’s pitiful. The onahole suppliers, at least, make an attempt to protect your items within a box with paper, bubble wrap etc.
Price, Taxes/Custom Charges & Shipping
Some of the items on Amazon Japan are cheaper, but most are in a similar price range, and others are even more expensive than what some of the Japanese sex toy specialists sell them for.
A significant negative though is that you have no choice but to pay the expensive import taxes on every sex toy purchase. While some of the sex toy specialists in Japan will work with prices and invoice totals to try and negate these costs, Amazon asks for the full tax amount upfront, which bumps up your total a fair bit.
Amazon charges you the price for the items you buy, plus shipping costs and on top of that, they ask you to pre-pay the full customs and tax charges that apply in your country. So there isn’t even the slightest chance of getting away with less or even no extra charges for tax.
As for International Shipping, you don’t have many options with Amazon. They call it stuff like Amazon Worldwide Express, but you never really know what courier will actually bring your Package.
Also, delivery prices are pretty high. Specialised retailers in Japan often offer various options such as Airmail, SAL Airmail or even Ferry Shipping which takes longer but saves you tons of money.
Discretion & Customer Service
Amazon offers no package removal service. Good luck explaining what sex toys you purchased, and all the lewd images, if your box ever gets stopped at customs. It is impossible to have any specific requests or even questions regarding your order, which is probably due to the size of Amazon, being the biggest online retailer on the planet.
And requesting to have different item names listed on the invoice for discretion? Forget it! If you ordered ‘My First Soft Dildo’, then it’s going to say My First Soft Dildo on the invoice.
Buying sex toys from Japan also requires trust in a shop (at least for me), and I need to feel that they take care of my order and any special requests. I just don’t see this at Amazon much. Even if, in some cases, I can perhaps save a few Dollars, Euros or whatever, I do not feel that it’s worth the stress and worry. Basically, the negatives outweigh the positives, in my opinion. I’ll stick to my preferred suppliers in Japan, thanks.
Just a quick side note about buying sex toys from Amazon, if you do decide to. Some people have reported receiving counterfeits of Japanese toys (often from China), even on amazon Japan. They use stolen images from the Japanese makers and put them on the sales pages on Amazon and trick people into buying these fake items. Often these products are of low-quality and are made in factories that also produce god-knows-what. It’s a risk buying from a lesser-known seller on Amazon, so if you do decide to purchase there, stick to the big names or direct from the makers.
