Has it always been common for sex toy companies to blatantly steal designs from other sex toy companies, or is it just starting to happen a lot? Because I feel like I’ve seen crap like this everywhere lately.
The Zolo line of toys caught my eye because it’s all products for men, and there just aren’t that many good toys for boys out there. There’s Tenga and Fleshlight, and there are other companies that dabble in making male masturbators, but the field is pretty limited compared to what’s available for women.
Hoping for something new and innovative, I was kinda pissed when it turned out that Zolo is just a blatant rip-off of Tenga.
The toy I scored for my boyfriend is the Corner Pocket, a single-use masturbator made of a stretchy material. Sound familiar? That’s because it’s a bad knock-off of Tenga Eggs.
My boyfriend wholeheartedly recommends the original Tenga product over this sad Zolo copy, for the following reasons:
1. The Zolo is made of a more rubbery-feeling material that seems cheaper and grosser.
2. The packet of lube that comes with the Zolo lists a whole whack of nasty ingredients, like glycerin, propylene glycol, and parabens. Granted, this lube isn’t intended to go into a vagina, so these pussy-unfriendly chemicals aren’t a huge deal – but Zolo’s lube is still significantly stickier and cheaper-feeling than the lube that comes with Tenga products. My boyfriend was so disgusted by the lubey residue left on him after using the toy that he had to immediately go rinse himself off.
3. The texture inside the Zolo toy isn’t nearly as raised and detectable as the Tenga textures. In fact, it’s so shallow that he could barely feel it. He was able to reach orgasm using the Zolo, but he didn’t find it to be a pleasant experience at all, and said he would’ve preferred to just use his hand.
4. Zolo Pocket Pool toys are $2 more expensive than Tenga Eggs, which feels kind of like paying $500 for a cheap made-in-China derivative of a $400 designer handbag, y’know?
In summary: Tenga rules, Zolo drools.