There wasn’t a Better Sex Homemade Sex Toy Design competition when Nortel laid off Bruce and Melody Murison.

The Murison’s believed one door closing meant another must be opening. A natural inventor, Bruce focused efforts on joining a growth business by creating sex toys. The Murison’s wanted to create something new, something the adult toy market had never seen. Their unique idea: create a toy designed for use while making love. They mortgaged their house to fund an entrepreneurial dream and the We-Vibe vibrator ( www.bettersex.com/Sex_Toys/we-vibe-sex-toy.html ) was born.

“We see the same trend,” said Martin Smith a BetterSex.com Marketing Director. “Adult toys is a creative and growing field innovating on scale with video games,” stated Smith. Better Sex awarded its Better Sex Toy of the Year medal to the Murison’s creation last year. The Sinclair Institute is searching for the next great adult toy engineer / designer.

“We want to find and help as many cool designers as possible,” Director Smith said. The company created the adult toy design contest to help discover the next We-Vibe. “We know there are creative homemade toys out there and one of them could be worth $100,000. Wish I had had that kind of help,” joked Mr. Smith.

Mr. Smith knows a cool toy when he sees it. Smith, a popular marketing blogger and creator of PoetySlam, Dada Box and The Alien Questionnaire, founded the specialty gift company Found Objects before joining the Sinclair Institute to manage its web properties. “I know creating and launching new products is one of the hardest things you will ever do. We hope to help the next adult toy designer so they don’t have to mortgage their house,” Smith shared.

Why are adult toys selling so well in the worst recession since the great depression? Connection businesses are booming. Dating site E-Harmony reported a 20% increase in registrations earlier in the year. Forbes.com writer Christopher Varmus noted the same tend in his December Sex and Recession article. Is the “adult” industry experiencing a perfect storm? “Interesting question,” Mr. Smith said looking skyward, “Match growing sexual health acceptance with a giant Oprah Effect created by Hollywood, popular press and social networks and adult toy acceptance and sales are growing very fast.”

The contest takes steps to protect contestant’s intellectual property. “We leave copyright with the creator as we do with our Fiction Contest,” Mr. Smith explained, “we are granted a limited release to anonymously publish designs for a community vote. Rights to the design only transfer when we have a winner and if they sign a licensing deal.” Full details for the Better Sex Homemade Adult Toy Design Contest may be found at BetterSex.com.