Una Touch - Bend, Oregon, USA
Una Touch makes “smart” high tech vibrators designed by women, engineers and health professionals using a unique interactive touch pad which allows users to design their own erotic experience across 3 locations on the body. Una is proud to empower women of all sizes, ages, physical abilities & orientations to honor diversity, body-positivity, and imagination.
Dr. Kathy Hoyt at Una Touch
Dr. Kathy Hoyt, CEO is a clinical psychologist with double PhDs and 30+ years experience teaching/researching/counseling in psychology with a focus on sexual health and creative thinking. Her passion is to educate and innovate towards inclusive joy for all women.
What is the problem your company trying to solve or the opportunity you are trying to seize? In other words, what is your secret sauce?
A design lag in the industry has left customers with 1960s dated on-off vibrators that stimulate in the wrong places with factory-set patterns that do not allow user imaginative control or adaptation to the user’s physical abilities. The new women’s sexual revolution produced 3 new customers; millennial, senior and disabled women who expect easy to use “smart” devices with creative options, elegant marketing, medical grade and repurposeable materials. Una is unique in 4 ways: you can design your own erotic experience, across 3 stimulation areas, maintaining the vibe no matter how its held or pressure used, and the device remembers your preferences across time getting smarter the longer you own it. Una—creating erotic experiences unique to each woman.
What is the biggest obstacle to growth?
Through self-funding and angel investment we have achieved a MVP but are seeking funding to complete final product design and testing to launch our product. We need some additional engineering staff to do this quickly to launch by January 2021—unfortunately investors and the world kind of stopped around the COVID events. COVID has been an obstacle and a blessing because we are primed to launch during an era of incredible sales growth in the industry.
How has COVID and the economic downturn changed your strategy, if at all?
The economic downturn and COVID has actually been a boon to our industry—the sale of vibrators has increased 40% since February 2020 due to the social isolation of COVID!! We were already planning on manufacturing our product in the U.S. but COVID cemented that plan into place along with the changes in economic agreements with China.
What do you know now that you wish you knew two to five years ago about entrepreneurship?
Wow there is so much. We have learned to keep advocating for women’s sexual health products even when investors squirm at the topic. We have learned how to vet vendors and hire staff to increase successful results. We have operated on a shoe string by self-funding and are in a current learning curve about how to scale and predict financial requirements.