Luxury Condoms Go for $56 a Box to 'Edgy, Hip, Rich' Types Who Buy Luxury Condoms

Imagine you had an alternate reality in which everything was "luxury." You'd drive a luxury car instead of taking an average to shitty non-luxury subway, live in a luxury apartment, wear luxury clothes, eat in luxury restaurants, be named whatever your name is but with "luxury" in front, and so on. Everything luxury! Luxury everything. Your condoms, in that case, should also be luxury, and/or luxurious. Or both! Fortunately, there are strides being made in the luxury condom market. They are called Naked condoms, and they are "one of the most upscale brands in the growing business of luxury prophylactics." This means you will pay $56 for a box of 12, compared to $12 for a pack of 12 Trojans.

The New York Post does the annual math on this for us:

Using data from a Kinsey Institute study that estimates that 18- to 29-year-olds have sex on average 112 times per year, that means it would cost $520 to protect yourself with Naked condoms, as opposed to roughly $112 for the same number of Trojans.

This brings up a few questions: Are Naked condoms actually better? Or are they just more "statusy"? Naked CEO Jud Ireland says the company wants to target "'edgy, hip, and rich" men and women," i.e., the types who meet for cocktails at Soho House (where, handily, Naked condoms are sold). And his sister told the Post that she'd rather sleep with a guy who had a Naked condom because "the guy looks better." Apparently there are actual aspects of the product as well, or so they say: thinner, softer latex, better lube, an easy-tear wrapper, a "pleasure-fit" design, even "elegant packaging." But is that enough to convince anyone to pay five times the going rate for condoms?

Truth be told, the kind of condom a person has does kind of matter. For example, an Ed Hardy condom would inspire us to flee immediately, while a regular Trojan would go without much notice other than the fact that it is there -- which is good, because nobody wants a luxury baby. Other than that, do you really want to spend much time noticing the condom in the first place?

Lap of luxury: $56 for a box of condoms? [NYP]