Readers’ Lives Tony Levine Big Teaze Toys
What was your childhood ambition? To be a fighter pilot, a submarine captain and a fire truck.
What ambitions do you still have? To go sky-diving again; find the phone number I lost for those triplets in Australia; build a company staffed by the most talented, great people I can find so we can continue to bring great products to our customers; and build a better automated kitty litter box.
What led you to create the original I Rub My Duckie? I had wanted to get into the adult industry designing products since I left college. I knew I could create better products than what was on the market, but that wasn’t going to be enough, I had to do something different. It seemed, at the time, that sex toys were all so ‘hardcore’ and I didn’t see why they had to be. I knew that making my first toy fun and playful would open a lot of doors.
The man behind the multi-million selling I Rub My Duckie lets us poke our noses into his business and it’s no surprise to discover that he is full of surprises...
The Duckie came about because I had an ex- girlfriend who used to take very long baths and she had a rubber duckie. One day I kidnapped her duckie and went into my garage and built a vibrator into it and then left it for her to find on her own. That night, when she got out of her bath (an hour later than normal) with a big smile on her face, I knew I had my first customer and a great idea.
When Duckie was launched, did you honestly still expect to be selling it ten years later? I did. Nobody else did.
Approximately how many Duckies have been sold over the years? Not that much... but millions.
What do you think is the key to its evergreen appeal?
Innocence and playfulness never go out of style. Our products make people smile before they even touch them.
Where can UK retailers buy Big Teaze Toys? We have a handful of distributors that service the whole of Europe. For referrals, retailers can always contact
sales@bigteazetoys.com
What are you working on now, and what have you got planned for the near future? I’ve been busy VerSpanken.
Is being ‘The Duckie Man’ a winner with the chicks? That’s Duck Man to you. And yes... yes it is. “It’s good to be the Duck Man.”
Do you live in a mansion shaped like a Duckie, with thousands of the little Duckies living wild in your swimming pool? Yes. Hef is my pool boy. (See answer to previous question about being Duck Man.)
How do you like to relax when you’re not working? Have you ever seen me not working? But I do enjoy a nice bowl of Jell-O...
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If you had a time machine and you could spend a day visiting any period in history, where would you go? I’d travel with my grandmother on the SS Lithuania from Russia when she immigrated to the US. Oh... wait... that wouldn’t be fun, she only spoke Russian and she wouldn’t know who I was.
What was your favorite subject at school? Debate, biology, history, photography, robotics... it was all over the place, just like now. My interests are still pretty broad.
What makes you laugh? Rolling naked in a pile of kittens.
Which subject do you know more about than anyone else? Ducking.
If we gave you £1,000 to spend today, what would you do with it? I would buy myself three chocolate cupcakes from Sprinkles and then donate the rest to Heifer International
www.heifer.org and buy 100 flocks of ducks to add to the ducks I’ve already donated to help support families in need around the globe.
What do you think is your best attribute? I make vibrators; I don’t need a ‘best attribute’.
What three words would your friends use to describe you? Stubborn, intelligent, compassionate, funny and bad at counting.
What’s the best thing that has happened to you in the last 12 months? Recently in Hong Kong I met the owner of a French restaurant at a bar. Who, when he found out what I made for a living, insisted on buying my beers and treating me like a celebrity. It turns out that when he was in university in France studying marketing one of the class projects was to study the success of I Rub My Duckie.
What’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to you? It wasn’t so much something someone said, but what they did. I had done something nice for someone and they started to cry with joy. It was better than any words they could have said.
Tell us something about yourself that would surprise us? I used to be a private investigator and I was also a black belt in Shotokan.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever been given? “Follow your heart and find your voice and keep out of jail.” I think the person who told me that was a 6’8” black guy who had just gotten out of prison.
And what advice would you pass on to anyone thinking of making a career in the adult industry? Start young and have a back-up plan.
Erotic Trade Only June 2012
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