Just four people showed up last week to Reyes' Saturday afternoon get-together at an undisclosed valley location, but she still reaped $700 in sales. Reyes is booked through November and starting to pay for that boat.

Brian Wallace / Juneau Empire

"Times are changing, and sex toys are OK," she said. "I'd much rather help women stay with their partners and keep it exciting, than have her or him stray."

Thanks to television shows such as "Sex In The City" and increasingly liberal sexual attitudes throughout the United States, sex toys are no longer relegated to closets, dungeons and back rooms.

In Juneau, there are at least three women (with three different wholesale suppliers) who act as in-home distributors for bachelorette parties, divorce parties and girls' nights out. That's in addition to Xandi's Treasure Chest, Juneau's lone sex toy emporium.

Brian Wallace / Juneau Empire   Massage oil candles: Light these candles up and not only do they smell great, the wax doubles as body massage lotion.

Pleasure parties are a billion dollar industry. U.S. consumers spend at least $1.2 billion annually on sex toys, according to mypleasure.com, an adult-toy shopping site. Forty percent of Americans have tried a sex toy, the site said, and 10 percent have purchased one in the last year. The sale of toys has not dramatically increased, but pleasure parties and hundreds of sites on the Internet have made them more readily available.

Reyes has worked for Slumber Parties for two months. Her "Slumbermom," the woman who trained her, lives in Salt Lake City. That woman's Slumbermom, Reyes' "Slumbergrandma," is the company's highest-selling rep in the United States and earns $180,000 a year.

Brian Wallace / Juneau Empire   X-Scream: One of Slumber Parties' best sellers. The stuff looks and smells like cake icing. Think edible, flavored and tingly on the naughty bits.

"People get married and have kids, and when your kids are raised and they go off into college or the military, you're stuck with each other," she said. "This is a definite help for marriages. If you can keep the spark alive and have that passion, the children will see that passion, they'll see a happy mom and dad, and they'll want to make their marriages work."

"It's about love and romance, and I'm all for that," Reyes said. "The one thing that I tell women is 'You're not replacing your husband or your partner. You're enhancing the relationship.' "

Juneau's distributors average three to four parties a month.

No matter the company, most pleasure parties have a similar formula. They're usually small groups, 5 to 10 women, no men. Everyone must be 18 or older. No babies are allowed. The parties start with games, proceed into lingerie and continue into sex toys. The floor is open for questions and answers. The distributors have been trained and continue to learn through Web forums and teleconferencing.

Brian Wallace / Juneau Empire   Coochy (Shave Gel): Keri Reyes' biggest seller in Juneau isnÕt even a sex toy. It's this conditioning shave gel that promises a rash-free shave for both sexes. We're not quite sure thatÕs why it sells so well, but maybe itÕs not just the ladies who are using this.

"It's the hot new way to have a girls' night out," Reyes said. "Girls always want to go out with their friends. This way you don't have to go to a bar. You can just stay home and entertain and learn and laugh."

Some women have bought their first sex toy from Reyes. Her most popular item is the "Butterfly," a $120 rotating, light-up vibrator defined by its slogan: "30 seconds or less." The "Flipper," the "G-Wiz," a shaving cream known as "Coochy," a three-part candle/massage oil/massage cream and a variety of lubricants are also sought after.

"It's not dirty. It's not vulgar. It's not nasty," Reyes said. "The total philosophy of Slumber Parties is to enhance, educate and empower women to feel OK about themselves. You need to relax and you need to be comfortable in your own skin. If mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy."

April was nervous on the way to Reyes' party, but her nerves soon vanished.

"It's done very tastefully," she said. "You walk in here, and it's nice. The atmosphere is nice. Things are brought out very slowly. You don't know what you're going to walk into, walking into one of those stores downtown."

Xandi's Treasure Chest, at 209 Seward St., is Juneau's lone sex toy store. Owner Xandi Sanchez hosts pleasure parties periodically but doesn't have time to train vendors. Reyes worked three or four parties for Sanchez before starting her business with Slumber Parties.

Lubricant: Going into a wild sexual encounter without enough lube is like riding in a car without a seat belt, eventually someone is going to end up with a lot of bruises. Check the labels. If your partner is allergic to silicone there are plenty of water-based products.

Sanchez opens her store for private shopping if customers want to schedule a time.

"I don't feel like we are in competition either," Sanchez said. "What these ladies offer is wonderful, and I have a lot of respect for them. I don't feel that the parties or the Internet cuts into my business. I think there is plenty to go around."

Brainard started Guilty Pleasures Lingerie & Novelties in Juneau, consulting through Edible Ecstasy, when her husband was transferred to town three years ago from Point Reyes, Calif.

She'd been to a handful of parties in California and was looking for a job in which she wouldn't have to work outside her home. A fellow military wife booked Brainard's first party, and Guilty Pleasures began to take off through word of mouth. Brainard, a former hotel manager, carries more than 4,000 toys, lotions and novelties and gets orders on her Web site from as far away as Prince of Wales Island.

Brainard sells mostly sex toys and, like other vendors, has had problems advertising within some people's perceptions of legal decency.

She starts her party with a variety of games - one called "Dick, Tac, Toe" and another involving clay -Êto lighten the mood and help the ladies relax. She has handouts on oral sex technique, g-spot tips and Kegel exercises for pelvic muscles.

Brian Wallace / Juneau Empire   Pheromone-laced perfume: The secret is out. ItÕs not the skimpy clothes or the sculpted body that does the trick, it's this rub-on Spanish fly. No word on how powerful these things are but there's no guarantee label.

Holmes started Undercover Alaska - now Undercover Wear - three years ago as a home side-business to her job as a transcriptionist. At first, she was reluctant to sell anything but lingerie.

"That's totally out the window now," Holmes said. "Now I just love it. I've met many close friends. I've made deliveries to people in the street."

Holmes was overwhelmed when she started. Her business exploded with word-of-mouth advertising, and some weekends she was hosting two parties a day, back-to-back-to-back on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. She soon had six girls working for her, including one in Ketchikan. She's had others in Fairbanks, Palmer and Wrangell.

"It's really my hobby," Holmes said. "I'm here to answer questions. I want everybody to be happy. I don't make a lot of money, and I tend to put it right back into the product. It's a really bad habit that my husband hates, but it's fun."

The demand died down, and Holmes now averages about four parties a month. She concentrates on pajamas and lingerie but also sells sex toys. July, the start of wedding season, and January, when the new catalogs come out, are her most popular months. She's manned a table during the home distributor shows at Mendenhall Mall, helped out during strip shows at Marlintini's Lounge and sold regularly at Henry's Food & Spirits. Her recent appearance at a Centennial Hall bridal show won her clients in Skagway, Haines and Angoon. Most of her customers are in the 30- to 45-year-old range.

"The people that come to me are new to this," Holmes said. "They got into something 20 years ago with the right person, and it's 10 or 20 years later, and they're in a rut. They need something to do differently, whether it's buying little silk rose petals or buying a new toy. I've had some really surprising people come to me, and they say, 'Yeah, I have sex, what's the big deal?'"

Holmes also occasionally hosts "couple parties" for husbands and wives.

"About midway through the party nobody pays any attention to me, and I start handing out things and stop talking," Holmes said. "They're too busy laughing, or they have wine out."