Think of them as Tupperware parties with a twist.

The names vary - Passion Parties, Brown Bag Party, Pure Romance - but they're selling the same thing, romance-enhancement products for people who prefer to keep their preferences private.

Home pleasure parties have been around for more than 30 years. But they're still big business for consumers, product distributors and party consultants. In 2006, for example, the Passion Parties company, based in Las Vegas and Canada, claimed sales of more than $47 million.

The premise is simple, like any home sales party: Invite a few folks, offer some snacks and pull out the products and order forms. You might even play a game for a door prize.

In this case, however, you're ordering bedroom accessories instead of bowls, and your order will be taken in a separate room to ensure discretion. You must be at least 18 to attend, and all sales are final.

Home pleasure-party companies, their products and prices are similar, said Sherrie Brown of Chesterfield. Brown has been a romance consultant for the North Carolina-based Temptations Parties for 2½ years.

After attending and enjoying a couple of parties, she said, "I decided if I can spend money on it, I might as well be a consultant."

By day, the 33-year-old Brown is an insurance agent in Richmond. She runs about three Temptations Parties a month - usually for women and occasionally for couples - taking home 50 percent of the party profits.

Adult novelties and toys from Temptations Parties cost from $10 to $175. Typically, the parties bring in between $400 and $500. Last October, Brown hit the big time with a $1,000 party - not bad for a couple of hours of work.

"I went with Temptations because if you want to sell, you sell. If you don't, you don't," Brown said. "Some companies require a quota."

Although home pleasure parties aren't new, they are taking advantage of new sales techniques and strategies, including an Internet presence, said Craig H. Kinsley, a professor in University of Richmond's psychology department.

"This sort of activity indicates there's clearly an interest in making what's rather routine more stimulating," he said.

There's a phenomenon called habituation, he said, where the mundane becomes boring after awhile. That could help explain why so many people seek to enhance their romance.

Also, he said, because women tend to be less promiscuous, they might seek variety not in multiple partners but in how they interact with their long-term partners.

"They're having their cake and eating it, too," he said.

Buying romance-enhancement products - once known as marital aids - represents a sort of compromise while maintaining monogamy, Kinsley said.

Martha Allison sees the logic.

"I come from a line of feminists," she said. "You love your husband or partner for a very good reason, and [home pleasure parties] allow women to express themselves in ways that are otherwise taboo. Especially in Richmond."

Allison is putting herself through graduate school with the money she makes as a romance-enhancement consultant with Slumber Parties by Martha. "It's a fun, exciting way to spend evenings," she said. "And I get to meet awesome women."

Allison, 23, had her spiel down pat at a recent party at Wack Salon in the Fan District. Handing out order forms to 10 area women - students, professionals and homemakers ages 22 to 40 - she asked for contact information. "That's so I'll know how to contact you when that big vibrating box comes," she said.

Registering the slightly panicked looks on a few participants' faces, she laughed. "No, no, everything is discreetly packaged. . . . It's all confidential," she said.

As UR professor Kinsley said, "What happens behind closed doors is nobody's business."

Explaining the anatomical euphemisms she uses in describing some of the products, Allison got the party started by introducing a few of the more nonthreatening items: shaving creams, massage candles and a Plexiglas massager.

Just about everything in the romance-enhancement department seems to come with a particular fragrance or taste. Sensations, a "sugar-free and diabetic-friendly" edible massage lotion ($11), is available in butterscotch, spearmint, Creamsicle, strawberry margarita, cinnamon, sour apple and pink lemonade.

When Allison brought out a kitty whip and mask ($14), the room erupted in giggles. "It would make a good Halloween costume," said Sophie Lannien of Midlothian. Daniella Tsamouras of Richmond wondered aloud if a man was supplied along with the product.

"How many products have you tried yourself?" asked Christina D'Angelo of Richmond by way of New York.

"I have a secret stash," Allison said. The Baton Rouge, La.-based Slumber Parties catalog features a couple of hundred items, she said, along with lingerie.

As the hors d'oeuvres began to disappear, Allison's mostly euphemistic naughty talk loosened things up. A frank discussion about sex and pheromones was in progress when she called intermission. "Next I'll bring out the heavy artillery," she said.

Ten minutes later, emptying a large red suitcase with a James Madison University sticker on it, Allison had topped a nearby table with what looked like a collection of shiny, plastic erector sets. Only these erector sets were hot pink and purple, battery-operated and had names such as Decade Indulgence 3, The Butterfly and Double Your Pleasure Deluxe.

Glimpsing one large item that resembled a lava lamp, D'Angelo winced. "I'm scared of that," she said with a laugh. That evening, as part of a package deal, Endless Pleasure was available for $125.

Scary products notwithstanding, Allison clears $200 to $750 per party at two to three parties a month. "Some people do 10 or 12 a month," she said. "My sponsor brought in something like $82,000 last year, and one woman made $120,000."

She isn't worried that interest in these items will wane because of the economy. "Sex is innate," she said. "I feel it's something people will always be fascinated with and spend money on."

Once Allison led a retirement party for a 63-year-old woman and four of her friends. The party was a big seller. "One woman said, 'Where have you been the last 40 years?'" Allison said.

Ronda Harvey, who works for Passion Parties in Moline, Ill., thought home pleasure parties were a joke when she first heard of them several years ago. Then she attended one.

"It was very clean, classy and fun. . . . I told my husband I was sold," she said.

Now she's an executive director for the company, which means recruiting team members, accruing incentive awards and attending annual conventions. "We have million-dollar women on our team," Harvey said. "It's definitely a moneymaker."

New companies are popping up all the time, she said. And while women consultants far outnumber men, men are getting into it, too.

Of course, not everyone is going to be comfortable with the concept, no matter how private or confidential. While her parents in North Carolina support her endeavors, Allison said, "If you ask my dad, he says I sell candles."