A secret shop hidden in an Upper East Side commercial building has become a mecca for lonely hearts seeking to meet their new synthetic sex partner.
Customers who pay a $50 deposit can walk in and find a menagerie of 12 life-size dolls that cost up to $3,000 apiece — each one, 75 pounds of heavy silicone or more skin-like materials called thermoplastic elastomer — lounging on sofas and chairs in their best lingerie.
The strange showroom, and its companion website DollsYouCanTouch.com, is the brainchild of “Benji,” a 46-year-old entrepreneur who spoke to The Post on condition of anonymity.
He’s been leading tactile tours at his mysterious shop — the location of which he reveals only to the customers he has vetted — since July. He gave The Post a peek this week.
Customers sign a nondisclosure agreement barring them from spilling the tea on the love dolls’ location, and must adhere to a golden rule: “Pants stay on!” Benji said.
He got into sex dolls in 2021, after breaking up with his girlfriend and deciding dolls filled his needs better than dating apps, porn sites and pricey escorts.
“My thing was to go for prostitutes . . . but prostitutes were getting a little bit expensive,” he confessed.
His first artificial girlfriend was Gabby, a dark skinned brunette 2021 JY doll with N-cups that cost $1,200.
He ultimately gave her up though.
“The breasts were huge and it was really difficult to maneuver her around. . . . I’m in a studio apartment, and it takes up some space,” he told The Post. “And family members started visiting me and staying here.”
So the natural-born salesman, who also hocks candles and furniture, began selling the dolls.
Inside the neon-lit showroom, three dolls sat on old couches, legs spread akimbo.
One of them featured pointy, elfen ears, while another had an anthropomorphic cat’s face.
The average full-size doll in his shop stands nearly 5 feet and comes in every hair and skin color — even blue and green skin.
One of the dolls had a choker necklace that read “WHORE” in faux diamonds.
Some come with vibrating body parts. One has freckles, and, with the click of a switch, can warm up to 98 degrees. Another model has an articulating tongue. They are so realistic that the soles of one doll’s feet features faint calluses.
Most are fitted with lighter foam cores, to reduce weight, and come from China.
Benji considers Gotham the perfect setting for his kinky commercial venture.
“There’s no other showroom that exists,” he noted. “And if there is a showroom that has these dolls or a sex novelty store — they have it behind glass and you can’t touch them.”
At his shop, “I’m there for an hour, just one-on-one, explaining . . . every single doll while they’re probing, they’re touching, they’re squeezing boobs, they’re sticking fingers in orifices.
“It’s a workout for both of us, because they’re like . . . ‘What does this all look like with that wig on? . . . Can you pose her in this position?”
Deep-pocketed clients range from tech bros in their mid-20s and finance guys, to semi-retired 70-year-olds stuck in sexless lives.
“This is the best way to do it, without having the temptation of cheating with . . . organic women,” he said.
Many don’t stop at one doll, with most owning more than five, Benji said.
COVID loneliness led to a surge in the sex-doll business, but nowadays Benji says he makes $2,000 on a good day. “We’re selling one to three dolls a day,” he said.
A black doll is a best-seller, he said, but “some guys want their doll to be green and look like an alien with three boobs. And we have one.”
He chafes at customers who ask about rentals. We’re not a “doll brothel,” he sniffs.
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