The Three Kinds of BDSM toys.

There are three kinds of BDSM toys in this world:

Serious Toys.
These are made out of genuine full-grain kangaroo leather by one guy named Buck who lives in a cabin in Maine and does all the crafting himself while his sub runs the website and mails out the orders.

Pros: The quality is almost always amazing. You're supporting your own community. Nothing else gives you more party cred.

Cons: It's usually insanely expensive. If you're new, don't have much money, or just looking for some casual bedroom play, choosing and buying toys from this kind of vendor can be intimidating and frankly overkill. Buck's e-commerce may be disorganized or nonexistent to the point where tracking him down in person at a convention is the only way to actually get his stuff.


Pervertibles.
These are sold at Home Depot. They think we're going to tie down packages with that rope or hang potted plants with those eyebolts. Tee hee.

Pros: This is the cheapest way to go. There's lots of room to improvise and experiment and play MacGuyver.

Cons: Can be unsafe if you don't know what you're doing. Not every kind of toy can be replicated with Home Depot materials. The MacGuyvering can be a lot of work and require some knowledge to do effectively.


Vanilla-Kinky Toys.
These are sold in regular sex shops. There's a slutty lady on the box and it's mass-produced in China or Mexico or something.

Pros: Far cheaper than the serious toys. Far less work than the pervertibles. Far easier to shop for than either. If you're not a mega-serious hardcore-BDSM player but just want to screw around in the bedroom, probably perfectly adequate.

Cons: You can lose cred with Master Raven Darkclaw types if they find out you got your sex toys at a *pfft* sex toy shop. The quality can be all over the map, from just as good as Buck's stuff to uselessly flimsy. The slutty box-ladies can really wear on you after a while.


Hm. Now that I've said you can't make everything at Home Depot, that feels like a challenge. I bet that between Home Depot and Michael's Crafts, at least... hm.