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There's also the important issue of basic body mechanics. Manufacturers say that their sales are driven in part by boomers and the advent of erectile dysfunction drugs. "Men started taking Viagra, and now women of a certain age group need our products," says Trigg's Winning.

Lubricants are also popular among women who are nursing, postpartum, or have had chemotherapy—all conditions that can make intercourse painful. According to Leiblum, about 15-18 percent of women in all age groups suffer from this problem, and most women will encounter this issue sometime in their lives.

Ann, a 40-year-old mother of two from Phoenix, Ariz. (who declined to give her full name), says drugstore-purchased lubricants rescued her sex life after her first child was born. "I'm not sure if my second child would exist if it were not for this stuff," she says, only half joking.

Not everyone is happy about this quiet sexual revolution. In 2005, when Church & Dwight Co. Inc., manufacturer of Trojan condoms, introduced Elexa, a condom marketed to women with a vibrating ring. They rolled it out across the country except in a handful of states (Alabama, Georgia, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas and Virginia) where obscenity laws prevented its sale in retail stores. The Family Research Council, a conservative policy group, denounced the products as "vulgar" and pointed out that there aren't age restrictions on the purchase of the products, so teens could buy them.

In Alabama the laws take the ban one step further. All stores, including specialty stores, are barred from selling vibrators because of a 1998 law prohibiting distribution of devices that provide genital stimulation. Breaking the law is an offense that can bring up to a year in jail and a $10,000 fine. It's a penalty that rivals that for illegal gun ownership in some states.

Though for the moment the ban is not being enforced, Alabama's sex-shop owners are not standing passively by. Adult store owner Sherri Williams has sued on the grounds that the ban is unconstitutional. Her motto: "They are going to have to pry this vibrator from my cold, dead hand." So far it's been a losing battle. Last year the Supreme Court declined to hear the case pending further information. The decision leaves like-minded women in Alabama to do their vibrator shopping online or out of state, for now.