HOPING to put a bit of oomph back into their love lives, the French are turning national stereotypes on their head by seeking help from, of all people, les rosbifs.

In a curious reversal of roles, the new craze in France for chic designer boutiques offering tips to couples on how to spice up their sex life is being fuelled by erotic products from over the Channel.

“We are supposed to be the land of Eros, the country of expert lovers,” said Patrick Pruvot, owner of Passage du Désir, one of several new “love stores” in the centre of Paris.

“As a matter of fact, about a third of the products I sell come from Britain.”

Pruvot, a 40-year-old former advertising executive, is one of a new breed of erotic entrepreneurs catering to what recent surveys have shown is a growing number of French couples complaining of boredom in bed. He is also at the cutting edge of a trend being described as the “democratisation” of sex shops.

“Sex shops are awful places, with a shifty-looking clientele and curtains hanging over the windows,” he said last week in an office cluttered with boxes of sex toys. “No woman would have dared to enter such places.”

As an industry once dominated by pornographers becomes gentrified, warm and friendly love stores have been popping up in some of the most fashionable corners of Paris. Business is so good that Pruvot is well on the way to developing a national chain.

“There is enormous hunger for what we are providing,” he said. “At first my stuffy old bank did not even want to give me a loan to get started. But it forgot its qualms when the money began flowing in.”

Other love-store operators tell the same story. In a trendy district near the Bastille, business is booming for Anna Ciulla at Les Nuits Blanches, where she seats customers on a red velvet sofa to talk about sex.

“I feel as though I’m providing a really useful social service,” she said. “People always leave with a smile on their face.”

She, too, said that she sells many products from Britain. “What Britain has that you don’t find here so much is a good sense of humour,” she explained, holding up a British nurse’s uniform. “A sense of humour in bed is really important.”

Pruvot, for his part, speaks with a missionary’s zeal about promoting the “sustainable development of the relationship”, a quest he embarked on after a messy divorce focused his mind on the dearth of help available for those wanting to perk up flagging relationships.

“This is not just for pleasure,” he added, brandishing one of the pink vibrators scattered over his desk. “It could help to salvage a marriage.”

Most of the toys he sells are designed in Britain but made in China. The gadget that amuses customers most, however, comes not from Britain but from Holland. It is a remote-controlled vibrator, usually “worn” by the woman and controlled by the man. It has a range of eight metres.

“It’s a great way of livening up a dull cocktail party or a dreary lunch with your wife and your mother-in-law,” Pruvot said.

Besides sex toys, the shop sells lingerie, “pheromone candles” and a range of massage oils and aphrodisiacs, as well as pole-dancing kits, edible or luminous body paint and packs of playing cards featuring different sexual positions. Customers can also be put in touch with a professional sexologist.

The response to his venture has reassured Pruvot that he is on the right path. One of his recent customers was a 75-year-old woman who complained that her 79-year-old husband no longer wanted to have sex with her. She bought one of the pink vibrators.

“Not many people can claim to have so many satisfied customers,” Pruvot said.

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