Upside-down pineapple explained: TikTok exposes 2022’s hot sex trend for swingers
You’ll never look at this fruit the same way again.
TikTokers are exposing the juicy underground symbol that indicates couples are eager for erotic experimentation — and it appears completely innocuous without insider info.
Here’s the scoop: Randy travelers are pinning posters of upside-down pineapples to their hotel and cruise ship cabin doors to let fellow vacationers know they’re up for swinging. Some are even plopping out welcome mats!
The hashtag #UpsideDownPineapple has clocked a whopping 138 million views on TikTok as of Wednesday, with some clips claiming swingers even leave an actual pineapple upturned out front of their Airbnb accommodation to indicate that they enjoy partner swapping.
“People’s sex drives tend to go off the charts during vacations,” John Kamau, CEO of the hook-up app Cruise Ship Mingle, told The Post, saying he’s shocked by the number of swinging couples signing up for his, uh, pineapple-friendly service.
But while some lusty vacationers are brazen with their pineapple displays, other swingers are more subtle, putting pineapple pins and earrings on their clothing to signify their status.
“Tell me you’re a swinger without telling me you’re a swinger,” one experimental TikTokker wrote beneath a viral video showing her turning her pineapple earring upside down.
It’s unclear how the upturned fruit came to signify swinging. However, slang watchdogs noticed the popularity of the symbol “rising massively” among the partner swapping community in the 1990s, Men’s Health reported this week.
While there have long been other covert ways to identify swingers — such as pampas grass and a person wearing a black ring on their right hand — upside-down pineapples have now become the symbol du jour thanks to TikTok.
As the “sex party” summer of 2022 looms, the viral video platform has become a haven for sharing stories and information about unconventional kinks, with the hashtag #swingtok racking up a staggering 1.7 billion views.
The upside-down pineapple frequently features in the #swingtok videos — further evidence of the growing popularity of the symbol.
According to the popular travel tips website Cruise Mummy, upside-down pineapples are often seen on the cabin doors of cruise ships.
“If you see pineapple on a cruise ship door it means that the people in the cabin are up for meeting other couples for ‘adult fun,’ ” an anonymous tipster on the site wrote.
Cruise ships have long been a place for sexual experimentation, according to experts, with some intrepid travelers emboldened by the fact that they’re far from home and not on dry land.
“Most people on a cruise are total strangers … they are willing to push the envelop and do what they otherwise won’t do in their neck of the woods,” Cruise Ship Mingle’s Kamau told The Post.
Kamau added that he has been on more than a dozen cruises in the past four years and has noticed a significant uptick in the number of upside-down pineapples stuck on cabin doors.
Some cruises have even tapped into the trend, with Cruise Mummy reporting that P&O Cruises’ new ship Iona offers a drink that comes in a cup shaped like an upside-down pineapple.
However, it’s not just cruise ships that have become hot spots for swingers.
Sexual wellness retreats encouraging erotic experimentation are booming across the globe. Some luxury resorts have even started offering services such as “orgy workshops,” according to Vice.
“Sex retreats are now becoming much more sophisticated in the sense that they’re not necessarily sex dens — they’re actually very nice resorts,” sex and relationships coach Colin Richards told the outlet.
“Sure, they might have a little dungeon in the corner, but if you’re sitting by the pool, it might feel like any other resort,” he added. “Except for perhaps a sign or two instructing folks not to engage in penetrative sex in the water.”
Wellness tourism in general — which includes sexy spa retreats and yoga workshops — is set to generate a whopping $817 billion this year, according to a report from the Global Wellness Institute.
And the field is only set to grow, with the business projected to bring in $1.3 trillion in 2025.
Sexual wellness will be a key component of the field, with sex therapist Marissa Nelson saying holidays will only get hotter as TikTok helps break down taboos.
“All our travel data says that folks are moving away from stereotypical, luxurious vacations, and instead, are interested in having experiences,” she told Vice.
It all indicates that upside-down pineapples will only become more popular in the months and years ahead, meaning you’re likely to spot the saucy symbol sometime during your next vacation.
