Portugal's Renova, one of Europe's biggest producers of household paper products, has put a diamond-encrusted toilet paper holder on sale for 100,000 euros (132,000 US dollars), the company said Friday.
The one-of-a-kind gold-plated box was made entirely by hand by traditional jewellers in Lisbon who encrusted its logo plate with 148 diamonds to mark the worldwide sale of one million rolls of the firm's novelty black toilet paper.
The box weighs almost one kilogram (4.4 pounds) and it "gives toilet paper a lofty status it never enjoyed before," the company said in a statement.
Whoever buys the luxury toilet paper holder will receive one roll of Renova's black toilet paper per day for their rest of their lives.
"This is a commemorative item to mark a unique product," the company's international brand manager, Jose Manuel Pinheiro, told AFP on Friday.
The box went on display to the public under the watchful gaze of a bodyguard last week during Lisbon Fashion Week when Portugal's top designers showcase their latest collections.
Renova introduced its line of black toilet paper in upscale stores across Europe in 2005 in what it said was a world first. Demand far exceeded expectations, prompting the firm to launch red toilet paper line a year later.
The company, based in Torres Novas located some 120 kilometres (75 miles) northeast of Lisbon, has a history of introducing novelty household products. Among the items it has made in the past is toilet paper with moisturising lotion and multi-coloured paper towels.
Renova posted sales of roughly 120 million euros in 2005, the last year for which figures are available, roughly half of it outside of Portugal.
