March 25, 2025 • 35 mins
For our first ever feedswap, I'm excited to bring you episode 63 of "Narratives of Purpose" - a podcast hosted by a new friend of mine, Claire Murigande, that features global changemakers discussing social impact topics that include, youth empowerment, global health equity, and sustainable food systems. This one is on eradicating period poverty featuring Ira Guha!
Check out Narratives of Purpose wherever you listen to podcasts!
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Episode timestamps
00:26 - Episode introduction
02:32 - Asan's mission and Ira's motivations to create the start-up
06:39 - Asan cup's one-for-one donation and cost-saving model
07:58 - Designing and developing the Asan cup
12:12 - Asan's impact in rural India and beyond
14:28 - Breaking the taboos around periods
17:46 - Asan's partnerships and behavioural change framework
24:45 - Ira's entrepreneurial journey
26:36 - The evolving market for reusable period products
31:34 - How to connect with Ira and learn more about Asan00:26 - Episode introduction
02:32 - Asan's mission and Ira's motivations to create the start-up
06:39 - Asan cup's one-for-one donation and cost-saving model
07:58 - Designing and developing the Asan cup
12:12 - Asan's impact in rural India and beyond
14:28 - Breaking the taboos around periods
17:46 - Asan's partnerships and behavioural change framework
24:45 - Ira's entrepreneurial journey
26:36 - The evolving market for reusable period products
31:34 - How to connect with Ira and learn more about Asan
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome back to the GlobalHealth Pursuit Podcast.
I'm Hetal Bahman and as thetitle for this episode reads today
I'm dropping an episode fromthe Narratives of Purpose Podcast,
an award nominated podcastthat brings you the inspiring stories
of change makers.
A new friend of mine and hostof this amazing podcast, Claire Murigande,
(00:22):
showcases founders of impactdriven companies and initiatives
to a global audience.
Anything from youthempowerment in remote communities
to sustainable food systems ofthe future.
This podcast explores it allthrough the lens of purpose.
Claire is a leader in the lifesciences industry and a passionate
(00:44):
women's health advocate.
In this episode, she sits downwith Ira Guha to discuss what she's
doing to eradicate period poverty.
If you love this episode, makesure to check out other episodes
of the Narratives of Purposepodcast where wherever you get your
podcasts, we'll be back with anew episode of the Global Health
Pursuit Podcast next week.
(01:16):
Hello and welcome to a newepisode of Narratives of Purpose,
a place for conversations withinspiring leaders that is all about
amplifying social impact.
I bring you unique stories ofchange makers, stories of people
who are contributing to make adifference in society.
By showcasing these individual journeys.
I would like to inspire you totake action if you are tuning in
(01:38):
for the first time.
My name is Claire Morigande.
I am your host on this podcast.
In today's episode, I amwelcoming a new guest.
Her name is Ira Guha.
Ira is based in London.
She is the founder of asan, asocial venture with a mission to
eradicate period poverty whichprevents women and girls across the
(01:58):
world from participating inessential daily activities such as
going to school and work.
In our discussion, Ira talksabout how she and her team designed
a very easy to use menstrualcup that can be safely reused for
10 years and thereforeeliminating over 2,500 sanitary pads
(02:20):
or tampons.
Please take a moment to rateand to review our show.
Wherever you listen to yourpodcasts, this will help other listeners
find narratives of purpose andfurther amplify the stories of change
we bring on our show.
For now, let's get into thefascinating conversation with Ira.
(02:47):
Ira, welcome to the podcast.
How are you today?
I am very well.
It's lovely to be here.
Thank you Claire.
It's absolutely a greatpleasure to have you.
And just a bit of backgroundfor our listeners.
A few episodes back I wasasking some of my guests, you know,
who they would like to hear onthis podcast whose story they think
is also very impactful and youwere actually mentioned by my previous
(03:10):
guests.
So to our audience if theywant to listen again to those episodes,
it was with the founders ofMyara Health, about women's health.
So they recommended me toreach out to you, and here we are
today.
So thank you for joining me.
You are the founder of Asancup, and if I could narrow it down
to a few words, you'rebasically fighting period poverty.
(03:31):
Okay, now before we jump intothat, I'd like you to please introduce
yourself to our listeners.
What would you like them toknow about you?
So my name is Ira Guha and Iam originally from Bangalore in South
India.
I moved to the UK when I was18 for university.
But I've been going home toIndia a lot over the past couple
of years.
(03:52):
And my startup, Asan.
Asan means easy in manylanguages, in Hindi, Urdu, Persian,
maybe in your language.
Asan's mission is to reallymake periods easy for everyone across
the world, no matter wherethey're from, no matter what their
income is.
So we designed and patented aninnovative reusable menstrual cup
(04:15):
called, called the Asan Cup.
And for every Asan cup wesell, we donate one for free to someone
in rural India who can'tafford period care.
So our mission is to eradicateperiod poverty and also tampon waste.
Because one asan cup avertsthe waste of 2,500 pads or tampons.
And for those of us who canafford period products, you know,
(04:36):
billions of pads and tamponsare being flushed or going into the
oceans every year.
And in addition to periodpoverty, this is a big issue that
Asan is trying to address.
So before you tell me moreabout the cup, tell me about how
it all started.
You know, how did you beginyour entrepreneurial venture with
your startup?
What led you to create Asan?
Yes, I think like manyentrepreneurs, I did not seek out
(05:00):
to build a business or be anentrepreneur at all.
I was just interested in aproblem and trying to solve that
problem.
So it's.
It started when in 2017, I wasback home in Bangalore and actually
a cook who was working in mymom's house had stopped coming to
work.
And my mom asked me to followup with her and find out what was
(05:21):
wrong or if she was sick.
And when I contacted her, Iwas shocked to find out that, you
know, she wasn't ill, she justhad her period.
She was using really lowquality pads that had given her terrible
rashes and a uti.
So I said to her, you know,can you show me these pads?
And when she showed them tome, I was shocked because they were
(05:41):
so Thick and uncomfortable,you know, I wouldn't want to use
them.
And she shared with me thatactually, you know, with these low
cost sanitary pads becomingavailable, many women in her community,
they were so uncomfortablethat many women were actually throwing
them and going back to cloth rags.
So at the time I showed her mymenstrual cup which I was using,
(06:02):
and I explained how it worksand I asked her if she would be open
to trying it and she was.
So I gifted her a menstrualcup from the uk and she took to it
like this, you know,immediately she was able to do all
her tasks at work and she was comfortable.
And she asked me, you know,can you bring back some more for
my nieces and for my sister.
And it just spiraled from there.
(06:23):
And every time I was goinghome, I was literally expending 300
pounds on 10 menstrual cups.
It didn't make any sense.
And fast forward a couple ofyears, I was working in the private
sector in London and thatwasn't a good fit for me.
And I had quit my job and Iwas doing a master's in public policy
at Harvard and I spoke to aprofessor there about, you know,
this work I was doing withmenstrual cups in India and could
(06:46):
we, you know, do somethingmeaningful out of this.
And the two problems we wantedto work on was one, designing a better
men's tool cup, because Ithink there hasn't been innovation
in the space for some time.
And we wanted to make amenstrual cup that was actually really
accessible and easy to insertand remove.
And then the second problemwas actually how to make menstrual
cups affordable and accessiblefor people in, you know, rural areas
(07:10):
or from low income backgroundswho might not even know that the
option of menstrual cups exists.
And that's how ASAN was born.
We designed the Asan cup atthe Harvard Innovation Lab to be
the easiest menstrual cup toinsert and remove.
And then I moved back home toIndia to work with a local charity
on, you know, distribution inrural areas.
And we learned quite quicklythat while it was an incredibly life
(07:34):
changing product, the womencouldn't afford it even if we was
to sell it at cost.
And we also realized there wasso much demand for our product among
those who could afford it.
And that's how the one for Onedonations was born.
So selling it to, you know,people like you or others who might
need a really high qualitymenstrual cup anywhere in the world,
and that allows us to Financethe donations for people who can't
(07:55):
afford it.
That's a good explanationbecause I was wondering when you
were explaining, you know, youwant to make it more affordable,
but still, because you'veimproved the product, I would assume
as well that the prices wouldbe more than what you find currently
on the market.
So you solve that by doingthis one one Donations.
Correct.
Exactly.
So the Asan cup is stillreally affordable because it replaces
(08:17):
the waste of pads and tampons.
So, you know, even if you lookat a woman in, say, Switzerland or
the UK, you know, you arespending upwards of £1,000 on pads
and tampons in just a coupleof years.
And the asan cup cost £25 andit's going to last you a decade.
So it is still a cost saving,you know, even for a higher income
(08:38):
person who buys it.
But the really amazing thingabout our model is when we sell the
asan cup for £25, we'reactually baking in the cost of donating
one for free as well.
So you mentioned somethingabout improving the product and making
it different from what's onthe market.
And I was also checking yourwebsite and it does say that it's
the highest quality and Idon't know if it's the best.
(08:59):
Maybe you can tell me moreabout that.
What is particularly specialwith your cup that makes it stand
out from the rest of the cupson the market?
So I think just coming from aproduct design perspective, the first
thing that we did was, youknow, we bought the highest quality
period cups available inScandinavia and the US and we tested
them.
We had a user group both inIndia and in the US who were testing
(09:22):
the products and giving usreally detailed feedback and just
trying to understand, youknow, what are the difficulties in
using menstrual cups.
And a couple of things wefound, number one really big problem
was removal.
You know, I myself have a highcervix, so I related to this.
When you insert a cup, it canactually go quite high up and it
can be quite difficult toremove after a couple of hours.
(09:44):
So at Asan, we actually put aremoval ring on the cup, which makes
it really easy to locate,almost like a tampon.
The ring means you can pull itdown much, much more easily.
So that was the first innov.
The second thing that we foundwas around sizing.
So menstrual cup sizing isincredibly complicated and confusing.
(10:06):
If you go on, you know, anysort of manufacturer's website, they'll
say, measure the height ofyour cervix.
Have you given birth or not.
And it's a lot of languagethat's not actually very accessible
to people because, you know,even here in the uk, a lot of people
don't know what a cervix is orhow to measure it, but let alone
in a village in India,certainly they don't know how to
(10:26):
measure their cervix.
We worked with gynecologistson this, and what we learned was
the single most importantfactor in menstrual cup sizing is
actually your flow.
Just like with pads or tampons.
Do you have light flow?
Do you have moderate flow?
Do you have heavy flow?
So we actually changed thesizing completely and we designed
a menstrual cup for light flowand a menstrual cup for heavy flow.
(10:48):
So you could be a teenager,you could be a mom of three kids.
It doesn't matter.
Just go based on your flow.
And that, again, is simple,easy, accessible language that anyone
can understand.
If you change your cloth oryour pad, you know, more often, say,
every five hours, because youhave a very heavy flow, then you
should go for the heavy flow cup.
It's really simple language.
(11:08):
And then there were a coupleof other design tweaks we made.
For example, we learned thatpeople were very unhappy with their
menstrual cup becomingdiscolored over time.
So we made our cup red becausethat's the color of period, so it
never discolors.
So, you know, small thingslike that, making the design leak
proof.
But a lot of sort of thoughtand engineering actually did go into
this, and also a lot of trial.
(11:30):
You know, the Asan cup we havetoday is the fourth version because
we would make a cup, havepeople try it out, give us really
detailed feedback, and thentweak it.
And we only really stopped thedesign once.
We were completely confidentthat it was the best menstrual cup
out there.
And also very happy to say in July.
So a couple of months ago, theEvening Standard, which is, you know,
(11:51):
a really popular newspaper inthe UK, their reviewer personally
tried and tested 10 globalmenstrual cup brands and ranked them
and found Asan to be the best.
So that was awesome.
Oh, really?
Congratulations.
Yeah, thank you.
That's amazing.
And out of curiosity, how longdid that product development process
last?
I mean, from the first productthat put out, up until now, the version
(12:14):
you have, you say you're happy with.
It took about a year and ahalf because at the very beginning
we were working, you know, inthe Harvard Innovation Lab.
It's kind of like a Designstudio and they have 3D printers.
So I was working with anEngineer to just 3D print different
products and see what wethought of the design, different
shapes of the ring.
But our product is made fromClass 6 medical grade silicon.
(12:35):
It's the same material thatgoes into heart stands.
You can't 3D print thatmaterial, obviously that takes actual,
you know, injection molding.
So we 3D printed for about sixmonths and then, you know, we actually
started working on the realmaterial and making some, you know,
temporary molds.
And that took another year orso to, to go through all the different
designs.
(12:55):
And then once we had ourdesign, you know, we started applying
for IP and patents and thingslike that.
And you know, there's onething I like to talk about as well,
the podcast is the impact ofstartups or foundations.
The entrepreneurs come on theshow to talk about.
And my question to you, interms of impact, I'd like to understand
like how many lives or atleast how many people you've been
(13:18):
able to reach in rural India.
Because my understanding isyou first start in India, but your
objective is to go worldwideat some point.
So what is your impact therein terms of the lives you've changed?
And on another subject aswell, because not only in India,
but even here I can relate.
Switzerland probably also youin the UK or when you were in Harvard.
Periods still are a taboosubject, just like menopause.
(13:41):
Anything almost related towomen's health, I guess it's another
topic.
But, you know, what is yourrole there with ASAN in advancing
the awareness and thediscussions on this topic?
Yeah, really good questions interms of the number of lives.
So we have more than 30,000active Asan users at the moment,
(14:01):
the majority of whom areactually in rural India.
And you know, we werecompletely sort of bootstrapped to
date, but we are now sort ofin a growth and scaling phase of
our company.
And in the next five years,our vision is to have completely
transformed the lives of atleast 1 million low income women
(14:21):
and girls across the world.
And when I say, you know,transform the lives, the reason I
say that is because periodpoverty and not accessing products,
it's really not just about asolution for your period, it's about
empowering people to take partin essential daily activities like
going to school and going towork and even doing housework that
(14:45):
they are currently unable todo during their period.
And you know, estimates saysomething like $87 billion is lost
in GDP just in India becauseof period poverty, because of women
and girls not participatingfully during their periods.
And this is something I reallyrelate to, because in the villages
that Asan works in, we can seethat an average of two to three days
(15:06):
is lost every single periodbecause you don't leave the house.
You skip school.
If you have an exam, you mighteven miss it.
Right.
So it's really about economicempowerment when we think about impact.
And then on your secondquestion about taboos, I really appreciate
the fact that you said thattaboos exist in every society.
In, you know, in rural India,in urban India, in Switzerland, in
(15:29):
the US There are justdifferent kinds of taboos around
periods.
And something that was reallyimportant to me as a founder in being
open about the work we weredoing and breaking the taboo was
to be very bold with our brandand our packaging.
So if anyone has a look at theAsan packaging, it is brightly colored.
You know, it's bright pinks,bright reds, bright yellow.
(15:52):
If you go on our Instagram,we're literally shouting from the
rooftop about periods in theboldest and brightest way possible.
And the reason for that isbecause if you think of period care
as a category, it's alwayspale blue and pale pink because it's
about being discreet andhiding in a corner and, you know,
(16:12):
being ashamed of your period.
And I completely disagree withall of that.
I actually just think periodsare a practical fact of life.
Exactly.
And actually, without periods,there's no life, if I could say it,
you know, so why shame it orwhy hide it?
Exactly.
You're so right.
It's just normal.
It's just life.
And that's why we want to bebold and we want to be proud.
(16:32):
The only other thing I wouldsay when it comes to taboos, is that
it's really important to also,you know, respect where other people
are coming from.
And it's not on me, as thefounder of Assad, to tell other women
or people from differentbackgrounds what they should and
shouldn't do during their period.
And I know that there are amillion different sort of cultural
(16:55):
differences of things we do inour period.
In some cultures, people don't cook.
In some cultures, peopledon't, you know, maybe go to a place
of worship.
And, you know, I don'tpractice that, and maybe I don't
agree with it.
That said, I come from a city.
My first language is English.
I just don't believe that it'smy responsibility to change the way
other people behave in every case.
(17:15):
So, again, something that wefeel very strongly about at Assan
is saying to people, look,this is a product that really works
for us, for our teampersonally, it's been so life changing
for us.
We'd love to give you theopportunity to try it if you're open
to it, but there's no sort ofconversation of you have to use this
or you have to behave in acertain way.
It's just empowering peoplewith information and access to a
(17:39):
great product.
And in terms of the impact,what we really find when we work
in a rural context is theamazing thing about the Asan cup
is how discreet it is.
So if you're using cloth rags,you have to scrub them and hang them
up to dry, and other peoplemight see that.
And there's a lot of shameassociated with that.
And similarly with pads, youmight have to ask a family member
(18:00):
for money or you might have totravel somewhere to buy the pads.
When you're disposing of them,that's very public, you might have
to burn them.
So the amazing thing about theAsan cup is it's so tiny and it's
just so personal.
It's just for you.
And we actually have a fewvillages in Karnataka where the women
call it magical cup.
And it's magical because italmost erases your period.
(18:21):
No one knows you're on yourperiod and that's what they love
about it.
So I think in terms of taboos,it's also quite empowering that it
sort of removes that taboo ofthe period because no one knows when
you're menstruating.
And it's up to you to sharethat if you want to share.
Wow, that's impressive.
And you talked about alsoexpanding and having broader reach.
So right now you're in India.
(18:42):
Can you tell me about, like,which regions you're covering and
looking forward, you know,what is your outlook and especially
do you have specific partners?
How do you want to make thiswhen you grow Asan?
So Asan has obviously twosides to our organization.
We have the more commercialside, which is where we sort of sell
the Asan Cup.
And then we have the socialimpact side, which is donations,
(19:04):
partnerships with foundations.
So at the moment, our sort ofmore commercial side, our sales is
uk, Europe and India.
And our social impact has beencompletely in India.
You know, again, because, forexample, I'm from Karnataka, it's
a state that I understandwell, we have amazing partners doing
really, really thorough sortof work there.
(19:24):
And, you know, when wedistribute the Asan cup, it's really
not about just giving people aproduct because there's so much training
and education that goes intohow to safely Use the ASAN Cup.
And there's so much effortthat goes into follow ups.
Because our target, which, youknow, we always hit, is that 90%
of a community should be ableto safely use the ASAN cup.
(19:45):
And it doesn't happen overnight.
It takes a lot of effort andtraining and education.
We have a six month behavioralchange model.
And because of this educationcomponent, we are very careful about
who we work with because everyday we have organizations reaching
out to us who are, you know,even happy to sponsor Azan Cups.
They don't need the donations,but if they don't have the capacity
(20:08):
or the capability to do thateducation and monitoring and following
up, we don't end up partnering together.
Because my worst nightmare asa founder is an Asan cup lying on
a shelf unused because theperson didn't receive the right education
or doesn't feel confidentenough to try it.
In terms of expansion, I thinkthat is the number one challenge
(20:30):
is we want to scale.
Of course, you know, we wantto eradicate, period.
Babti, that is a huge mission.
There's a billion women andgirls across the world who need access
to a product like this.
But we also want to scale inan extremely sustainable and authentic
way where we know thateverybody who we're reaching is really
(20:50):
able to have all theinformation that they need to safely
use the product.
So we are actuallyestablishing some partnerships outside
of India as we speak.
But again, they are withorganizations who have very deep
roots in a certain community.
So we tend not to work with,say, volunteer networks where someone
(21:11):
lives in a city, but then theyjust travel to a village and do some
kind of social work and thentravel back to the city.
Because for us, it's veryimportant that the trainers and the
project managers of anyproject are actually embedded within
a community and come from that community.
So even if we look for apartner in say Kenya or a partner
in Uganda or country, thefirst thing we will analyze is, is
(21:35):
your team actually embeddedwithin this community and can you
give them the correcteducation and follow up for the next
six months or one year orthree years, however long it will
take, and if we feel confidentthat that is being met, then we would
love to partner with you.
You talked about a program, soI wrote down training, education,
(21:56):
follow up.
Can you describe that a bit?
How long does it take?
And do you have people withinASAN team?
Or as you were saying before,is it the working with who do this
work?
Yeah, so we call it, I guessthe ASAN Behavioral Change Framework,
which we've come up with aftera lot of practice and trying and
testing different methods, Iwould say it usually takes six months,
(22:17):
but it could definitely be,you know, a little longer, a little
shorter, depending on thecommunity's response.
But how our behavioral changeprogram works is we start really,
really small to build trustwith the community.
So we actually start withmaybe just 10 or 20 women and they
are usually change makers orinfluencers within a community.
(22:38):
So they could be the staff ofthe charity or NGO who we're partnering
with, or they could be maybeschoolteachers or nurses who live
in that community who arequite influential in changing behaviors.
And we have a really smallgroup and what we do is we conduct
the ASAN team, conducts atraining for them where we again,
(23:00):
we always come from a space ofour team has made this product, we
are using it.
Would you like to try it?
And maybe out of the 20, only15 want to try it and that's fine,
but we start with them and weactually have a sort of, you know,
one to two month really closeknit group that's in communication
with each other, usually overWhatsApp and following up.
(23:21):
And what you'll see is thefirst two or three people try it
and they love it so much thatthey might share a video or a testimonial
on that group.
And then very quickly peopleare inspired that hey, my friend
is using it and then everyoneelse tries it.
That's the very first stage.
Once we have those 20 women onboard and loving it, they come to
us and they actually say, wewould love to take this to our community,
(23:43):
we would love to distributethis for you.
How can we partner together atthat stage?
Our son has a train thetrainer model.
So we essentially equip themwith all of the kind of medical information,
all of the training toolsthey'll need.
That could be local language videos.
We always give user guides,illustrated user guides in the local
language as well.
(24:04):
We develop all of that contentand then we do the train our sort
of curriculum for them.
And then when they feelconfident, that's when we get to
the stage where they take itto the community.
And again that takes a coupleof months because first you have
an awareness session where youmight not even distribute the product,
you're just talking about it.
And again they will go totheir community saying, I use this,
(24:24):
it's coming from me, it's notany sort of outside influence.
No one is forcing this producton you.
I use this, would you like it?
And then that's how it spreads.
And honestly, to go from 20women to a thousand can literally
happen in the space of a few weeks.
If those 20 women aremotivated enough and talking about
it.
It's amazing.
I really love this concept ofsaying I've used it and like, it's
(24:47):
my own experience.
Right.
And that's what everybody islooking for.
When you put a product outthere, you look at customer feedback
and all these things, and thisis like direct.
It's so power to say, I'veused it.
Maybe you can try it.
Right.
So I think it's a verypowerful approach.
Absolutely.
And I think the really sadthing is that this approach is lacking
in the way we do a lot of whatthey call sort of development work,
(25:12):
you know, with other menstrualhealth initiatives, for example,
where people say, oh, Ipersonally use tampons, but I'll
give you this low quality pad.
Or there's always this ideathat, oh, if I'm donating something,
let me go for the cheapestoption, for example.
And then that's where trustgets lost, because why would you
donate something that youwould use yourself?
(25:32):
The trust is really key here,as you say.
And now I'm curious to know,for you personally as a founder,
right, as an entrepreneur, canyou tell us a bit about your own
personal journey?
What was the most challengingfor you and what keeps you going
as well?
Yeah, absolutely.
So I think having theuniversity environment to support
you is incredible because todevelop a product is really expensive.
(25:56):
You know, hiring an engineer,having access to a 3D printer, all
of these things cost a lot of money.
And I think what was sofantastic was having the ecosystem
at Harvard, where they hadbasically, you know, patent lawyers
and all of these other thingscompletely for free.
So that was an amazing supportin creating the product.
But in terms of what's beenchallenging, I think at every stage
(26:19):
of my business, whetherproduct development, acquiring customers,
acquiring investors, it's allalways been the constant challenge
of behavior change.
Because I'm tackling anindustry where people have been so
used to the same products for,honestly, 100 years, you know, pads
(26:39):
and tampons, and just the ideathat period, products should be disposable,
use it once and throw it away, that's.
That's hygienic.
You know, this.
Trying to break into anindustry where there's consumer habits
are so set is a challenge.
But that said, I think what'samazing is that times really are
changing.
After the COVID pandemic, wereally see, you know, supply chains
(27:01):
were disrupted for pads and tampons.
So people were, in some casesForced to try something new and awareness
about the environment and alsoabout our own health and what we're
putting in our bodies hasreally gone up.
So I'm really happy to seesort of the changes even in the market
environment.
In the UK we see that tamponsales I think have fallen by 12%
(27:22):
in the last five years.
So I think the winds are sortof in our favor now.
I was wondering now if youlook ahead, it's been only two years
since you have the product onthe market, but you've been working
on it for four years now.
And you also have competitors.
You see how things are movingforward and how mindsets are changing.
What is your vision in this area?
How do you see things beingdifferent in, let's say, five years
(27:46):
from now?
I think we're going to see ahuge amount of change because of
the kind of market conditionsnow post Covid.
I think there is a hugeopportunity for reusable period products
because reusable periodproducts are maybe, you know, 5%,
maybe 10% in some markets.
I honestly see in the nextfive years this shifting to maybe
(28:06):
50% because of the rapidchange in consumer behavior.
And I think the reallyinteresting thing about the market
in which we operate is everysingle year a teen joins the market
or a young adolescent joinsthe market and a menopausal person
leaves it.
And what's really interestingabout that dynamic is, you know,
(28:28):
if you look at a woman goingthrough menopause, she's used pads
or tampons for the last, youknow, 20, 30 years.
It's really hard to get her tobreak out of that habit.
But if you look at a teenwho's getting that period for the
first time, you know, there'sa whole world of options available.
And social media is incredible.
All teens are on social mediaand you know, so pads aren't being
(28:48):
forced on them because they'resaying, hey, no, I just saw, you
know, my friend is using aperiod cup or my friend is using
period underwear.
So I think this reallyinteresting dynamic where you're
getting really open minded andreally eco conscious teens entering
the market every year iswhat's going to drive it towards
reusable.
And you know, when we talkabout competitors, I really think
that the big competitor hereis the sort of established pattern
(29:12):
tampon brands who occupy alarge part of the market.
And I actually think reusableand sustainable challenger brands
are actually working togetherin tandem to create a whole new space.
And that is very exciting.
Absolutely.
And quite interesting becauseI would have thought otherwise Right.
Because if you say all thesenew companies or brands coming on
(29:33):
the market, they're all, it'strue, competing against the established
ones.
But I thought that togetherwith their reusable products, there
must be some competitionbetween these brands.
Well, I think also competitionis really, really healthy in this
space.
I also think another bigdifference in, you know, market trends
and startups is periodproducts were always designed by
(29:53):
men or companies that soldperiod products were always owned
by men.
Now again, that's changing.
Women are getting morefunding, you know, they're getting
access to innovation.
You have women engineers, sowomen are also making products for
themselves.
And that's why you see betterperiod products being created.
You know, a man wouldn't haveput a ring on the Asan cup because
they wouldn't have even knownit was difficult to remove.
(30:14):
And so I think a level ofhealthy competition also leads to
innovation in the space.
And let's not forget how bigthis market is.
I mean, we have billions ofmenstruating people across the world
who need access to really goodperiod care.
And the opportunity ishonestly limitless.
And in terms of adoption, youmentioned like women who are probably
(30:37):
going through menopause orperimenopause, they've been used
for decades to have theseother disposable products.
Have you seen if you're intouch with your customers, like there
being a difficulty in adoptingcups for this age category compared
to teens, for instance?
I would agree with that.
Absolutely.
More sort of popular based.
(31:00):
And the people who are mostready to use the Asan cup is actually
teens.
We have a chat function on ourwebsite where people can speak to
our team.
And the number one question weget is I really want to use the Asan
Cup.
How do I convince my mom tobuy it for me?
Because the teen girl is readyto go for it, but her mom hasn't
heard of it and it's a littlebit nervous.
And we have actually investedso much in creating amazing resources
(31:24):
on our website about thatconversation between, you know, teens
and their parents and pickinga period product for your teen for
this reason.
I think, you know, in any agegroup you have people who are a bit
nervous about new products andwho are early adopters.
So even in the sort ofperimenopause age group, we absolutely
have some early adoptersbecause what happens at perimenopause
(31:45):
is your flow can become veryirregular and unexpected.
You can certainly have very,very heavy periods for a shorter
period of time.
So we do have women going toperimenopause who say this pad is
not enough and the Asan cupactually holds three times more than
a pad and you can wear it for longer.
So they actually find thebenefits amazing, but they just might
need that extra push or theymight need to hear about it from
(32:07):
a really trusted source, likeanother friend going through perimenopause
before they decide to try it.
I think all these reusableproducts have so many arguments going
for them that it's almost a nobrainer today, irrespective of your
age group.
So I think you're really inthe right area the moment.
Do you have anything that youwould like our listeners to know
about Asan?
(32:29):
How can we support you?
Well, if you're listeningtoday, I would say one thing I would
love you to do is just to headto Instagram and type ASAN cup A
S a N C U P and give us afollow because that's really where
we have all our content aboutour social impact.
You know, we're a verytransparent brand.
So in terms of all of thedonations we do, we have so many
(32:51):
testimonials about the peoplethat's reaching and their experiences.
So.
So please stay in touch withus on Instagram.
And we also have some amazingsort of FAQ content on there about
actually how to use events.
Because I think one thing wedidn't address today and which is
always on people's mind is,oh, how does that work?
It's so big.
How will it fit inside me?
You know, will it get stuck there?
(33:12):
All these sort of reallysimple questions.
And if you're just new to thisentire concept and you're wondering
how it works, have a look atAsan's Instagram and you'll actually
see that it's like Asan'sname, which means easy.
Menstrual cups are actuallyreally easy.
Thank you so much.
Thank you for taking the timeand thank you for sharing about Asan
and your journey on the podcast.
I hope to stay in touch withyou and see how Asan evolves through
(33:35):
time.
Yeah.
Thank you Claire forsupporting social impact entrepreneurs
and for having me here today.
Take care.
What a great conversation withyet another female founder making
waves in women's health withher social enterprise.
Ira's startup, Asan ensuresaccess to safe period care across
(34:00):
the world and providesmenstrual health education to women
and girls in India.
You will find a wealth ofuseful resources and articles about
menstrual cups, period,poverty, periods and health, as well
as sustainability on the ASANwebsite at asancop.org if you are
(34:21):
more of a social media personthen simply follow Asan on Instagram
Sancup.
All these links are availablein the Show Notes.
Thank you so much for tuningin today.
I appreciate you taking the time.
That was episode 64 aconversation with Ira Guha on Eradicating
Period Spread Poverty.
Join me again in two weeks forour final episode of the season and
(34:45):
believe it or not, this seasonfinale will coincide with our three
year anniversary so don't missthis last episode.
Make sure you leave us areview everywhere you listen to podcasts
and if you like what you'relistening to, remember to share this
episode with a friend, acolleague or even a family member.
You can also connect with usus through our website at Narratives
(35:08):
ofpurpose podcastpage IO.
The link is available in theShow Notes or through our Social
Handles Narratives of Purpose Podcast.
Until the next episode, takecare of yourselves.
Stay well and stay inspired.
Welcome back to the GlobalHealth Pursuit Podcast.
I'm Hetal Bahman and as thetitle for this episode reads today
I'm dropping an episode fromthe Narratives of Purpose Podcast,
an award nominated podcastthat brings you the inspiring stories
of change makers.
A new friend of mine and hostof this amazing podcast, Claire Murigande,
(00:22):
showcases founders of impactdriven companies and initiatives
to a global audience.
Anything from youthempowerment in remote communities
to sustainable food systems ofthe future.
This podcast explores it allthrough the lens of purpose.
Claire is a leader in the lifesciences industry and a passionate
(00:44):
women's health advocate.
In this episode, she sits downwith Ira Guha to discuss what she's
doing to eradicate period poverty.
If you love this episode, makesure to check out other episodes
of the Narratives of Purposepodcast where wherever you get your
podcasts, we'll be back with anew episode of the Global Health
Pursuit Podcast next week.
(01:16):
Hello and welcome to a newepisode of Narratives of Purpose,
a place for conversations withinspiring leaders that is all about
amplifying social impact.
I bring you unique stories ofchange makers, stories of people
who are contributing to make adifference in society.
By showcasing these individual journeys.
I would like to inspire you totake action if you are tuning in
(01:38):
for the first time.
My name is Claire Morigande.
I am your host on this podcast.
In today's episode, I amwelcoming a new guest.
Her name is Ira Guha.
Ira is based in London.
She is the founder of asan, asocial venture with a mission to
eradicate period poverty whichprevents women and girls across the
(01:58):
world from participating inessential daily activities such as
going to school and work.
In our discussion, Ira talksabout how she and her team designed
a very easy to use menstrualcup that can be safely reused for
10 years and thereforeeliminating over 2,500 sanitary pads
(02:20):
or tampons.
Please take a moment to rateand to review our show.
Wherever you listen to yourpodcasts, this will help other listeners
find narratives of purpose andfurther amplify the stories of change
we bring on our show.
For now, let's get into thefascinating conversation with Ira.
(02:47):
Ira, welcome to the podcast.
How are you today?
I am very well.
It's lovely to be here.
Thank you Claire.
It's absolutely a greatpleasure to have you.
And just a bit of backgroundfor our listeners.
A few episodes back I wasasking some of my guests, you know,
who they would like to hear onthis podcast whose story they think
is also very impactful and youwere actually mentioned by my previous
(03:10):
guests.
So to our audience if theywant to listen again to those episodes,
it was with the founders ofMyara Health, about women's health.
So they recommended me toreach out to you, and here we are
today.
So thank you for joining me.
You are the founder of Asancup, and if I could narrow it down
to a few words, you'rebasically fighting period poverty.
(03:31):
Okay, now before we jump intothat, I'd like you to please introduce
yourself to our listeners.
What would you like them toknow about you?
So my name is Ira Guha and Iam originally from Bangalore in South
India.
I moved to the UK when I was18 for university.
But I've been going home toIndia a lot over the past couple
of years.
(03:52):
And my startup, Asan.
Asan means easy in manylanguages, in Hindi, Urdu, Persian,
maybe in your language.
Asan's mission is to reallymake periods easy for everyone across
the world, no matter wherethey're from, no matter what their
income is.
So we designed and patented aninnovative reusable menstrual cup
(04:15):
called, called the Asan Cup.
And for every Asan cup wesell, we donate one for free to someone
in rural India who can'tafford period care.
So our mission is to eradicateperiod poverty and also tampon waste.
Because one asan cup avertsthe waste of 2,500 pads or tampons.
And for those of us who canafford period products, you know,
(04:36):
billions of pads and tamponsare being flushed or going into the
oceans every year.
And in addition to periodpoverty, this is a big issue that
Asan is trying to address.
So before you tell me moreabout the cup, tell me about how
it all started.
You know, how did you beginyour entrepreneurial venture with
your startup?
What led you to create Asan?
Yes, I think like manyentrepreneurs, I did not seek out
(05:00):
to build a business or be anentrepreneur at all.
I was just interested in aproblem and trying to solve that
problem.
So it's.
It started when in 2017, I wasback home in Bangalore and actually
a cook who was working in mymom's house had stopped coming to
work.
And my mom asked me to followup with her and find out what was
(05:21):
wrong or if she was sick.
And when I contacted her, Iwas shocked to find out that, you
know, she wasn't ill, she justhad her period.
She was using really lowquality pads that had given her terrible
rashes and a uti.
So I said to her, you know,can you show me these pads?
And when she showed them tome, I was shocked because they were
(05:41):
so Thick and uncomfortable,you know, I wouldn't want to use
them.
And she shared with me thatactually, you know, with these low
cost sanitary pads becomingavailable, many women in her community,
they were so uncomfortablethat many women were actually throwing
them and going back to cloth rags.
So at the time I showed her mymenstrual cup which I was using,
(06:02):
and I explained how it worksand I asked her if she would be open
to trying it and she was.
So I gifted her a menstrualcup from the uk and she took to it
like this, you know,immediately she was able to do all
her tasks at work and she was comfortable.
And she asked me, you know,can you bring back some more for
my nieces and for my sister.
And it just spiraled from there.
(06:23):
And every time I was goinghome, I was literally expending 300
pounds on 10 menstrual cups.
It didn't make any sense.
And fast forward a couple ofyears, I was working in the private
sector in London and thatwasn't a good fit for me.
And I had quit my job and Iwas doing a master's in public policy
at Harvard and I spoke to aprofessor there about, you know,
this work I was doing withmenstrual cups in India and could
(06:46):
we, you know, do somethingmeaningful out of this.
And the two problems we wantedto work on was one, designing a better
men's tool cup, because Ithink there hasn't been innovation
in the space for some time.
And we wanted to make amenstrual cup that was actually really
accessible and easy to insertand remove.
And then the second problemwas actually how to make menstrual
cups affordable and accessiblefor people in, you know, rural areas
(07:10):
or from low income backgroundswho might not even know that the
option of menstrual cups exists.
And that's how ASAN was born.
We designed the Asan cup atthe Harvard Innovation Lab to be
the easiest menstrual cup toinsert and remove.
And then I moved back home toIndia to work with a local charity
on, you know, distribution inrural areas.
And we learned quite quicklythat while it was an incredibly life
(07:34):
changing product, the womencouldn't afford it even if we was
to sell it at cost.
And we also realized there wasso much demand for our product among
those who could afford it.
And that's how the one for Onedonations was born.
So selling it to, you know,people like you or others who might
need a really high qualitymenstrual cup anywhere in the world,
and that allows us to Financethe donations for people who can't
(07:55):
afford it.
That's a good explanationbecause I was wondering when you
were explaining, you know, youwant to make it more affordable,
but still, because you'veimproved the product, I would assume
as well that the prices wouldbe more than what you find currently
on the market.
So you solve that by doingthis one one Donations.
Correct.
Exactly.
So the Asan cup is stillreally affordable because it replaces
(08:17):
the waste of pads and tampons.
So, you know, even if you lookat a woman in, say, Switzerland or
the UK, you know, you arespending upwards of £1,000 on pads
and tampons in just a coupleof years.
And the asan cup cost £25 andit's going to last you a decade.
So it is still a cost saving,you know, even for a higher income
(08:38):
person who buys it.
But the really amazing thingabout our model is when we sell the
asan cup for £25, we'reactually baking in the cost of donating
one for free as well.
So you mentioned somethingabout improving the product and making
it different from what's onthe market.
And I was also checking yourwebsite and it does say that it's
the highest quality and Idon't know if it's the best.
(08:59):
Maybe you can tell me moreabout that.
What is particularly specialwith your cup that makes it stand
out from the rest of the cupson the market?
So I think just coming from aproduct design perspective, the first
thing that we did was, youknow, we bought the highest quality
period cups available inScandinavia and the US and we tested
them.
We had a user group both inIndia and in the US who were testing
(09:22):
the products and giving usreally detailed feedback and just
trying to understand, youknow, what are the difficulties in
using menstrual cups.
And a couple of things wefound, number one really big problem
was removal.
You know, I myself have a highcervix, so I related to this.
When you insert a cup, it canactually go quite high up and it
can be quite difficult toremove after a couple of hours.
(09:44):
So at Asan, we actually put aremoval ring on the cup, which makes
it really easy to locate,almost like a tampon.
The ring means you can pull itdown much, much more easily.
So that was the first innov.
The second thing that we foundwas around sizing.
So menstrual cup sizing isincredibly complicated and confusing.
(10:06):
If you go on, you know, anysort of manufacturer's website, they'll
say, measure the height ofyour cervix.
Have you given birth or not.
And it's a lot of languagethat's not actually very accessible
to people because, you know,even here in the uk, a lot of people
don't know what a cervix is orhow to measure it, but let alone
in a village in India,certainly they don't know how to
(10:26):
measure their cervix.
We worked with gynecologistson this, and what we learned was
the single most importantfactor in menstrual cup sizing is
actually your flow.
Just like with pads or tampons.
Do you have light flow?
Do you have moderate flow?
Do you have heavy flow?
So we actually changed thesizing completely and we designed
a menstrual cup for light flowand a menstrual cup for heavy flow.
(10:48):
So you could be a teenager,you could be a mom of three kids.
It doesn't matter.
Just go based on your flow.
And that, again, is simple,easy, accessible language that anyone
can understand.
If you change your cloth oryour pad, you know, more often, say,
every five hours, because youhave a very heavy flow, then you
should go for the heavy flow cup.
It's really simple language.
(11:08):
And then there were a coupleof other design tweaks we made.
For example, we learned thatpeople were very unhappy with their
menstrual cup becomingdiscolored over time.
So we made our cup red becausethat's the color of period, so it
never discolors.
So, you know, small thingslike that, making the design leak
proof.
But a lot of sort of thoughtand engineering actually did go into
this, and also a lot of trial.
(11:30):
You know, the Asan cup we havetoday is the fourth version because
we would make a cup, havepeople try it out, give us really
detailed feedback, and thentweak it.
And we only really stopped thedesign once.
We were completely confidentthat it was the best menstrual cup
out there.
And also very happy to say in July.
So a couple of months ago, theEvening Standard, which is, you know,
(11:51):
a really popular newspaper inthe UK, their reviewer personally
tried and tested 10 globalmenstrual cup brands and ranked them
and found Asan to be the best.
So that was awesome.
Oh, really?
Congratulations.
Yeah, thank you.
That's amazing.
And out of curiosity, how longdid that product development process
last?
I mean, from the first productthat put out, up until now, the version
(12:14):
you have, you say you're happy with.
It took about a year and ahalf because at the very beginning
we were working, you know, inthe Harvard Innovation Lab.
It's kind of like a Designstudio and they have 3D printers.
So I was working with anEngineer to just 3D print different
products and see what wethought of the design, different
shapes of the ring.
But our product is made fromClass 6 medical grade silicon.
(12:35):
It's the same material thatgoes into heart stands.
You can't 3D print thatmaterial, obviously that takes actual,
you know, injection molding.
So we 3D printed for about sixmonths and then, you know, we actually
started working on the realmaterial and making some, you know,
temporary molds.
And that took another year orso to, to go through all the different
designs.
(12:55):
And then once we had ourdesign, you know, we started applying
for IP and patents and thingslike that.
And you know, there's onething I like to talk about as well,
the podcast is the impact ofstartups or foundations.
The entrepreneurs come on theshow to talk about.
And my question to you, interms of impact, I'd like to understand
like how many lives or atleast how many people you've been
(13:18):
able to reach in rural India.
Because my understanding isyou first start in India, but your
objective is to go worldwideat some point.
So what is your impact therein terms of the lives you've changed?
And on another subject aswell, because not only in India,
but even here I can relate.
Switzerland probably also youin the UK or when you were in Harvard.
Periods still are a taboosubject, just like menopause.
(13:41):
Anything almost related towomen's health, I guess it's another
topic.
But, you know, what is yourrole there with ASAN in advancing
the awareness and thediscussions on this topic?
Yeah, really good questions interms of the number of lives.
So we have more than 30,000active Asan users at the moment,
(14:01):
the majority of whom areactually in rural India.
And you know, we werecompletely sort of bootstrapped to
date, but we are now sort ofin a growth and scaling phase of
our company.
And in the next five years,our vision is to have completely
transformed the lives of atleast 1 million low income women
(14:21):
and girls across the world.
And when I say, you know,transform the lives, the reason I
say that is because periodpoverty and not accessing products,
it's really not just about asolution for your period, it's about
empowering people to take partin essential daily activities like
going to school and going towork and even doing housework that
(14:45):
they are currently unable todo during their period.
And you know, estimates saysomething like $87 billion is lost
in GDP just in India becauseof period poverty, because of women
and girls not participatingfully during their periods.
And this is something I reallyrelate to, because in the villages
that Asan works in, we can seethat an average of two to three days
(15:06):
is lost every single periodbecause you don't leave the house.
You skip school.
If you have an exam, you mighteven miss it.
Right.
So it's really about economicempowerment when we think about impact.
And then on your secondquestion about taboos, I really appreciate
the fact that you said thattaboos exist in every society.
In, you know, in rural India,in urban India, in Switzerland, in
(15:29):
the US There are justdifferent kinds of taboos around
periods.
And something that was reallyimportant to me as a founder in being
open about the work we weredoing and breaking the taboo was
to be very bold with our brandand our packaging.
So if anyone has a look at theAsan packaging, it is brightly colored.
You know, it's bright pinks,bright reds, bright yellow.
(15:52):
If you go on our Instagram,we're literally shouting from the
rooftop about periods in theboldest and brightest way possible.
And the reason for that isbecause if you think of period care
as a category, it's alwayspale blue and pale pink because it's
about being discreet andhiding in a corner and, you know,
(16:12):
being ashamed of your period.
And I completely disagree withall of that.
I actually just think periodsare a practical fact of life.
Exactly.
And actually, without periods,there's no life, if I could say it,
you know, so why shame it orwhy hide it?
Exactly.
You're so right.
It's just normal.
It's just life.
And that's why we want to bebold and we want to be proud.
(16:32):
The only other thing I wouldsay when it comes to taboos, is that
it's really important to also,you know, respect where other people
are coming from.
And it's not on me, as thefounder of Assad, to tell other women
or people from differentbackgrounds what they should and
shouldn't do during their period.
And I know that there are amillion different sort of cultural
(16:55):
differences of things we do inour period.
In some cultures, people don't cook.
In some cultures, peopledon't, you know, maybe go to a place
of worship.
And, you know, I don'tpractice that, and maybe I don't
agree with it.
That said, I come from a city.
My first language is English.
I just don't believe that it'smy responsibility to change the way
other people behave in every case.
(17:15):
So, again, something that wefeel very strongly about at Assan
is saying to people, look,this is a product that really works
for us, for our teampersonally, it's been so life changing
for us.
We'd love to give you theopportunity to try it if you're open
to it, but there's no sort ofconversation of you have to use this
or you have to behave in acertain way.
It's just empowering peoplewith information and access to a
(17:39):
great product.
And in terms of the impact,what we really find when we work
in a rural context is theamazing thing about the Asan cup
is how discreet it is.
So if you're using cloth rags,you have to scrub them and hang them
up to dry, and other peoplemight see that.
And there's a lot of shameassociated with that.
And similarly with pads, youmight have to ask a family member
(18:00):
for money or you might have totravel somewhere to buy the pads.
When you're disposing of them,that's very public, you might have
to burn them.
So the amazing thing about theAsan cup is it's so tiny and it's
just so personal.
It's just for you.
And we actually have a fewvillages in Karnataka where the women
call it magical cup.
And it's magical because italmost erases your period.
(18:21):
No one knows you're on yourperiod and that's what they love
about it.
So I think in terms of taboos,it's also quite empowering that it
sort of removes that taboo ofthe period because no one knows when
you're menstruating.
And it's up to you to sharethat if you want to share.
Wow, that's impressive.
And you talked about alsoexpanding and having broader reach.
So right now you're in India.
(18:42):
Can you tell me about, like,which regions you're covering and
looking forward, you know,what is your outlook and especially
do you have specific partners?
How do you want to make thiswhen you grow Asan?
So Asan has obviously twosides to our organization.
We have the more commercialside, which is where we sort of sell
the Asan Cup.
And then we have the socialimpact side, which is donations,
(19:04):
partnerships with foundations.
So at the moment, our sort ofmore commercial side, our sales is
uk, Europe and India.
And our social impact has beencompletely in India.
You know, again, because, forexample, I'm from Karnataka, it's
a state that I understandwell, we have amazing partners doing
really, really thorough sortof work there.
(19:24):
And, you know, when wedistribute the Asan cup, it's really
not about just giving people aproduct because there's so much training
and education that goes intohow to safely Use the ASAN Cup.
And there's so much effortthat goes into follow ups.
Because our target, which, youknow, we always hit, is that 90%
of a community should be ableto safely use the ASAN cup.
(19:45):
And it doesn't happen overnight.
It takes a lot of effort andtraining and education.
We have a six month behavioralchange model.
And because of this educationcomponent, we are very careful about
who we work with because everyday we have organizations reaching
out to us who are, you know,even happy to sponsor Azan Cups.
They don't need the donations,but if they don't have the capacity
(20:08):
or the capability to do thateducation and monitoring and following
up, we don't end up partnering together.
Because my worst nightmare asa founder is an Asan cup lying on
a shelf unused because theperson didn't receive the right education
or doesn't feel confidentenough to try it.
In terms of expansion, I thinkthat is the number one challenge
(20:30):
is we want to scale.
Of course, you know, we wantto eradicate, period.
Babti, that is a huge mission.
There's a billion women andgirls across the world who need access
to a product like this.
But we also want to scale inan extremely sustainable and authentic
way where we know thateverybody who we're reaching is really
(20:50):
able to have all theinformation that they need to safely
use the product.
So we are actuallyestablishing some partnerships outside
of India as we speak.
But again, they are withorganizations who have very deep
roots in a certain community.
So we tend not to work with,say, volunteer networks where someone
(21:11):
lives in a city, but then theyjust travel to a village and do some
kind of social work and thentravel back to the city.
Because for us, it's veryimportant that the trainers and the
project managers of anyproject are actually embedded within
a community and come from that community.
So even if we look for apartner in say Kenya or a partner
in Uganda or country, thefirst thing we will analyze is, is
(21:35):
your team actually embeddedwithin this community and can you
give them the correcteducation and follow up for the next
six months or one year orthree years, however long it will
take, and if we feel confidentthat that is being met, then we would
love to partner with you.
You talked about a program, soI wrote down training, education,
(21:56):
follow up.
Can you describe that a bit?
How long does it take?
And do you have people withinASAN team?
Or as you were saying before,is it the working with who do this
work?
Yeah, so we call it, I guessthe ASAN Behavioral Change Framework,
which we've come up with aftera lot of practice and trying and
testing different methods, Iwould say it usually takes six months,
(22:17):
but it could definitely be,you know, a little longer, a little
shorter, depending on thecommunity's response.
But how our behavioral changeprogram works is we start really,
really small to build trustwith the community.
So we actually start withmaybe just 10 or 20 women and they
are usually change makers orinfluencers within a community.
(22:38):
So they could be the staff ofthe charity or NGO who we're partnering
with, or they could be maybeschoolteachers or nurses who live
in that community who arequite influential in changing behaviors.
And we have a really smallgroup and what we do is we conduct
the ASAN team, conducts atraining for them where we again,
(23:00):
we always come from a space ofour team has made this product, we
are using it.
Would you like to try it?
And maybe out of the 20, only15 want to try it and that's fine,
but we start with them and weactually have a sort of, you know,
one to two month really closeknit group that's in communication
with each other, usually overWhatsApp and following up.
(23:21):
And what you'll see is thefirst two or three people try it
and they love it so much thatthey might share a video or a testimonial
on that group.
And then very quickly peopleare inspired that hey, my friend
is using it and then everyoneelse tries it.
That's the very first stage.
Once we have those 20 women onboard and loving it, they come to
us and they actually say, wewould love to take this to our community,
(23:43):
we would love to distributethis for you.
How can we partner together atthat stage?
Our son has a train thetrainer model.
So we essentially equip themwith all of the kind of medical information,
all of the training toolsthey'll need.
That could be local language videos.
We always give user guides,illustrated user guides in the local
language as well.
(24:04):
We develop all of that contentand then we do the train our sort
of curriculum for them.
And then when they feelconfident, that's when we get to
the stage where they take itto the community.
And again that takes a coupleof months because first you have
an awareness session where youmight not even distribute the product,
you're just talking about it.
And again they will go totheir community saying, I use this,
(24:24):
it's coming from me, it's notany sort of outside influence.
No one is forcing this producton you.
I use this, would you like it?
And then that's how it spreads.
And honestly, to go from 20women to a thousand can literally
happen in the space of a few weeks.
If those 20 women aremotivated enough and talking about
it.
It's amazing.
I really love this concept ofsaying I've used it and like, it's
(24:47):
my own experience.
Right.
And that's what everybody islooking for.
When you put a product outthere, you look at customer feedback
and all these things, and thisis like direct.
It's so power to say, I'veused it.
Maybe you can try it.
Right.
So I think it's a verypowerful approach.
Absolutely.
And I think the really sadthing is that this approach is lacking
in the way we do a lot of whatthey call sort of development work,
(25:12):
you know, with other menstrualhealth initiatives, for example,
where people say, oh, Ipersonally use tampons, but I'll
give you this low quality pad.
Or there's always this ideathat, oh, if I'm donating something,
let me go for the cheapestoption, for example.
And then that's where trustgets lost, because why would you
donate something that youwould use yourself?
(25:32):
The trust is really key here,as you say.
And now I'm curious to know,for you personally as a founder,
right, as an entrepreneur, canyou tell us a bit about your own
personal journey?
What was the most challengingfor you and what keeps you going
as well?
Yeah, absolutely.
So I think having theuniversity environment to support
you is incredible because todevelop a product is really expensive.
(25:56):
You know, hiring an engineer,having access to a 3D printer, all
of these things cost a lot of money.
And I think what was sofantastic was having the ecosystem
at Harvard, where they hadbasically, you know, patent lawyers
and all of these other thingscompletely for free.
So that was an amazing supportin creating the product.
But in terms of what's beenchallenging, I think at every stage
(26:19):
of my business, whetherproduct development, acquiring customers,
acquiring investors, it's allalways been the constant challenge
of behavior change.
Because I'm tackling anindustry where people have been so
used to the same products for,honestly, 100 years, you know, pads
(26:39):
and tampons, and just the ideathat period, products should be disposable,
use it once and throw it away, that's.
That's hygienic.
You know, this.
Trying to break into anindustry where there's consumer habits
are so set is a challenge.
But that said, I think what'samazing is that times really are
changing.
After the COVID pandemic, wereally see, you know, supply chains
(27:01):
were disrupted for pads and tampons.
So people were, in some casesForced to try something new and awareness
about the environment and alsoabout our own health and what we're
putting in our bodies hasreally gone up.
So I'm really happy to seesort of the changes even in the market
environment.
In the UK we see that tamponsales I think have fallen by 12%
(27:22):
in the last five years.
So I think the winds are sortof in our favor now.
I was wondering now if youlook ahead, it's been only two years
since you have the product onthe market, but you've been working
on it for four years now.
And you also have competitors.
You see how things are movingforward and how mindsets are changing.
What is your vision in this area?
How do you see things beingdifferent in, let's say, five years
(27:46):
from now?
I think we're going to see ahuge amount of change because of
the kind of market conditionsnow post Covid.
I think there is a hugeopportunity for reusable period products
because reusable periodproducts are maybe, you know, 5%,
maybe 10% in some markets.
I honestly see in the nextfive years this shifting to maybe
(28:06):
50% because of the rapidchange in consumer behavior.
And I think the reallyinteresting thing about the market
in which we operate is everysingle year a teen joins the market
or a young adolescent joinsthe market and a menopausal person
leaves it.
And what's really interestingabout that dynamic is, you know,
(28:28):
if you look at a woman goingthrough menopause, she's used pads
or tampons for the last, youknow, 20, 30 years.
It's really hard to get her tobreak out of that habit.
But if you look at a teenwho's getting that period for the
first time, you know, there'sa whole world of options available.
And social media is incredible.
All teens are on social mediaand you know, so pads aren't being
(28:48):
forced on them because they'resaying, hey, no, I just saw, you
know, my friend is using aperiod cup or my friend is using
period underwear.
So I think this reallyinteresting dynamic where you're
getting really open minded andreally eco conscious teens entering
the market every year iswhat's going to drive it towards
reusable.
And you know, when we talkabout competitors, I really think
that the big competitor hereis the sort of established pattern
(29:12):
tampon brands who occupy alarge part of the market.
And I actually think reusableand sustainable challenger brands
are actually working togetherin tandem to create a whole new space.
And that is very exciting.
Absolutely.
And quite interesting becauseI would have thought otherwise Right.
Because if you say all thesenew companies or brands coming on
(29:33):
the market, they're all, it'strue, competing against the established
ones.
But I thought that togetherwith their reusable products, there
must be some competitionbetween these brands.
Well, I think also competitionis really, really healthy in this
space.
I also think another bigdifference in, you know, market trends
and startups is periodproducts were always designed by
(29:53):
men or companies that soldperiod products were always owned
by men.
Now again, that's changing.
Women are getting morefunding, you know, they're getting
access to innovation.
You have women engineers, sowomen are also making products for
themselves.
And that's why you see betterperiod products being created.
You know, a man wouldn't haveput a ring on the Asan cup because
they wouldn't have even knownit was difficult to remove.
(30:14):
And so I think a level ofhealthy competition also leads to
innovation in the space.
And let's not forget how bigthis market is.
I mean, we have billions ofmenstruating people across the world
who need access to really goodperiod care.
And the opportunity ishonestly limitless.
And in terms of adoption, youmentioned like women who are probably
(30:37):
going through menopause orperimenopause, they've been used
for decades to have theseother disposable products.
Have you seen if you're intouch with your customers, like there
being a difficulty in adoptingcups for this age category compared
to teens, for instance?
I would agree with that.
Absolutely.
More sort of popular based.
(31:00):
And the people who are mostready to use the Asan cup is actually
teens.
We have a chat function on ourwebsite where people can speak to
our team.
And the number one question weget is I really want to use the Asan
Cup.
How do I convince my mom tobuy it for me?
Because the teen girl is readyto go for it, but her mom hasn't
heard of it and it's a littlebit nervous.
And we have actually investedso much in creating amazing resources
(31:24):
on our website about thatconversation between, you know, teens
and their parents and pickinga period product for your teen for
this reason.
I think, you know, in any agegroup you have people who are a bit
nervous about new products andwho are early adopters.
So even in the sort ofperimenopause age group, we absolutely
have some early adoptersbecause what happens at perimenopause
(31:45):
is your flow can become veryirregular and unexpected.
You can certainly have very,very heavy periods for a shorter
period of time.
So we do have women going toperimenopause who say this pad is
not enough and the Asan cupactually holds three times more than
a pad and you can wear it for longer.
So they actually find thebenefits amazing, but they just might
need that extra push or theymight need to hear about it from
(32:07):
a really trusted source, likeanother friend going through perimenopause
before they decide to try it.
I think all these reusableproducts have so many arguments going
for them that it's almost a nobrainer today, irrespective of your
age group.
So I think you're really inthe right area the moment.
Do you have anything that youwould like our listeners to know
about Asan?
(32:29):
How can we support you?
Well, if you're listeningtoday, I would say one thing I would
love you to do is just to headto Instagram and type ASAN cup A
S a N C U P and give us afollow because that's really where
we have all our content aboutour social impact.
You know, we're a verytransparent brand.
So in terms of all of thedonations we do, we have so many
(32:51):
testimonials about the peoplethat's reaching and their experiences.
So.
So please stay in touch withus on Instagram.
And we also have some amazingsort of FAQ content on there about
actually how to use events.
Because I think one thing wedidn't address today and which is
always on people's mind is,oh, how does that work?
It's so big.
How will it fit inside me?
You know, will it get stuck there?
(33:12):
All these sort of reallysimple questions.
And if you're just new to thisentire concept and you're wondering
how it works, have a look atAsan's Instagram and you'll actually
see that it's like Asan'sname, which means easy.
Menstrual cups are actuallyreally easy.
Thank you so much.
Thank you for taking the timeand thank you for sharing about Asan
and your journey on the podcast.
I hope to stay in touch withyou and see how Asan evolves through
(33:35):
time.
Yeah.
Thank you Claire forsupporting social impact entrepreneurs
and for having me here today.
Take care.
What a great conversation withyet another female founder making
waves in women's health withher social enterprise.
Ira's startup, Asan ensuresaccess to safe period care across
(34:00):
the world and providesmenstrual health education to women
and girls in India.
You will find a wealth ofuseful resources and articles about
menstrual cups, period,poverty, periods and health, as well
as sustainability on the ASANwebsite at asancop.org if you are
(34:21):
more of a social media personthen simply follow Asan on Instagram
Sancup.
All these links are availablein the Show Notes.
Thank you so much for tuningin today.
I appreciate you taking the time.
That was episode 64 aconversation with Ira Guha on Eradicating
Period Spread Poverty.
Join me again in two weeks forour final episode of the season and
(34:45):
believe it or not, this seasonfinale will coincide with our three
year anniversary so don't missthis last episode.
Make sure you leave us areview everywhere you listen to podcasts
and if you like what you'relistening to, remember to share this
episode with a friend, acolleague or even a family member.
You can also connect with usus through our website at Narratives
(35:08):
ofpurpose podcastpage IO.
The link is available in theShow Notes or through our Social
Handles Narratives of Purpose Podcast.
Until the next episode, takecare of yourselves.
Stay well and stay inspired.
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