Thinx underwear promises to change female period experience as we know it

Of all the inopportune times to get your period, a crucial three-legged-race ranks right up there as one of the worst. That’s what happened to Miki Agrawal’s sister, Radha, then 26, back in 2005 in South Windsor, Connecticut. It was the kind of incident that every menstruating woman dreads and never forgets.

“My twin sister and I were defending our three-legged-race-champions’ title, and my sister started her period during the race,” Miki Agrawal says by phone from New York City, where she now lives. “We blew through the finish line in first place, of course, then we had to remain tied to each other to run straight to the bathroom so she could change out of her bathing-suit bottoms. While she was washing blood out of her bathing suit bottoms we were saying, ‘Wouldn’t it be amazing if we could create underwear that didn’t leak or didn’t stain or that was absorbent and that looked like real underwear?”

After several other awkward moments—including one involving a white skirt—the Agrawal sisters and their friend Antonia Saint Dunbar went on to do just that. They founded Thinx, a company that produces a line of pretty, comfortable undies that protect women against leakage and stains, give them more freedom, and help preserve their dignity, all while saving countless undergarments along the way.

Watch their founding story here:

“It just kept happening to one of us every single month; we had to throw away I don’t know how many pairs of underwear,” Agrawal says. “It was so frustrating.”

The trio spent more than three years developing the underwear, working with textile manufacturers all over the globe. They ended up patenting a product that is moisture-wicking, antimicrobial, leak-resistant, and absorbent. The undergarments aren’t meant to replace tampons or menstrual cups  during the first two days of  woman’s period when blood flow is typically heavy but rather to be used in conjunction with them in case of a leak. But on lighter days, the undies can be worn without other sanitary products then thrown in the wash.

Related stories:

Conservatives remove federal tax on feminine hygiene products as of July 1

Reusable alternatives to tampons, pads becoming more popular with Canadian women

The women behind Thinx are doing much more than offer a practical solution to an everyday problem, though. They’re also empowering women around the globe.

For every pair of Thinx sold, the company donates money to AFRIpads, a social business based in Uganda that hires local women and trains them to sew and sell washable, reusable cloth pads. Without this type of product, millions of young women in developing nations are unable to go to school for up to a week every month (what’s known as their “week of shame”), because they don’t have tampons or pads to manage their menstrual cycle. They use things like leaves or dirty rags instead. As a result, many end up dropping out of school altogether.

 “One thing we really want to do is break the taboo and change culture around something as natural as a woman’s period,” Agrawal says.  “Gender equality is the backbone of our company.”

While many women the world over still don’t have easy access to sanitary products, these items have gone through an evolution over the last several decades. Check it out:

- Ancient periods: Way back in the day, women used whatever they could to absorb menstrual blood: papyrus, moss, wool, animal skins, grass, cotton, or rags, according to Femme International, which aims to advance the rights of women and girls through gender-targeted programmes that focus on menstruation, sexual health, and feminine hygiene, and MenstrualCup.com.

- Mid- to late-1800s: Nurses in France were the ones who first up the idea of disposable pads, looking for new methods to stop excessive bleeding, particularly on the battlefield. The first pads were made from wood pulp bandages. 

- Late 1800s: Lister’s Towels, the first American disposable pads, appeared on the market, according to the Museum of Menstruation. Produced by Johnson & Johnson (and named for Joseph Lister, a pioneer in antiseptic surgery), they consisted of a cotton pad in a muslin case.

- Early 20th century: Many American women made their own pads out of “bird’s eye”, the same absorbent cotton material used for baby diapers. They would pin these cloths to their underwear or to homemade muslin belts. Sanitary aprons and bloomers were available by mail and were designed to protect clothing from staining.

- 1920s: Kotex (a combination of “cotton” and “texture”) hit the market. Disposable pads had to be worn with reusable sanitary belts. But the pads often slipped either forward or backward from their intended position. Johnson & Johnson introduced Modess, Kotex’s major competitor.

- 1930s: Leona Chalmers patented and produced the first reusable menstrual cup.

- 1931: Dr. Earle Haas patented the tampon with applicator. Gertrude Tendrich went on to purchase the patent and founded Tampax two years later. At first she made tampons at home with a sewing machine and compression machine.

- 1968: The makers of Pursettes, a non-applicator tampon with a lubricated tip, introduced stain-resistant underwear.

- 1969: Bye-bye belts and safety pins:  Stayfree minipads, with adhesive strips, went on sale.

- 1975: Proctor & Gamble introduced super-absorbent Rely tampons, then took them off the market five years later. The tampons were linked to Toxic Shock Syndrome, a life-threatening complication of certain types of bacterial infections.

- 2007: Lybrel (Anya), the first birth control pill to eliminate periods altogether, was approved.