STAYFREE | PROJECT FREE PERIOD | 2020
The Women Who Looked Forward to Their Period / STAYFREE "PROJECT FREE PERIOD"
There are women who get excited when their period arrives, because it means they get to rest. They're sex workers in India. A sanitary pad brand turned those three days into a school for work.
The problem
In India, periods are still a deeply rooted taboo, and only a small fraction of women use hygienic sanitary pads. STAYFREE has long championed "Dreams of Progress," a message that periods shouldn't be allowed to stop women's progress.
The insight
While most women dread their period, there was a group of women actually looking forward to it: sex workers. During their period, they are forced to stop working. Many who try to leave this line of work end up returning because they can't find another way to make a living. DDB Mudra realized that these "three days off" could become the very opening they needed.
The idea
Could this forced time off be turned into time spent growing a future instead? Working with an NGO, they created a three-day training program teaching henna art, candle making, embroidery, and basic beauty skills. The days off that came around with every period became, just like that, time for learning.
What happened
More than 1,200 sex workers took part, turning their accumulated period days into over 46,000 days of learning. In one city alone, the workshops reportedly generated the potential for several million rupees in income. Since launching in 2018, the campaign has won multiple awards at Cannes Lions.
Afterthought
This wasn't a sanitary pad ad that just says "push through without complaining." It reached straight into the structure of exploitation itself. What's amazing is that a brand that sells pads wrote a campaign that changes people's lives without ever mentioning pads at all. I want to see more work like this.
Awards
- Cannes Lions Gold 2020
