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Valentina Milanova is taking the ladies’s well being business by storm together with her revolutionary tampon design that’s not solely absorbent however pain-relieving too.
She got here up with the thought for cannabidiol-infused tampons, which may relieve the ache many ladies endure throughout their durations, making their month-to-month cycles a lot simpler to endure.
Nonetheless, creating this type of product proved to be a problem when each traders and engineers are usually male-dominated roles.
Like many different feminine founders, Valentina quickly realised the difficulties of discovering funding and engineers that have been keen to create tampon machines.
On this episode, Valentina explores how she is tackling taboos in enterprise, altering the narrative round ladies’s well being and making an attempt to eradicate the gender hole in product innovation.
Right here is her unfiltered recommendation beneath:
Unwilling following in your dad’s entrepreneurial footsteps
Kate Bassett:
So Valentina, you’re the pressure behind this unimaginable ladies’s well being model, however rising up you’d inform folks that you’d by no means change into an entrepreneur.
So why didn’t you see your self beginning your individual enterprise?
Valentina Milanova:
Yeah, so that you’re proper. I used to swear that I’d by no means change into an entrepreneur as a result of my dad was an entrepreneur, and my mom had a really secure nine-to-five job in a financial institution.
And I at all times thought that my dad had the worst finish of the deal as a result of he was at all times confused, at all times on his telephone, at all times travelling.
We skilled lots of monetary insecurity as effectively, as a result of not each one in every of his a number of little ventures at all times labored out.
So I at all times promised myself that I’d have a really secure, dependable nine-to-five job.
After which once I was 22, I had the thought for Daye. I took on lots of bank card debt and adopted in my dad’s footsteps, considerably unwillingly.
How hemp impressed the thought for a revolutionised tampon design
Kate Bassett:
And inform us concerning the inspiration for Daye, since you began it again in 2018 with this aim of reinventing the tampon.
The place did that motivation come from?
Valentina Milanova:
Yeah, I began in 2017 truly, and the preliminary concept for our first product, which is a ache relieving cannabidiol-infused tampon, got here from me studying analysis papers on industrial hemp.
I used to be simply actually within the plant and its properties, and two of its properties actually caught with me. The primary one is that industrial hemp has very absorbent fibres.
So I believed to myself, “Okay, that’s nice for tampons.”
And a second property of the extract from the flower of commercial hemp is that it may be ache relieving.
There have been some early research with most cancers sufferers in Canada who have been making use of it topically and experiencing pain-relieving results.
So I believed to myself, “Okay, effectively they’re the identical plant that produces absorbent fibres and a pain-relieving extract, what if we put them collectively to create a pain-relieving tampon in order that you possibly can each on the similar time have your menstrual fluids absorbed and that the tampon can launch a cannabidiol formulation into the vaginal mucosa?”
In order that’s how I had the primary concept for our first product.
And later this advanced to redesigning the tampon altogether after which to redesigning the tampon to serve for lots extra than simply absorbing menstrual fluid.
So we now have a second-generation diagnostic tampon that helps ladies get screened for gynaecological infections like STIs, HPV.
We will additionally display screen the vaginal microbiome, which performs a vital function in your general reproductive well being.
So from this primary enterprise into redesigning one tampon, I realised that tampons can truly do much more to interrupt the cycle of poor innovation in gynaecological well being.
You’ve gotten a wealth of data at your fingertips—use the web to fill the gaps in your data
Kate Bassett:
So the corporate’s actually advanced since these early days, nevertheless it was such a daring transfer as a result of nobody had completed this earlier than.
You had no manufacturing data, no credibility out there.
So how did you do it, and who did you flip to for assist?
Valentina Milanova:
I feel it was a really naive transfer. I’m undecided if it was daring, nevertheless it was simply very naive, and I actually didn’t know what I used to be getting myself into.
And once more, I used to be 22 once I first based the corporate, so I had lots of this simply blind optimism. I usually am an individual that’s susceptible to excessive ranges of blind optimism, however once I was 22, it was even larger.
And I used to be simply taking up bank card debt, working loopy hours as a result of I had a full-time job that I partially used to subsidise the event of Daye. I wasn’t getting any sleep.
And I simply thought to myself, “Oh, that is so intellectually satisfying. It sparks my curiosity to be engaged on this firm.”
I used to be additionally motivated by the people who have been utilizing our first prototypes and the primary merchandise and discovering actual aid from the interval ache that had been such a primary characteristic of their relationship with their menstrual cycles for therefore lengthy.
That’s what drove me initially.
And then you definitely’re proper, I don’t have an engineering background. I don’t have a producing background. I’ve by no means managed groups, or massive groups. I haven’t constructed a direct-to-consumer firm earlier than.
However fortuitously, we dwell within the instances of the web and each bit of data that I wanted to get entry to, whether or not it was in our high quality requirements in clear room manufacturing or medical trial design or regulatory landscapes in numerous European nations, every little thing was only a Google search away.
I feel we dwell within the best instances ever to change into an entrepreneur, particularly now there’s ChatGPT, so it’s even simpler. You don’t even must Google and undergo completely different hyperlinks, you possibly can simply ask a query.
So I turned to the web and that’s the place I discovered lots of the early data that I wanted in an effort to begin the corporate.
As an entrepreneur you will need to change into exceptionally comfy with discomfort
Kate Bassett:
I imply, you stated the rationale you initially didn’t need to change into an entrepreneur was since you’d seen the degrees of stress that your father went by and the monetary debt that he acquired himself into.
So while you have been then in that very same scenario of bank card debt, working lengthy, loopy hours, was there any level the place you panicked and thought, this isn’t the proper transfer for me?
Valentina Milanova:
Yeah, there have been plenty of instances once I panicked, I had plenty of panic assaults.
I bear in mind the primary time an investor wrote us a time period sheet, which is a proper funding provide, I had a full-blown panic assault. I went residence, I puked. I used to be like, “Oh my God, that is a lot cash that somebody’s providing to place into this firm, which not that way back was simply an concept.”
There have been instances once we had a few of our commerce secrets and techniques leaked to large behemoths in our business.
There’s plenty of anxiousness inducing moments in entrepreneurship. It will get simpler with time. The highs change into much less excessive, the lows change into much less low, and also you develop a very good capacity to simply stay very calm and secure all through completely different tribulations.
However I feel in an effort to be an entrepreneur, it’s good to be actually comfy with feeling ashamed out of your depth, missing in data, being embarrassed.
After I was first beginning the corporate, most of my days have been simply stuffed with listening to, “No, thanks.” or me simply not realizing higher and doing big fake pas.
You could be exceptionally comfy with discomfort in an effort to be an entrepreneur.
With private discomfort particularly.
Kate Bassett:
You must get comfy with being uncomfortable.
Discovering funding for a girl’s well being product amongst predominantly male traders
Kate Bassett:
I need to speak to you about these conversations with traders since you stated that probably the most tough features of being the CEO of an organization that’s targeted on feminine gynaecological well being is these conversations with predominantly male traders.
So are you able to inform us slightly bit about that have?
Valentina Milanova:
Yeah, sadly, the vast majority of enterprise capital traders and angel traders and enterprise debt suppliers and grant funding suppliers are nonetheless males.
And we nonetheless dwell in a time when cisgendered males really feel considerably uncomfortable with discussing gynaecological well being.
So what occurs to me once I fundraise is, I stroll right into a room and I begin speaking about menstruation, tampons, the vaginal canal, the vaginal mucosa, the vaginal microbiome, STIs, bacterial vaginosis, vaginal discharge.
And what occurs is most individuals begin feeling basically uncomfortable and simply look to the bottom, and I can see that they only can not wait to get me out of the room, to allow them to really feel extra comfy once more.
You possibly can see that mirrored within the statistics round fundraising for gynaecological well being.
In personal enterprise capital, it’s simply 1% of enterprise capital, so personal healthcare investments, that went to ladies’s well being. Out of the entire funding, 100% that went to healthcare as an entire, only one% went to the entire of gynaecological well being.
So that features menstrual well being, vaginal well being, hormonal well being, et cetera. With public funding, relying on the nation that you simply’re , it’s 0.7% to 2.5% of public funding and grant funding that goes to ladies’s well being, even though one in three ladies will expertise a persistent gynaecological well being concern in her lifetime.
And this 0.7 to 2.5%, that features the entire funding that goes to breast most cancers, the entire funding that goes to endometrial most cancers.
So you possibly can think about how little funding is offered for much less frequent and fewer publicly mentioned circumstances like endometriosis, polycystic ovarian syndrome, menopause.
It’s actually unhappy that almost all of feminine well being corporations as we speak are created in circumstances of utmost shortage.
And that’s very a lot has been the case for Daye as effectively. Regardless that we have now been profitable with fundraising, we’ve raised a pre-seed spherical, a seed spherical and a Sequence A.
We’ve lately been profitable with grant funding as effectively. The one purpose why Daye has been profitable is as a result of we’ve pitched to an insane variety of traders for our seed spherical, for our Sequence A spherical.
Most lately, we contacted over 420 traders for our Sequence A spherical.
So what I see within the business, what I see amongst my different feminine founder buddies is that they’re constructing their corporations with unusually excessive ranges of hardship and shortage as a result of the funding simply isn’t there.
And the unhappy factor is that this can inevitably have a detrimental influence on the standard of the ultimate product, which is then offered to ladies and to sufferers and delivered to market.
Don’t hesitate to ship out chilly emails
Kate Bassett:
I imply, the answer after all, is to have extra feminine traders placing their cash behind manufacturers like this and actually understanding the merchandise.
However given the variety of traders that you simply pitched to, and also you have been profitable then in elevating funding, what can be your recommendation significantly to feminine entrepreneurs on elevating cash?
Valentina Milanova:
Simply preserve going. Maintain reaching out to traders.
The standard fundraising recommendation says don’t do chilly attain outs. Solely attain out to traders if somebody has launched you. Which is all effectively and good if you recognize you’ve an enormous Oxbridge community, otherwise you went to Eton or no matter.
However I didn’t have anybody to introduce me to those traders, but I stored listening to, “Oh, no, no. Don’t contact them on LinkedIn. Don’t simply ship them a chilly e mail.”
I used to be like, “Nicely, how am I speculated to get in contact with them then?” So I simply did it anyway.
And the vast majority of the people who have invested in Daye have been utterly chilly attain out people who I had met at occasions or met by LinkedIn or simply despatched a chilly e mail to.
So don’t hesitate to do this regardless of the standard knowledge saying that it is best to have a heat introduction.
And don’t take no’s personally.
One in all our traders, Leila Zegna from Kindred Capital, she at all times says, “You have to be grateful for the no’s as a result of they’re carrying you nearer to the sure. Each time somebody offers you a no, you’re simply getting one step nearer to the sure.” And once I heard that, I visualised it, I internalised it.
So each time somebody stated no, I used to be like, “Okay, subsequent one.”
Kate Bassett:
Yeah, choose your self up, preserve going.
Regulatory and recruiting challenges of making a lady’s well being product
Kate Bassett:
And as soon as you bought some funding in, what have been the opposite preliminary challenges you confronted in constructing the model and constructing the enterprise?
Presumably there have been some regulatory challenges round utilizing CBD in your merchandise.
Valentina Milanova:
Yeah, plenty of regulatory challenges as a result of medical units for ladies are usually not tremendous clearly regulated.
So for instance, tampons and pads, despite the fact that they go inside or across the human physique and are very near the vulva and vaginal canal, which is very absorbent, they’re not regulated as medical units.
They’re regulated as basic hygiene merchandise, so in the identical class as rest room paper, for instance.
So we needed to design our personal high quality requirements.
We needed to borrow from the pharma world, borrow from the medical gadget world in an effort to create high quality requirements and medical trial requirements, so we may then current to regulators, so they may assess our product.
The primary product we delivered to market was significantly difficult as a result of it’s a pain-relieving tampon. It’s a very novel idea.
Nobody has completed this earlier than.
Nobody has introduced it to regulators earlier than.
And there’s no clear framework that we match inside as a result of cannabinoids are usually not regulated. They’re not thought of medical units, they’re not thought of medicine, they’re not thought of dietary supplements. It’s simply an enormous regulatory vacuum.
Then on the opposite finish, you’ve tampons that, in my view, are under-regulated and ought to be regulated extra stringently.
So regulators initially thought, “Oh, why are you making an attempt so onerous?”
And we nonetheless preserve getting these questions.
A variety of, “Why do you produce in clear rooms? It’s not a part of the usual for tampon manufacturing, so why do you do it?”
Or, “Why do you sanitise your merchandise? Sanitisation isn’t a compulsory step in tampon manufacturing. So why do you do it?”
And for us, the reply is at all times, “Nicely, as a result of we need to assure shopper security.”
And nobody questions the truth that we sanitise our meals. Nobody questions the truth that we sanitise plaster band-aids.
Why will we query the truth that tampons that go inside your physique should be sanitised?
However outdoors of the regulatory challenges, one other key problem that we confronted was with engineering, hiring design engineers. Constructing design engineering groups for ladies’s well being could be very onerous.
There’s an enormous hole within the availability of feminine design engineers. The vast majority of design engineers and mechanical engineers and automation engineers are males.
And the design engineering business in lots of methods is sort of old-fashioned.
So it’s very a lot a boys membership of, “We do necessary issues like automobiles and engines and ships. And tampon machines are lame and boring.”
So it was actually onerous for me to search out design engineers within the first place. So I don’t have an engineering diploma, which makes me an entire no one within the eyes of engineers.
After which I had this bizarre ask of, “Hey, are you able to construct me a tampon machine somewhat than like a bike engine?”
Discovering and funding feminine design engineers
Kate Bassett:
How did you go about discovering these feminine design engineers? Did it’s a must to accomplice up with universities, or what did you do?
Valentina Milanova:
Yeah, what occurs truly is that lots of feminine design engineers drop out of college as a result of they discover the atmosphere to be so closely male dominated and poisonous in some methods.
There’s a comparatively equal variety of women and men that apply for engineering levels and get into these engineering levels, however then they both don’t graduate, or after they graduate, they don’t truly get into the sector of design engineering, they refocus on different fields.
So the way in which that we did it was we went to the artwork world, and we employed engineers that have been engaged on galleries and shows and rain-making installations, and we discovered that these forms of engineers have extra openness to engaged on ladies’s well being.
Now we’re sponsoring programmes for feminine design engineers, and we have now actually good relationships with the colleges, and we invite ladies engineers from 12 months one to start out doing internships with us, after which we assure a spot for them as soon as they graduate in order that they know they’ve a spot that they will go to.
And that’s what we discovered very, very profitable. We’ve been doing this since 2019, so for the previous 4 years.
Different advertising strategies you should utilize if Google and Meta block your advertisements
Kate Bassett:
And naturally, one of many different challenges that you simply got here up towards was advertising and promoting as a result of social media websites and Google block adverts that include phrases round feminine well being.
So how has that impacted progress and what intelligent methods of promoting did you utilize to get round that drawback?
Valentina Milanova:
It’s actually onerous. The censorship of girls’s well being merchandise on Meta and Google, it’s such a shame.
It’s exceptionally onerous to get round.
We continuously have our content material being categorised as porn or political content material, and it’s virtually unimaginable to develop your small business when you can’t depend on the primary instruments for progress that everybody else is counting on.
And it’s extremely unfair as a result of erectile dysfunction corporations that promote Viagra drugs, they will fortunately promote on Google and Meta and all of those paid channels.
However the second you begin talking concerning the vaginal microbiome or menopause or breastfeeding, you get categorised as porn or grownup content material.
We haven’t cracked that nut but.
We’re doing intensive lobbying efforts with Google and Meta, however there’s hardly ever precise folks that you could converse to inside these corporations.
As a result of we don’t spend hundreds of thousands monthly on Meta and Google, we don’t deserve an account supervisor, so we at all times have to elucidate ourselves to a bot.
And it’s slightly little bit of that scenario, like “Pc says no.”
So what we’re doing as an alternative is we’re focusing so much on having robust ambassador programmes whereby we reward our group financially for producing gross sales for Daye.
I like that mannequin.
We’d like to make it extra scalable as a result of I’d a lot somewhat pay our group somewhat than pay Meta and Google.
One other factor that we do is we have now a powerful referrals programme whereby each time you carry a good friend to the Daye platform, they get £5 off their subsequent field, you get £5 off your subsequent field.
We even have invested so much in search engine marketing by content material.
One of many first merchandise that we delivered to market truly was our Girls’s Well being weblog, Vitals, which helps ladies find out about completely different gynaecological well being circumstances in nice depth.
So having medically vetted data however doing it in a really digestible method.
One in all our key values as an organisation is that you simply shouldn’t see the medical diploma in an effort to perceive the workings of your physique.
And we actually attempt by our social media presence and our weblog content material, make it very simple for folks to grasp what’s inflicting them their gynaecological ache. These are among the three techniques.
So referrals, ambassadors, search engine marketing. We’re now doing much more with e mail as effectively.
Value implications of getting your advertisements banned
Kate Bassett:
I imply, even simply listening to you, I’m stuffed with rage on the double requirements within the business.
Do you discover it irritating that it’s a must to spend a lot time on lobbying and making an attempt to alter these narratives?
Valentina Milanova:
Not simply on lobbying, however there’s an actual financial penalty to having your advertisements be continuously banned.
As a result of the entire premise of working with Google and Meta is that you simply make investments, you let their algorithms study, after which they discover the proper viewers for you, they usually place your advertisements to them.
However each time you’ve an advert banned, the learnings of that algorithm get wiped away.
So say you’ve invested £50,000 a month or £70,000 a month in letting the algorithm study, after which the algorithm decides that your content material on the vaginal microbiome is definitely porn.
So all of these investments that you’ve put in all through the months to grasp what the very best viewers is for you and what the very best advertisements are for you, get utterly wiped away.
So there’s an enormous financial penalty to making an attempt to innovate in ladies’s well being after which discover individuals who battle with the problems that you’ve discovered options for.
Offering employment alternatives for folks from deprived or tough backgrounds
Kate Bassett:
There are different sensible methods that you’re innovating throughout the business. I do know that your merchandise are produced by ladies who was a part of the prison and care system.
So what are your tips about recruiting and retaining folks from deprived or tough backgrounds?
Valentina Milanova:
Yeah, so our mission at Daye is to make a very constructive influence on ladies’s well being as an entire and gynaecological well being as an entire by analysis and innovation.
And we need to create this evergreen supply of funding for steady R&D into gynaecological well being by creating commercially profitable merchandise, after which reinvesting the revenues from these commercially profitable merchandise into extra services that bridge extra gender gaps in healthcare.
In order that’s the long-term plan.
Within the quick time period, as we’re progressing in direction of that aim, we need to go away a constructive social influence behind.
And a part of our dedication to nurturing the group inside we exist as we speak, not simply the group that we are going to serve tomorrow, is to accomplice with charities resembling Working Likelihood and 821 who assist folks from the care and prison system in addition to sexual trafficking survivors reintegrate again into society and discover significant work.
So we’re the business accomplice. We offer employment alternatives which are pretty compensated, but additionally very versatile so that individuals which have childcare duties can make the most of working a day.
Individuals who perhaps are nonetheless recovering from trauma and can’t work an eight-hour day can nonetheless use Daye as a strategy to step by step get again into work.
It actually is probably the most satisfying a part of my job, working with our manufacturing workers. It offers me plenty of pleasure.
Being a pacesetter will train you new ranges of empathy
Kate Bassett:
And the way many individuals do you use now?
Valentina Milanova:
So it’s 42 folks in complete.
Kate Bassett:
And the way do you suppose you’ve modified as a pacesetter, because the enterprise has grown?
Since you talked about that blind optimism within the early days.
How would you describe your self now?
Valentina Milanova:
Nicely, I’ve modified so much as a result of once more, it’s simply due to the age bracket.
You alter probably the most out of your 20s to your 30s, after which after 35 to 40, you’re extra like totally established. So I’ve been on a trajectory like this.
I’m nonetheless everlasting optimist as we speak. I feel it’s good to have somebody that has limitless drive, limitless optimism and is completely happy to be the engine for the enterprise.
Now I’ve a senior group as effectively who assist mitigate for my everlasting optimism and supply injections of realism every now and then.
I feel Daye has taught me to be much more empathetic than I’d have perhaps in any other case ended up being. As a result of as a pacesetter throughout the firm, I’ve had to assist my group navigate plenty of difficult conditions. I’ve been doing this for the previous six years.
Once you’re the founding father of an organization, folks come to you with, “My mom handed away. I’m getting divorced. My little one has drug abuse points.”
I feel a very powerful talent that I’ve discovered over the previous years of constructing Daye is simply empathy.
Kate Bassett:
And what are the struggles in the intervening time with the enterprise? What’s conserving you awake at evening?
Valentina Milanova:
Development. We’re on the stage the place we have now to develop actually quick.
We’re so privileged to be a ladies’s well being firm that has raised Sequence A and that has attracted grant funding. I’m simply afraid of squandering this chance that we’ve fought so onerous for, and in addition, we’ve been very privileged and lucky to have entry to.
I’m simply obsessive about how we create this commercially sustainable mannequin the place we have now adequate progress to proceed investing in R&D. To have that evergreen supply of funding for ladies’s well being. That’s what I’m most frightened about.
However that’s additionally as a result of I’m privileged to have a very robust operations group and a very robust product group.
For those who take a look at Daye from the skin, you may suppose the operations inside this firm are going to be so onerous, or the provision chain goes to be so difficult. The regulatory approvals that they need to acquire are so complicated.
However the true problem, as a result of we have now actually robust groups in operations and finance and product, the true problem for us has at all times been progress because of the limitless limitations that exist round how and the place we are able to market our merchandise.
Repurposing the tampon to make gynaecological well being extra comfy and handy
Kate Bassett:
And what’s subsequent for the enterprise by way of new merchandise and progress areas?
Valentina Milanova:
The principle subsequent factor that we’re specializing in is repurposing the tampon for at-home gynaecological well being diagnostics.
At the moment, within the UK there’s over 650,000 ladies on a wait record for gynaecological well being screening.
In order that’s STI screening, HPV screening. And the vast majority of ladies nonetheless forego their recurrently scheduled appointments as a result of they discover them to be unnecessarily invasive and ugly.
So we need to create circumstances for seamless gynaecological well being checkups, but additionally for the therapy of no matter has been detected.
So we’ve created this telemedical platform that lets you get screened for STIs, HPV infections, fertility inhibiting pathogens.
However then you aren’t simply caught with the outcomes, which is perhaps complicated or troubling, you additionally instantly get beneficial subsequent steps in aftercare and prescription therapies that you could make the most of.
And medical doctors that you could converse with which are vetted and are empathetic to the issues that you simply is perhaps dealing with.
As a result of we have now a difficulty within the UK, not simply with folks not getting screened as a lot as they need to, folks additionally drop out of the therapy pathway since you get your outcomes through NHS SMS or a letter, and then you definitely freak out, and you like to not do something about them.
Or it’s time-consuming to must go to a sexual well being clinic and acquire your aftercare.
So we need to make it very easy for folks to handle their gynaecological well being from the consolation and comfort of their properties.
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