​How brands and retailers are battling period poverty

No comments

Tampons

More than 137,700 girls in the UK missed school last year because they couldn’t afford sanitary products.

That stark figure on period poverty was reported in May by charity ActionAid, which also found 6% of parents had been so desperate to equip their daughters with menstrual products that they resorted to stealing.

As the cost of living crisis rages on, those figures could rise – despite the 5% VAT on period products being axed in 2021.

Indeed, prices of some own-label lines are up by as much as 57% across Sainsbury’s, Asda and Morrisons [Assosia 12 w/e 16 August 2022], largely driven by production costs.

This is despite retailer efforts to keep prices down. For example, Sainsbury’s has pledged to invest more than £500m “to keep prices low on the items people buy most often”, including sanitary products.

Asda stresses its towels cost as little as 49p and tampons 69p, while Morrisons has for some time discreetly handed out free sanitary products via its Package for Sandy initiative across all stores’ customer service desks.

Tesco – the first supermarket to offset VAT costs on all period products in 2017 – appears to be following Morrisons’ lead. It’s started the similar Ask for Beth scheme, local papers reported in September.

Period care brands are also working to ease period poverty.

At TOTM, that means “continuing to run price-cut promo offers and initiatives such as the ‘buy one, give one’ campaign we ran with Morrisons a few months ago” says chair Ruby Parmar.

For Wuka, political campaigning is on the cards. “The removal of VAT on menstrual products failed to include period pants, which continue to be taxed at 20%,” says Ruby Raut, co-founder & CEO.

“Periods are not a luxury and a desire to manage them sustainably should not be penalised through tax.” As such, Wuka has launched a petition to push for the abolition of sales tax on reusable period pants.

Forceful political action on sanitary care can pay dividends – as was proven in August. After campaigning by Labour MSP Monica Lennon, Scotland introduced the Period Products Act, giving all councils, schools and other education providers a legal duty to provide products free of charge to anyone who needs them.