Dial A Pad Limited

In Kenya over 65% of women and girls cannot afford access to menstrual hygiene products and sexual reproductive health care.

We then realized the dire situation of lack access to safe menstrual materials especially at work that brings about lost hours for the female workers especially when working while on their periods. 

This negatively impacted their earning both at at employee level and at the business owner level.

We propose the fitting of our smart sanitary towel dispensers in workplaces to promote higher productivity of the female workforce and gender equality.

We have the women pay kes 10 for every sanitary towel via mpesa and just before collecting the pads we ask them if they would like to recieve more information on dsexual reproductive health and rights. then thew ladies who sign up for this will have follow on smses to their phones with tidbits on SRHR 

In addition to this we offer chats with inhouse gynecologists through the sms/ussd platform.

Our solution serves the bottom of the pyramid women in the informal sectors. our women work mostly as small business owners in the market place retailing fruits and vegetables, casual labourers in farms and factories.

these women currently cannot afford to purchase a full packet of pads that is retailing from  kes 65-100 but howver they are able to purchase pads for kes 10 on need basis. they mostly earn their income based on their productivity ie if they haervest 100 kgs they get say kes 2,000 and whenthey harvest short of that they get less earnings.

our solution is two fold it will address the access to relevant SRHR information via sms and our dispensers with the option of consultants with our inhouse gynecologists while simultaneously giving them access to safe menstrual material ie pads.

Linda Ng'ondu Co founder Dial A Pad Limited has a masters and a bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Public Administration and Faith Mutindi Co founder Dial A Pad has a Masters and Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry. 

Together they have over 10 years experience in the WASH sector ranging from handwashing to menstrual hygiene and health.  They are trainers of trainers in MHM and sit of several Technical working groups with Ministry of Health and Gender 

our company engages in cocreational activities with the  women we serve in the product design andservice implementatrion. for example when coming up with the consultation charges we had candid discussions with the women who revealed they would like to access the information for free but one on one consultation with the obygyn they were willing to pay up to kes 100

We have over 1,000 women using our sanitary towel dispensers in different markets and public spaces. These women have also been able to access SRHR info on screen as they use our vending dispensers.

Through the sms and chats we have been able to connect 50 women with our inhouse gynecologists for group chats and one on one chats  with quite a number of referrals. 

we incorporate IoT to collect and relay data to our women on various SRHR topics. through the dispenser we can transmit tidbits on SRHR to the women every time they access a sanitary pad, we are also administer closed ended questions to them through our dispensers.

we wish to reach 10,000 working women through our dispensers by 2030 these women will have improved menstrual hygiene and SRHR as a result of dignified access to sanitary towels and free access to relevant and timely information on sexual reproductive health.

We will now have more women using safe and hygienic materials and women with correct information on sexual reproductive health to inform their life choice which results in healthier outcomes for them. It should be noted that women majorly rely on their peers to advise on sexual reproductive health and they only afford visits to the OBGYN when its for the natal visits because these services are free from the government.

We will also attain gender equality at the work place as well as improve work conditions for women to earn more or as much as their male counterparts in similar positions.

Up to 65%* of women and girls cannot afford sanitary Pads, which directly impacts their productivity and capacity to learn. ( According to the Ministry of Health’s Menstrual Hygiene Management Policy 2019-2030 studies (Afri-Can, 2015)

Our theory of change is dignified access to the sanitary towels will improve their productivity and increase their earning while simultaneously getting access to free accurate information on sexual reproductive health that is not readily available to them in a convenient way.

One report stated that Lack of knowledge exists among women and girls about menstruation, contraception, safe abortion, sexual gender-based violence, reproductive rights, and Kenya’s constitutional provisions on SRHR and thus we close this gap by providing access to this information via sms and onscreen every time the women access pads.

Another report recommended that all health facilities should be equipped with health service providers trained in the provision of comprehensive sexual and reproductive health and rights information we however, would like to make this process seamless and convenient for the women wherever they are by having the health professionals/OBGYN in their hand through their mobile phones via sms.

https://reproductiverights.org/report-highlights-lack-of-access-to-srhr-information-in-kenya/#:~:text=The%20lack%20of%20access%20to,including%20rape%20and%20sexual%20exploitation.

2 Founders we work full time

2 engineer both software and hardware work full time

1 part time CFO

1 Part time OBGYN 

2 Marketers part time

we have been working on sanitary towel dispensers since 2018 at the time we targeted school girls only and we diversified to include workplace dispensers from 2021(2 years).

in essence our work of democratizing access to sanitary towel is inclusive in nature and promotes gender equality as through our dispensers we enable school girls stay in school/end absenteeism due to period pverty hence they catch up with their boy counterparts in education and opportunities for work. the same applies at the owrk place whilst women would have lost ceveral hours a month due to menstrual related issues with our intervention they are able to earn as much as the male employees due to higher productivity.

In addition to this we co create all our products and services with the local women in the community and have their input incorporated in our products and services.

we provide an avenue where lost hours due to menstrual related issues are recovered with utmost dignity which positively impacts productivity and earnings of the female workforce.

we offer free access to SRHR info through our dispensers on screen and we charge marketing fees to sanitary towel manufacturers for their ads.

In addition to this we give the women access to a wealth of SRHR info for free through sms and ussd for their sexual reproductive needs and we escalate this on need basis to an OGBYN for kes 100 for consulting which is way below the current market rat of kes 1,000.

we offer direct sales of the sanitary towels to the women in workplaces at kes 10 per pad.

we also charge kes 100 for consultation fees and a marketing fee to sanitary making companies.

we are seeking to raise usd 200,000 from grants and investors to be able to roll out to 3 counties in kenya ie Nairobi, Mombasa and Nakuru.