They Asked Where To Buy. We Taught Them To Make.
Four years of telling girls to use a clean pad — and then hearing, every single session, where? with what money? 79% of Pakistani women couldn't manage their periods hygienically; commercial pads never reached the village and cost a day's wages when they did. Education without a product was half a solution. The women already sewed rillis. We handed them a pattern.
Four years of teaching menstrual health taught us one thing: education was solving half the problem. Every session ended the same way — "i want to stop using a rag. where do i find pads? how do i afford them every month?" So on DO Day, 18 October 2021, launched by The DO in Berlin, we sat down with SRSO, IBA Sukkur and the rural women themselves and designed a reusable pad they could sew, sell and use. Made by rural artisans. Carried village to village by the digital champions. A menstrual product that cuts Pakistan's menstrual footprint instead of adding to it.
"a unique opportunity to invest in rural women's health, creative potential & artisan abilities."
The digital champions now carry Raaji pads on every listening party — the product and the lesson in the same bag.
get on the waiting list →
"the first period product you ever used has still not decomposed."
- → rural women still use rags, corn husks and ash
- → 11,000+ disposables per woman per lifetime; a plastic pad takes 500–800 years to break down
- → disposables are up to 90% plastic — infections, landfill, toxic smoke when burned
- → cups and tampons carry insertion stigma; commercial pads never reach the village
- → no product, no privacy, no information → girls skip school
a cloth pad that tackles it from six angles.
- affordable — lasts up to 2 years for a fraction of a year of disposables
- accessible — sold where commercial napkins never reach
- reusable — 1–2 years with basic care
- culturally appropriate — women already wash cloth; no shift in attitude needed
- good for health — no plastic, fewer infections
- entrepreneurial & empowering — designed and sewn by rural women for fair wages, sold door to door by champions
srso curates villages and artisan groups whose sewing skills it has fostered for years.
aurat raaj trains them — in person and on whatsapp — in pattern making, cutting, sewing, finishing.
srso gives interest-free loans for machines and cloth from nearby markets.
aurat raaj places bulk orders and sells to urban buyers online.
both train the menstrual champions to sell in their own and neighbouring villages.
champions earn commission on every pad. the lesson and the product, one bag.
Meera trained the first batch of artisans — holding up the paper template, guiding a trainee’s hands over red cloth, stitching the first sample herself while the room watched.
saba@poetica.studio