A Colorado startup is taking aim at the multi-billion dollar period care industry and hoping to make a dent in global poverty, all with a product that the co-founder first thought up while in high school.
Sunny, which has dual headquarters in Broomfield and Ashland, Mass., recently won a grant for disruptive technology from Colorado’s Office of Economic Development and International Trade for its menstrual cup, a replacement for tampons.
“A menstrual cup is a reusable period care product that collects menstrual fluid, as opposed to absorbing it like a tampon or pad. It sits just inside the vaginal canal and can be worn for up to 12 hours at a time, reused for up to a year or more,” explained Drew Jarvis, Sunny’s co-founder.
Because a cup is reusable, it can cost significantly less over the course of a year than tampons or feminine pads. It also reduces landfill waste. On average, consumers spend $120 to $150 per year on period products, while the Sunny Cup retails for $49 and can be reused for a year.
Menstrual cups were first invented in the 1930s, but have only gained popularity in the last decade, said Jarvis. There are multiple products on the market, but the Sunny Cup’s competitive advantage is that it comes with an applicator.
“We are the first and only menstrual cup applicator with FDA 510(k) clearance,” Jarvis said. “So the only ones that are legally allowed to sell in the United States.”
The FDA’s 510(k) clearance process reviews the safety and performance of medical devices before they can be sold in the U.S.
The applicator was Jarvis’ innovation, one she dreamed up in high school when she first tried a menstrual cup.
“I was in the bathroom for about 45 minutes, just laughing and crying, trying to figure out how to get this thing in,” she said. “I was like, ‘This is ridiculous. It should not be this hard.’”
A few months later, when a business competition was introduced at her Indiana high school, she pitched the idea of a menstrual cup with an applicator. She won the grand prize of $25,000.
That was 2018, and Jarvis has been working on the product ever since. Along the way, she teamed up with partner Cindy Belardo, moved to Denver, and has brought on investors and advisors to help with the hurdles of designing, manufacturing and selling a new menstrual product.
“So I’ve somehow gone from this teenager that’s creating this fun product, to a medical device manufacturing expert,” Jarvis said.
Another hurdle? Pitching to investors who can be uncomfortable talking about periods.
“I'm grateful that right out the gate, I had to start getting comfortable myself with having those conversations. I mean, I was in high school pitching at first to my own teachers, my own male teachers, to win the first round of my high school pitch competition,” Jarvis said. “The final round, I think, was four or five judges with only one of them being a woman, only one of them having a period. So I started out very early on having to get comfortable myself.”
While the co-founders of Sunny are focused on building their company, they have another interest: addressing what’s known as “period poverty,” or the lack of access to affordable period care. It’s a problem for more than 400 million people worldwide, and 17 million people in the United States. Period poverty can create a ceiling for education and financial stability.
“A lot of the time, unfortunately, women and girls, people with periods, will miss school or work or lose opportunities because they don't have access to care that makes them feel safe, secure, comfortable throughout the day, and would rather just stay home,” Jarvis explained.
The company donates money and promotes awareness of the cause on its extensive social media platforms, and may one day be in a position to donate its product.
Sunny launched its cup in a pilot program and is now working out some improvements, so is only taking names on a wait list. The company hopes to relaunch in the coming year.
What’s Jarvis’ advice for other budding entrepreneurs? Don’t be afraid to ask for help.
“I think as a kind of ‘type A’ overachiever myself, I oftentimes found myself going into my hole and just wanting to focus and create and flesh everything out myself,” Jarvis said. “And while that was great for ideation when it came down to actually making this happen, I certainly could not have done it by myself - whether it's my co-founder, Cindy, the product engineering team we work with, or the hundreds of mentors that I've had over the years.”
