Pad Party a huge success!

My dining room is bursting with 2201 tampons, 2225 sanitary pads and 1550 panty liners! Today-2 weeks since the event- more feminine care products were donated! Over 200 packages of feminine care products were collected at the first-ever It’s A Pad Party at Shear Ego Salon and Spa in Pittsford on May 15th. Next week I'll be dropping off the donated items at local non-profit organizations for distribution to teens and women in need. About 100 women attended the event, where admission was a donation of a feminine care product. The guests were pampered with mini-manicures and hand and chair massages while enjoying refreshments. “Most women take their monthly trip down the feminine care aisle for themselves and their daughters for granted, but when a family is struggling to pay the grocery bills, basic personal care items not covered by Food Stamps can be the most expensive. I am thrilled with the turnout at Pad Party which I hope will be duplicated in communities across the US,” Germanow said in a press release. “Many school and community groups are reluctant to collect these much-needed ‘unmentionable’ products,” said Cindy Harper, executive director of Cameron Community Ministries, in a press release. “We are grateful that Pad Party will help replenish our supply of sanitary products.” Cameron Community Ministries is one of five different organizations that will benefit from the event. The others are Mission Share, LASS (Ladies Attaining Self Sufficiency), Sisters Together Achieving Results, and The Center for Youth. I hope more woman business owners and charitable organizations will contact me about organizing a Pad Party in their community!

PAD PARTY to collect feminine care products for women in need

It’s a PAD PARTY

A period.ic gathering of women helping women No woman should have to choose between food for her family and proper feminine hygiene protection products. Period. This is exactly what Pad Party aims to fix. Pad Party is the first social event of its kind to collect only sanitary pads and tampons for women in need in the Rochester New York community. The products will be donated to various organizations that will distribute the products to women and teens in need. Public assistance programs such as Food Stamps do not cover the cost of any personal care items, including the basic necessity of feminine hygiene products. Pad Party, Tuesday, May 15 from 6 to 8 pm at Shear Ego Salon and Spa in Pittsford Plaza, will collect boxes of sanitary pads, tampons, or panty liners as an admission charge. Attendees will be treated to mini-manicures, chair and hand massages, as well as networking, food and beverages. Pad Party is a recognized event during National Women’s Health Week by the Office of Women’s Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’Office and sponsored by my Company. “Being able to provide basic toiletry necessities, especially feminine care products, are a huge help to the families that come in to Mission Share,” says Tom Hakes, director of Mission Share. “If not for places like Mission Share, many of these clients will have to make a choice between proper nutrition and proper hygiene care.”

World Hand Hygiene Day is May 5

The World Health Organization, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other partners celebrate World Hand Hygiene Day today May 5th. The goal is to encourage healthcare providers to promote good hand hygiene measures to reduce the risk of infection among patients. A day devoted to reminding health care providers of the importance of properly washing hands? Are you kidding? Isn't this not only a given that they are taught how, when, where and why to wash hands effectively on the first day of any nursing (Aides, LPN, RN) or medical school program? How about the lack of washing hands in public restrooms--or for that matter at home after using the bathroom? Restroom observers with Harris Interactive reported that 85 percent of men and women observed at public places in Atlanta, Chicago, New York and San Francisco washed their hands after using a public bathroom. But when surveyed on the phone 96 percent of people said they always washed their hands after using a public bathroom. Someone is not telling the truth! And since restroom observers cannot go from home to home to sit and watch someone after they flush--the phone survey revealed that 89 percent claim to wash their hands after going to the bathroom. The message is pretty simple-- washing your hands rinses away bathroom germs, protecting yourself and others. In addition to washing your hands, you might want to take some extra precautions when you're in a public restroom. The fewer surfaces you touch, the better!

WEGMANS customers reach out to us about SCENSIBLES!

Thank you to these WEGMANS shoppers who have sent us emails about finding SCENSIBLES in the store's female restrooms! WEGMANS is not only one of the top grocery stores in the country but they do the RIGHT thing by providing a hygienic disposal system for fem care products for customers and employees! Plus Scensibles are available for consumer purchase in the feminine hygiene aisle.

While visiting Rochester (my old home town) for Thanksgiving, I used the Ladies Room at Wegmans and bless you- discovered Scensibles! Western MA

I've used these in Wegmans and think they are great! Baileys Crossroads VA

I saw and used this bag at a Wegman's store. Brilliant. Virginia Beach, VA

I initially saw these at Wegmans restroom-how nice! There are five females in our home and when I found this product I was thrilled! Middletown, NY

We recently discovered your product and were able to purchase the bags locally at our Wegmans East Syracuse, NY

I heard about your product at Wegmans grocer in the ladies room Lexington Park, MD
I saw Scensibles in a Wegman's restroom and think they are a great idea Lexington Park, MD

I have used these from the rest rooms at Wegmans and LOVE the concept Williamsville, NY

Take-a-Tampon, Leave-a-Tampon

Take a Tampon, Leave a Tampon

Posted on September 29, 2011

The McKendree Review

The problem with this campus (McKendree University) is the lack of feminine hygiene products. Young college women sometimes forget to bring such items with them or their “time” comes unexpectedly. This is when the tampon dispensers in the restrooms become saviors; unfortunately, the dispensers at McKendree are often empty.

How do we solve this problem? Complaining to the people in charge could work. However, given all the new things this year, menstruation is not the utmost concern in everybody’s minds. No one can blame them. It is hard for others to sympathize unless they have experienced firsthand the awkwardness of starting one’s “time” in the middle of the day and being unable to make it back to their apartment or dorm room. This is on top of cramps, bloating, and general crankiness.

This may seem like a problem for only the women at McKendree, but it is actually a problem for everyone. If a girl has to search for a tampon or hope someone has one on her, she might miss or be late to her class(es). This creates a distraction for the classroom and the overall learning environment and it creates a problem for the people on campus, who must deal with angry women without tampons.

It is time to find a solution. I suggest a Take-a-Tampon, Leave-a-Tampon policy, like the penny system at the gas station. It would involve putting unused tampons in a universal box in the girls’ restrooms. Let us lack tampons no longer!

MY THOUGHTS: How about families in the US who cannot afford to purchase tampons and other feminine care products such as those on food stamps? Though not the same problem as the young ladies are experiencing at this University, it reminds me that I must try and focus time and effort to draw attention to this issue. Does anyone have data on the impact the lack of hygiene supplies have on tweens and teens in the US?

My German Shepard just ate a used tampon

Reprinted from Just Answer.com

My German Shepard just ate a used tampon, I am about 95% sure of this. I came home to find the bathroom trash all over the living room. Everything that was in the trash was there (plastic applicator for tampon, shredded toliet paper) except for the tampon itself. He seems fine and the vet is closed. Should I take him in the morning or is this an emergency that cannot wait, or does he not need to go at all and just be watched?
Thanks

Answer
This is a fairly common object for dogs to swallow and most vets will have dealt with it a few times. My experience with larger dogs such as German shepherds is that they will usually get away with it and the tampon just pass straight through their intestinal tract. It helps that such objects are biodegradable.

MY ANSWER: Dispose of your tampons in a SCENSIBLES BAG!! The dog will never sniff out a tampon again in the trash.

But why do dogs eat tampons in the first place? Here's a good reply.
Before dogs were domesticated they hunted and killed their food in the wild. They haven't completely gotten rid of all their instinct from the wild. Your tampons have blood on them. Your dog probably thinks they are a food source.
Dogs are carnavors, they will eat almost anything that smells of blood.

Other comments:

Because they are dogs and you aren't disposing of them in such a way that the dogs can't get to them.

A dog could easily choke on a menstrual pad or a tampon. Try wrapping your used items up tightly in toilet paper, place them in a sealed bag of some sort to keep the dog from smelling them, and take the bag out to trash can as soon as you can.

My Great Dane was sitting in the middle of the living room. I could tell something was in his mouth. I went over and looked he had a string hanging out of his mouth. I pulled it and ..... You guessed it. Its totally normal part of living with pets.

Feminine hygiene marketing doesn’t skirt the issue

Feminine hygiene marketing doesn’t skirt the issue

September 16, 2011 |


Celebrities are gabbing about it openly. A growing number of grooming products cater to it. And a recent TV commercial hails it as “the cradle of life” and “the centre of civilization.”

The vagina is becoming big business.

A generation that grew up with more graphic language and sexual images in the media is forgoing the decades-old practice of tiptoeing around female genitalia in favour of more open dialogue about it. To reach digital-age 20- and 30-somethings, who also have shortened attention spans, marketers are using ads that are edgier, more frank and sometimes downright shocking.

“Gen Y people are more relaxed about their bodies, so there’s more attention to products that people would have been embarrassed to talk about before,” said Deborah Mitchell, executive director for the Center for Brand and Product Management at the University of Wisconsin School of Business. “It’s part of this trend of women saying, ‘Hey, we’re not embarrassed to talk about this.”

The new freedom to talk about the vagina comes as marketers spend more to get women to buy products for the area. Ad spending for feminine hygiene products, including tampons, panty liners and cleansers, was up nearly 30% to US$218.9 million in 2010 from two years ago, according to Kantar Media.

Pop culture also has a lot to do with Americans’ – and companies’ – increased comfort with women’s nether regions. The term “vajayjay” became popular after media mogul Oprah Winfrey began using it on TV in 2007. Last month, actress Olivia Wilde, who stars on the Fox TV series “House,” described her favourite vagina tattoo on TBS’s Conan.

“I am about to pass out,” Conan said.

The openness has spawned an industry of products and services. “Vajazzling” – gluing on sparkly gems such as Swarovski crystals to jazz up a bikini wax – became a phenomenon last year when actress Jennifer Love Hewitt mentioned it on the former TBS talk show Lopez Tonight. It’s now a popular service offered by some salons across the country. For instance, the Brazil Bronze Glow Bar spa in New York, charges $25 for house designs like a butterfly, dragon and heart, and up to $100 for custom-made designs.

Big consumer products companies also are rolling out products for the vagina and using frank-talking ad campaigns to pitch them.

Energizer in 2009 introduced the Schick Quattro Trimstyle Razor, which has a bikini trimmer on one side. An ad for the product, which first aired in Europe and shows women dancing to a catchy song called “Mow the Lawn” as they trim hedges, became a viral hit online.


Kimberly-Clark makes fun of stereotypically touchy-feely feminine products ads in its campaign for a new line of pads and tampons introduced last year and put them in brightly coloured packaging.


In July, the company introduced a designer series that includes pads with flowers, polka dots and stripes printed on them and a limited edition pad and tampon carrying case designed by Sex and the City TV series stylist Patricia Field. An accompanying online campaign called “BanTheBland.com,” allows users to design their own pads using bright colours and patterns; winning patterns will be manufactured and sold for a limited time.

“There’s a lot of pressure these days for ads to go viral,” said Brian Steinberg, TV editor at trade publication Advertising Age. “If you want a viral pickup you have to be a little eyebrow raising.”

Some companies have stumbled over the line between provocative and offensive. In July, Fleet Laboratories, which makes the Summer’s Eve feminine products, has had mixed success with its “Hail to the V” campaign to market its cleansing products.

One 60-second TV ad touts the “power of the ‘V.’” It shows men throughout history battling each other while a voiceover says, “Over the ages and throughout the world, men have fought for it” and “it’s the centre of civilization.” The ad then cuts to a modern day woman standing next to a shopping aisle of Summer’s Eve products and the voiceover says, “So ladies, show it a little love.”


But another series of ads, which showed people of different races’ hands as puppets appearing to talk as though they were a vagina, was deemed racially insensitive and pulled from the air. The company apologized.

Rhonda Zahnen, a principal at The Richards Group, which created the ads, said despite the controversy, the company was pleased with the overall reaction to the campaign. She noted that about 25,000 have correctly completed its Summer’s Eve’s online “ID the V” body awareness quiz.

Originally published by MarketingMag.ca on September 16, 2011
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