Ruby Raut is the founder and CEO of WUKA, a female-led start-up which makes sustainable period pants. She was at the forefront of the campaign lobbying the UK government to drop the VAT on period pants, which were classed as garments rather than period products.
And her work has paid off! Period pants are no longer subject to value added tax (VAT), as of January 1 2024 – as announced by the UK government. This means savings of up to £2 per pair thanks to a 16% price reduction.
Here, Ruby speaks to GLAMOUR about sustainable menstrual care, period stigma, and why she started the campaign for the government to recognise period pants as period products…
My mother gave me a sari rag as my first menstrual product. In Nepal, where I was born and raised, period products are often passed from generation to generation. Whatever your mum gives you, you use it without any questions asked.
I was 12 years old when I had my first period. My mum told me that I'd need to stay at my aunt's house for eight days because I could not be around my dad while I was menstruating. Initially, I was quite happy. My aunt had two daughters around my age, so I thought I'd be able to spend time with them. When I arrived, however, my aunt showed me to a room and said, “This is your room. You cannot come out of the room, and you'll be here for eight days because you are in chhaupadi.”
Forensic reports showed that police requested tests to detect abortion drugs.
Chhaupadi is an illegal Hindu practice that involves women and girls being separated and isolated from their community for the duration of their period. You still hear stories about girls dying of smoke inhalation in ‘menstruation huts’ because they're trying to keep themselves warm by starting fires.
After those eight days, I came home scarred. I told my family, "I'm never going to do this again, and don't you dare tell anybody else to do it too." And my mum replied, “That's fine. It's only the first time. But, you know that in the far western parts of Nepal, girls and women do this every month.”
At school, we had a communal toilet, which was basically a canal in front of you where you'd just squat and wee. So, when you were on your period, pretty much everybody around you would know. And the canal would run towards the boys' toilet, where they'd see a trail of blood coming through. The minute my period came, I'd tell my mum, “I don't want to go to school, because I don't know where to change it.”
In 2010, I moved to the UK to pursue a degree in environmental science. I got a job working in
a supermarket, and I was just like, "Oh, my God!" There's like an entire aisle just of tampons and pads. Those were the things that nobody talked to me about.
My outlook changed when I started understanding more about environmental science. I noticed that all the period products contained plastic. That was the moment for me where I was like, "Okay. Why are we just using plastic? And why are there no alternatives? Why are there no beautiful-looking alternatives?"
I decided to make my own. I learned how to thread a sewing machine and made my first pair of period pants – and soon, WUKA was born.
In 2017, we launched a range of period pants in the market. When we registered for VAT, we reached out to HMRC and said, “Hey, look. When I'm trying to put the VAT on, I don't see period pants in any of the categories. Can you please add it to the menstrual products category because it is a menstrual product?”
We were told that as period pants are clothing, it has to be classed as a garment. And then they slammed us with 20% VAT. We collected evidence to show that period pants are period products, including that they sat on the same aisle as pads and tampons in the supermarket. But while they scrapped the VAT for pads, tampons, and cups in 2021, the tax on period pants remained.
So, we started petitioning. For the last three years, we've been campaigning to remove the VAT. We've managed to gather quite a lot of momentum. M&S reached out to us a few weeks ago and then said, “Hey, we would love to do it together with you.”
We live in a developed country, where everybody should have access to period products. The government announced a £21 million fund a couple of years ago, which goes to schools and colleges. But, the people who bid for grants can only access pads and tampons because the government didn't seem to know of reusable period products' existence. After I re-wrote the tender and sent it back to the government, they eventually included reusable options.
Still, people are often in situations where they must choose between food and what to use for their period. With the removal of VAT on period pants, they will be 20% cheaper and, therefore, more accessible.
It's time for change.
As well as lobbying the government to remove the tax on period pants, I want to challenge the stigma surrounding periods. As a South Asian woman, I've seen how period shame is passed on from generation to generation. In my culture, we're encouraged not to ask questions – whatever your family does is what you should do too.
In Nepal, people know that you're on your period because you're in isolation. So, if a woman does not go to a wedding or funeral (or any religious event), it's because they're on their period. In WUKA's ‘#DesiPeriodStories’ campaign, we celebrate South Asian women through key life stages – such as the young daughter who's just about to start a period, to the bride who might be on her period, and the aunties who are going through the perimenopause and menopause stage of their life – to show that we don't have to hide just because of our bodily functions.
In the UK, we also have a culture of keeping periods ‘discreet’. But this can lead to people not talking about periods. Why, for example, do we only get only 20 or 30-minute lessons about periods in school?
It's my hope that by changing the law on the taxation of period pants, we can get everybody talking.
As told to Glamour UK's Lucy Morgan, who you can follow on Instagram @lucyalexxandra.
