She gave period products a Gen Z-friendly glow up. Then a major retailer came knocking for her brand
Katie Diasti was done waiting.
She was done feeling anxious, occasionally embarrassed walking down the menstrual products aisle and lingering longer than she wanted to because “the options on the shelf were unappealing.”
“There was nothing on the shelf that was speaking to me as a Gen Z consumer,” she said in an interview with Bagable.com.
So she did something about it. Diasti, 27, tapped into her own unease, frustration and Gen Z mindset and launched Viv, a period care brand with personality.
“When you open your bathroom cabinet and have your fun skincare products nicely displayed, it shows your personality and you’re proud to use them,” Diasti said. “It’s why we put our skincare routines on TikTok. It’s a version of ourselves that we’re sharing with the world.”
Why not adopt a similar approach with period care, she thought.
Viv is an eco-friendly line of pads, liners, tampons, menstrual cups and menstrual discs that are toxin-free and made from sustainable materials such as 100% organic cotton, bamboo fiber and compostable corn starch. The cup and disc are made with medical grade silicone.
Viv pads (box of 12) cost about $8.50, liners cost about $6.50 (box of 16), tampons are priced at $8 (box of 18), and its menstrual cup and disc starter kits are $29.
Diasti wanted Viv to be bold and inspiring.
“Viv is modern and fun. It had to pop on the shelf ,” she said, pointing to how the products are packaged in eye-catching hues of green, yellow and pink. “If you're excited about the period products you're using, then you’re more willing to talk about it,” she said.
The brand started as a direct-to-consumer business in 2021. Although it’s available on Amazon, Viv also expanded across regional grocery chains, including Wegmans, Meijer and Stop & Shop stores.
Why grocery stores?
“These chains reached out to us because they were interested in adding more options for menstrual products,” Diasti said. “But we are a small, three-person team. We’ve raised a little bit of funding, but nothing crazy. We’re looking to scale and our next step to becoming more accessible is to expand into big-box chains like CVS, Target and Walmart.
Retailers started paying attention as buzz built that Viv wasn’t only a product-centric endeavor but also a collective effort to support and educate young girls and women of all ages.
From the beginning, Diasti was intent on evolving her idea into a platform where “Viv is like the cool big sister that everyone needs in their life when it comes to understanding their body, no matter where you are in your journey,” she said.
“Gen Z is very vocal about what they like and don’t like,” said Diasti, who put Viv on TikTok, YouTube and Instagram to build an interactive community.
“There's a lot of crazy things on the Internet and we want to make sure that we're providing a place where there’s good high-quality, accurate, empowering and non-judgmental education,” she said. “It’s beyond just questions about periods. It’s shared life experiences, too. We get DMs asking, ‘Hey, I want to shave my legs for the first time. How do I talk to my mom about that?’”
On Thursday, the brand announced a big next step in its evolution. Viv is rolling into 518 Whole Foods stores nationwide this month.
“We're excited to collaborate with a brand focused on more sustainable practices and education in menstrual care. These are important values in this space, and we believe our customers will appreciate these products,” Kayla Jopling, senior category merchant with Whole Foods, said in a statement to Bagable.com.
Diasti said Whole Foods’ team was following Viv on TikTok and “really liked how we were putting education at the forefront and engaging with younger consumers.” “Retailers in general are searching for brands like ours who can help bring in new and younger consumers to their aisles,” she said.
“Hey, do you want to talk about periods?
For Diasti, Viv combines her passion for service and education.
“My mom and my grandma grew up in a very poor rural village in Egypt. My grandma wasn’t allowed to go to school because she was a girl,” she said. “So education is very important to me and in Viv’s story.”
It was in her senior year at Boston College, where Diasti was studying marketing and business, that she took an entrepreneurial marketing class.
“The class was very classic incubator-style where we had to find a problem and come up with a solution for it,” she said. “I thought about it, reflecting on my own experiences and my community service work.”
Throughout college, Diasti poured herself into service work, volunteering in a women's shelter, teaching art and English classes and also handing out essential supplies, such as pads and tampons.
“The pads and tampons were really low quality and I was only allowed to give out three or four at a time, which wasn't really enough compared to how often someone had to come back to ask for more. Many times they would ask in a whisper,” she recalled.
It hit her: “Why not rewrite the narrative for anyone with their period, especially young people, and give them better products with a purpose,” she said. She took up the challenge for class but it also ignited her entrepreneurial journey.
Diasti split her time between school work and researching safer and eco-friendly materials for menstrual products and manufacturers certified to make them.
After graduating in May, 2019, Diasti was accepted into a business accelerator program and went full steam ahead to launch Viv.
“I would go to local market events in the Boston area with my samples and a banner about Viv. Looking back, it's hilarious,” Diasti said. “We got the word out by just talking to people. I would say, ‘Hey, do you want to talk about periods with me when someone would walk by. Some were terrified and some would come over.”
To date, the startup has raised just over $1 million, primarily from angel investors.
As she grows Viv, Diasti is aware of growing competition in the space from other popular brands, including Lola, Cora, Flex, August, The Honey Pot and DIVA.
“Having competitors who are innovative is really healthy for the industry and the consumer,” she said.