LAIQA - Best Sanitary Napkins available in India

Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by the organization it is based on.

The scenario of feminine hygiene is fast changing in India. There was a time when there were many taboos associated with menstruation, and menstrual cycles were perceived as something unclean and shameful. However, thankfully the situations are not the same today. Now, with women becoming more educated, financially independent and aware of her body, the way the menstrual cycle is viewed has changed. Along with it has changed the market for feminine hygiene products in India. Demand for quality feminine hygiene related products has increased and many companies are coming up with innovative products to meet this growing demand.

One such promising startup in the feminine hygiene sector is Laiqa. Laiqa sanitary pads are made from the highest quality absorbent materials - feather soft, chlorine-free & with reduced plastic-offering protection from rash, allergies and irritation, which makes Laiqa one of the safest and best sanitary napkins available in India.

StartupTalky interviewed Laiqa co-founder Ali Mir to know more about this startup which is envisioning to empower women to embrace and celebrate menstruation by making it a comfortable period.

Laiqa - Company Highlights

About Laiqa
Laiqa - Industry Details
Laiqa - Founders
Laiqa - The Idea and Starting Up
Laiqa - Name, Tagline and Logo
Laiqa - Business Model
Laiqa - Customer Acquisition
Laiqa - Challenges
Laiqa - Competitors
Laiqa - Achievements
Laiqa - Work Culture
Laiqa - Advisors and Mentors
Laiqa - Productivity Hack
Laiqa - Future Plans
Laiqa - Founder's Advice
Laiqa - FAQs

About Laiqa

LAIQA creates a hassle-free period for its consumer, right from product order to acquisition and experience. It offers a subscription model and a hotline number (functional 24/7 within Delhi NCR) promising same day delivery – to further smoothen your periods. Laiqa wants to help the Indian woman move past the stigma attached to menstruation by creating a platform for safe, healthy and comfortable discussion

LAIQA has designed individual and combo packs to suit the needs of different Indian women:  With that each pack is a value-added pack, a free panty liner is provided to build the culture of a clean period.

Laiqa is currently offering the following products-

• A pack of 10 Ultra-thin day pads designed for moderate flow (1 Panty Liner-Free)
• A pack of 10 Cosy-fluff night pads designed for heavy flow (1 Panty Liner Free)
• A pack of 20 Panty-liners designed for everyday discharges and spotting
• A pack of 15 Sanitary Pad - 10 Ultra-thin Day pads and 5 Cosy-fluff night pads. Designed to cater your flow at any point of your period. (2 Free Panty Liners)
• A combo box for you to personalize according to your needs. Choose a combination Day and Night (Ultra-thin and Cosy-fluff) pads that will suit your flow for the month.

LAIQA pads have a unique combination of features and functionalities coming together to make the perfect product. What differentiates Laiqa pads from most other sanitary pads available in the market are its features like, high-quality feather-soft top sheet, with a breathable bottom sheet, allowing breathability for your privates. The pads are rash-free, chlorine-free, fragrance-free, and protect the consumer from UTIs and yeast infections while providing them the best possible comfort.  

The napkins are designed keeping in mind the hot and humid climate of India. Excessive amounts of perspiration and moisture make the use of sanitary napkins uncomfortable. Laiqa napkins are manufactured using a negligible amount of plastic. While conventional sanitary napkins carry 70%-80% plastic, Laiqa pads have only 7% plastic presence and come in disposable bags and cardboard boxes that are made entirely of paper – making them 100% biodegradable & recyclable.  

Laiqa gives a platform to the users which encourages them to tell their own truths- share their own stories. This creates room for discussion, which further leads to discoveries and offers help in a space that is otherwise neglected due to constructs of shame and embarrassment.

The best part is that the sanitary napkins are delivered to the doorstep.

Laiqa - Industry Details

• The Indian sanitary napkin industry is dominated by 3 players, holding a market share of 52% WHISPER 24% STAY FREE and 15% Sofy, totaling 91 %.
• This Industry has done business worth $508 million in the last financial year (2018-2019).
• There 42.7 million consumers in India. 18 million Urban and 24.7 million Rural using sanitary napkin
• Industry expecting to grow by 80% till 2021.  

Laiqa - Founders

Ali Mir, Monica Bindra and Nazish Mir are the founders of Laiqa.

Ali Mir studied Econometrics in his undergraduate and numbers are his forte while managing the business. Ali worked at Accenture London for 2 years, prior to founding Laiqa.

Laiqa co-founder Nazish Mir comes with a background in Management and Entrepreneurship.

Monica Bindra is a Chemical Engineer from BITS Pilani with 15 years of experience in marketing research

"We are from different backgrounds, which gives us the ability to bring all our different experiences together to one table – allowing various perspectives to be highlighted" -  Ali Mir quotes

Currently, there are 10 members in the Laiqa team.

Laiqa - The Idea and Starting Up

Laiqa was started with the mission is to transform the experience of acquiring, using and enquiring about feminine hygiene and provide high quality, comfortable products for the consumers.

"I was doing my 9 to 6 Job at Accenture when my cousin called me howling over the phone, concerned I rushed to meet her. She had lost a friend to TSS (Toxic Shock Syndrome). I went home thinking about how we could cure this problem if she was at the receiving end, I was pretty sure many more were in the same boat. That’s where the urge to provide a safe reliable product came through"  Laiqa co-founder Ali Mir said explaining the idea behind the startup

It was Nazish who came up with an idea to alter an enhance female hygiene quality and supply in India and Ali soon joined Nazish, as he felt the urge to be part of the change that the feminine hygiene market needs.

Ali and Nazish met with Monica early in their journey – she carried the same passion to help women in treating their bodies with better products and quality care. The trio found resonance in one another’s beliefs and ideas and decided to join efforts in market research and product analysis over a period of a year and 9 months.  

"We put together a team consisting of the right resources, a product like no other and services that guarantee that you attain your pads in a wholly hassle-free manner. Laiqa strives to ensure a stress free, hassle free & allergy free period" - Ali said

Laiqa - Name, Tagline and Logo

LAIQA’s name was an amalgam of having drawn inspiration from 3 separate sources to come up with a whole new self-definition. LAIQA mean the following:

• The Laika dog: The first living being to go into space and orbit the Earth was a Russian female dog by the name of Laika. As per the founders, through Laiqa, they want to take feminine health & hygiene and launch it into a whole new space of comfort and compassion – while drawing a halo of sustainable growth in orbiting the planet.
• ‘Laayak’ in Hindi: The word literally meaning ‘deserving,’ drew us to it very naturally as we believe all women are in fact ‘laayak’ of the best care for their menstruation, their vaginas their health and their environment.
• LAIQA in Arabic: The dictionary definition of this word is ‘elegant’ – which for time immemorial has been highlighted as a predominantly feminine human trait. Again here, the pull was two fold – one, to acknowledge that yes, it is a product/service/safe space for women and two, to take the word elegant and cause it to mean whatever each individual woman chooses it to mean for herself.  

LAIQA’s main tagline is: Let’s create a period of change (because that’s what we want LAIQA to be – a different, more careful and mindful avenue into treating our bodies, minds and environment.  

Other tag-lines being used by Laiqa for marketing are:

a)   Embrace a new cycle: to bring to notice the difference Laiqa is about

b)  The hassle-free period: The ease & extra care it offers its users on the 5 most trying days of their every month.

c)  Good for her, good for Earth: How the pads are toxin free & biodegradable – making them good for your health and for the environment

d)  With you, every phase of the way: acknowledging how the female mind, body, form shift and dances like a water body along with the phasing moon  

Laiqa's logo is the phasing moon: reinforcing how change is a constant in the life of every person, especially a woman. The menstrual flow is exactly like the waters of the ocean, in sync with the alterations that take place during the monthly cycle of the moon. With this, not only does our physical form experience change but also the mental state with its mood alterations and simply handling PMS

Laiqa - Business Model

Laiqa contract manufactures the finest quality product for the consumers. Branding the product in accordance with market gap - an informative, educative and advocative brand. The company has a personalized targeted distribution network, marketing efforts and efficient use of logistics make the business model unique.

Being a startup, we want to evaluate where the consumer finds it most convenient to attain the product, due to which we have kept all verticals of purchasing the product available.

Laiqa products are available online, through their website, E-commerce portals and also offline in chemist stores. Besides, there is a Hotline Number that helps with urgent deliveries.    

Laiqa - Customer Acquisition

To understand what the consumer wants, Laiqa conducted a survey of 1500 women in NCR. Using the data, the company was able to design 5 different types of napkins to suit their demand.  

We took the 5 napkins and made 300 consumers use all 5 and went with the napkins that were accepted by 98% of the consumers. This gave us the confidence we needed to steer our business in the desired direction.

The products were launched on Valentines’s day, i.e 14th February 2019.

We started with the theme of love – but we focussed on turning it inward and making an occasion of love about SELF LOVE To attract consumers.

Laiqa was promoted across all digital platforms. The company made its products available on its own website, 7 e-commerce portals and in 50 shops pan NCR,  till date. Promotions were also done at DU colleges. Besides, awareness building campaigns were organized at corporates like TCS and Wipro. Laiqa also has a strong Customer Relationship Management that has resulted in repeat consumers. With the subscription model being a hassle free options consumers are shifting to the subscription.

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Laiqa - Challenges

According to Ali, getting people to believe and trust is an uphill task. The Laiqa team was formulated in May 2018. They made contact with all future vendors a good 6 months in advance, vendors, distributors, logistics, PR, marketing everything was planned from the get-go.  

It took us all of 6 months to convince people we were the real deal and we are here to stay - Ali recalls

Laiqa - Competitors

Whisper, Stayfree, Sofy, Nua and Carmesi are some competitors of Laiqa. While everyone is in the business of creating the same sort of product – obviously there are variations in how each company is trying to provide its own value proposition.

Feminine hygiene brands like LOLA, Glossier and Shethinx have been greatly inspiring for us through our teething phase as a brand.  

Laiqa - Achievements

We are on the rise up, with month on month showing a 158% growth from February to March 2019. Yes, it is a very small duration of time, but the acceptance of the product is obvious.  

The consumers are buying into Laiqa's products due to the marketing campaign #ComfortChallenge where consumers can go to the Laiqa site and within the first click avail a free sample. Within the first month, Laiqa already supplied its product to 12 different states in India.

As informed by Laiqa co-founder Ali Mir, till March 2019 Laiqa was able to attract over 750 consumers on the company's website. Out of these 250 are repeat buyers who are likely to shift to subscription within the first 3 months. Within just one month of its operation, Laiqa dispersed 5000 boxes in the market through their offline distribution and sold 46% of the stocks.

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Laiqa - Work Culture

Team Laiqa is constantly working towards bettering one another – both via active and passive reinforcement. The team believes in letting everyone focus on their forte and job and offering support in whatever form it is required. Ali, Nazish and Monica believe in giving the team members the power to make decisions so that every individual has their experience.  

LAIQA is a small family of working hands that care for one another – which is what has comfortably slipped into our brand’s language and ethos too. Support is a word we use a lot around the office.

Ali is driven by sports, so most of what he has learned about team building comes from there. He believes in giving everyone a chance to be themselves and display their talent and most importantly.  

I do not believe in the concept hierarchy, we all sit together, eat together and work together. Yes, there are decisions that are made on an individual level but when it comes to work and office operations there is no hierarchy and there never will be.

Laiqa - Advisors and Mentors

Harmeet Bindra is the adviser and mentor of Laiqa. He is the CEO of Leixir Resources.

Laiqa - Productivity Hacks

Team Laiqa has a weekly saturday which, as its name suggests, is a day to regroup, rethink, collect their thoughts and bounce some new crazy ideas off one another and inside our own heads.  

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Laiqa - Future Plans

Laiqa is looking to capture 13,60,000 Consumers from Tier 1 cities, New Delhi, Gurgaon, Mumbai, Bangalore, Tamil Nadu and Hyderabad in the next 3 years. This is .07% Of Urban Consumers Using Sanitary napkins.

Laiqa - Founder's Advice

"Make sure your heart is in it – make sure it’s a group of people you can trust to create something with. It’s like choosing a partner to have a child with – you need to be able to depend on one another to pick up slack wherever necessary" -  Ali Mir

Laiqa - FAQs

Who are the Founders of Laiqa?

Ali Mir, Monica Bindra and Nazish Mir are the founders of Laiqa.

What is Laiqa?

Laiqa sanitary pads are made from the highest quality absorbent materials - feather soft, chlorine-free & with reduced plastic-offering protection from rash, allergies and irritation, which makes Laiqa one of the safest and best sanitary napkins available in India.

Is Laiqa an Indian brand?

Yes

Is Laiqa biodegradable?

Yes