The archive · Product Ideas · Product decision · 2026
Somos Martina puts period underwear on Colombia's school uniform checklist
Somos Martina adds period underwear to the mandatory school uniform, so menstrual protection is standard schoolwear — not a shameful extra girls must ask for.
Somos Martina
What it had to solve
Figures cited by the campaign say one in four girls misses school during her period — held back by shame, stigma or lack of products. Somos Martina, a Colombian B Corp founded in 2019, noticed that school uniforms are mandatory and already standardised, so the list of essentials was infrastructure waiting to be used.
How it works
Across Latin America, one in four girls regularly misses school during her period, according to UN Women figures cited by the campaign; in the UK the figure is three in ten, and more than half of those girls improvise with toilet paper. The cause is rarely illness — it is shame, stigma, or simply not having products when the school day demands them.
Somos Martina, a Colombian B Corp that makes reusable period underwear, saw that Colombia's mandatory school uniform already came with a checklist — socks, shoes, the rest. The creative move was not to launch another discreet donation drive but to add period underwear to that official list, making menstrual protection part of standard schoolwear that schools procure through their existing uniform vendors.
The pilot launched at Institución Educativa Mayor de Mosquera near Bogotá, the first school in the region to adopt the model, with the underwear priced comparably to ordinary underwear and reusable for up to three years. A short docufiction film directed by Claudia Barral Magaz, shot with girls who had never acted, carried the emotional argument, while editorial and design work invited schools, families and policymakers into the conversation.
Why it lands
- It routes the solution through infrastructure that already exists — the mandatory uniform and its vendors — so no parallel charity logistics are needed.
- It removes the burden of asking: the school tells every family the uniform includes period underwear, so no girl has to initiate an awkward conversation.
- Priced like regular underwear and reusable for years, the economics work for public schools, not just for families who can afford premium products.
- By making protection a uniform standard, it attacks stigma at the level of the object — shame cannot attach to something every student wears.
What it did
The idea drew backing from Colombia's Vice Minister of Education, who said period care should be discussed from pre-school upwards, and won a Cannes Lions 2026 Gold in Sustainable Development Goals plus three Bronzes. Because it changes a checklist instead of creating a parallel donation program, any school with a uniform vendor can adopt it.
What you can take
When a stigma blocks access, don't fight the conversation one family at a time — change the default object: put the solution inside an existing mandatory system, and the awkward ask disappears.
Since then
The campaign gained early institutional momentum: Colombia's Vice Minister of Education publicly encouraged the model and called for period care to be discussed from pre-school through secondary school, and Somos Martina began engaging educators, institutions and private partners on scaling it — still a pilot, not yet national policy. At Cannes Lions 2026 the work took a Gold Lion in Sustainable Development Goals and three Bronzes across Brand Experience & Activation, Creative Commerce and Creative Strategy, carrying the model into a global conversation.
Sources
- Colombian B Corp Makes Period Protection Part of School Essentials
- Somos Martina integrates period protection into school dress codes
- A Year of Firsts: Serviceplan Group Marks Milestones at Cannes Lions 2026
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