The Honey Pot: A Plant-Based Female Hygiene Brand Born From The Whispers of Ancestors
The Honey Pot is a plant-based female hygiene product brand founded by a MelaninASS badass entrepreneur, Beatrice Dixon.
Photo by MelaninASS
So, just in case you didn’t know, a woman’s vagina is pure royalty. The womb is the divine and essential power of creation. However, what’s less talked about are the many complications that women go through with their vaginas. From yeast infections, UTI’s, bacterial vaginitis to a myriad of reproductive complications and even cervical cancer – women have to be especially cautious!
It’s not enough to just be mindful of the food we eat and the butters we put on our skin – we have to be mindful of what we’re putting on and in our vaginas because the feminine care industry is just as toxic as any.
Beatrice started her brand The Honey Pot out of necessity and what some would consider ancestral divine intervention.
“When things started to happen with my personal vagina – that was my ancestors way of saying this is a product that you need to create because they came to me in a dream and gave me the ingredients. If I don’t do this what am I doing – I’ll be a trader to women.”
You would think that your pads, tampons and feminine washes would be something that you don’t have to think about. But unfortunately, the mass production of conventional feminine hygiene products requires cotton that is mass-produced – usually made with genetically modified seeds (likely grown in a laboratory) and produced with ingredients that have synthetic chemicals. Just like with the cotton that’s made for our tee shirts, how it’s grown, made, manufactured and produced it not ethical or sustainable.
Often times we talk about how absorbent our skin is with regards to beauty products – but why not our sanitary products?
“Skin is an organ and essentially everything you put on it is absorbed. When you’re talking about skin – there’s no filtration system it goes straight into the blood stream and that’s the major difference than digesting food which filters through the liver.”
Photo by MelaninASS
The Honey Pot currently carries pads, feminine wipes and vaginal washes. Their next product line is a tampon line. Despite the production challenges, they intend for their new line of tampons to be as ethical as possible. We especially love hearing the authentic challenges of running a small scale ethical brand.
“In the beginning I wanted to do an 100% organic cotton tampon line. But when you consider my competitors (2 or 3 organic cotton manufacturers in the world that I’m able to work with), those manufacturers can only work at a certain capacity. The ones that are very well known and of quality are either at capacity or they can’t make the type that I need which is a BPA – free plastic applicator. Finding a manufacture that I can truly trust. I have to work with someone who is pesticide, chlorine free, non GMO but they just may not necessarily be organic. It’s hard.”
Photo by MelaninASS
Conscious and ethically focused brands work tremendously hard behind the scenes to bring quality products to market. Sometimes the reality is that you have to choose the lesser of two evils when it comes to ingredients, as brands are very rarely 100% sustainable, organic and natural.
“There’s always a way to keep your ingredients as clean as possible. Are you going to be able to impress everybody? NO - but if 99.7% of my formula is super clean and natural – I’m okay with .3% of my formula potentially being a propanediol made from non GMO corn. So you have to make real life decisions. I have to find the next best thing so that I can continue to serve my customers.”
As a young entrepreneur and founder of a health conscious feminine care brand, when not being a boss, Beatrice focuses on spiritually and physically taking care of herself. “What I eat and drink and put on my skin is important. Also, respecting the people around who and trying to do good by people.”
Image via AfriPads
One of the things we love about The Honey Pot is their commitment to social good globally. They’ve partnered with AfriPads - a social business that specializes in the local manufacture and global supply of cost-effective, reusable sanitary pads in Uganda. Their current model involves sponsoring about 10 girls per month, which will increase that they continue to raise capital. A lot of times these young women in developing countries cant afford or have access to feminine hygiene products. AfriPads teaches these women how to make their own reusable pads – sew them and educates them on how to take care of themselves. Costs abut $5 to sponsor a young girl, it’s empowerment for young girls and for older women it teaches them how to sell in the market place so they can make money to support their family.
Additionally, we love Beatrice’s refreshing take on being a woman of color in this space.
“Our community deserves the right to be pro black – we’ve been through enough shit where we’re not respected in the same way that other ethnicities are – we’re not always given the same opportunities but sometimes you don’t need to be given opportunities – you just take them.”
Futhermore, Beatrices puts an emphasis on being pro black but also pro human. “I’m pro black but I’m probably more pro human. AfriPads for example is a dope organization – the people who started that company don’t have brown skin and I love what they’re doing. I am very pro black because I love my people – I love my skin, my culture my religion – afro Cuban. But at the same time – I’m pro human. If we’re going to break down barriers – there’s a human element."
We are certainly looking forward to the future growth of The Honey Pot.