The Lowdown is the young femtech championing feminine and reproductive health. Founder Alice Pelton was 16 when she began her contraception journey. Fast forward to 2019, after several years of trial and error and poor quality recommendations, she decided to create a platform where women could share and receive the right education on contraception.

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As the world’s first contraception review platform, they’ve built a community for women to share their experiences around the world, with over 5,000 reviews.

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With $2.5 million seed Investment secured and a rapidly growing audience, The Lowdown is on the path to revolutionising the world of female sexual health.

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⚡A mission built around adding value…

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Approximately 80% of women suffer from a range of side effects from contraception. Paired with the lack of tailored professional guidance and education in the female sexual health sector, women are often left to fend for themselves.

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With an overwhelming demand for a platform willing to cater to an overlooked audience, The Lowdown has been able to build a following based on the fact that they are able to provide a solution to a common problem.

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⚡The power of community…

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As much as it helps to have a great product model, building a loyal community carries just as much weight. A huge contributing factor to their success lies in their ability to create an engaged community early on.

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In Alice’s research, she found that there wasn’t a one-stop shop for discussions or general information around contraception. Instead, she found that discussions around the subject were being held on a wide range on unspecialised platforms like Redddit and Mumsnet.

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While it was reassuring to know other women experience this issue, it also meant that there was an opportunity to create a specialist space, the first of its kind.

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Beyond this, what’s brilliant about The Lowdown is that - being a review platform, the majority of their content is user generated, taking references from platforms like Reddit, allowing users to set the precedent for the kind of experience they’re able to have, and creating an environment where customers effortlessly feel a part of the community.
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⚡It's all in the product…

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The Lowdown receives over 100,000 visits from women around the world. Why? Because they’ve created a product model that adds unique value for every customer.

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Beyond being a platform for reviewing contraceptive methods, their team makes a range of digital resources available every week, like contraception recommendation algorithms created from clinical research and reviews. They also host the widest range of contraceptives in the UK. This is particularly important because beyond the lack of tailored medical advice given to women, many still lack access to contraception.

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They also launched the U.K.’s first private contraception consultation service, which is run by a team of remote expert GPs, allowing for women to gain access to more extensive guidance that suits them specifically.  Essentially Alice has created her own lane and sidestepped her consumers by focusing on her unique offering.

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Our key takeaway here is that The Lowdown’s ability to grow and build an audience so quickly comes down to a value-centric product. They’ve invested in providing a very commonly sought after solution to a very common problem, in an industry whose competitors have largely been unable, or unwilling, to do this.

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