Episode 28: Navigating Sociopolitical Issues in Emergency Contraception with Stix Cofounder Cynthia Plotch

An especially timely conversation on reproductive care given the recently leaked Roe v. Wade decision

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In this episode you’ll discover:

  • What it is like to raise money in femtech from investors that are primarily men

  • What is it like to build a women’s health company, including tips and tricks for others in this space

  • How the company’s first emergency contraception product, Relaunch, came to be and the demand, access, and misconceptions around it

  • What the leaked Roe v. Wade decisions means for the future of women-centric healthcare companies

  • Why Stix decided early on to take a public stand on this issue and how other femtech founders can, too (even if they don’t know how yet)

Keep scrolling for a transcript of this episode.


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Learn More

  • Wondering about the impact of that leaked SCOTUS decision? Nixon Gwilt Law is putting together a roundtable discussion this summer for FemTech innovators. We’ll explore how to respond to this pending decision for your business and the industry. Want to be part of it? Start by sharing your thoughts in this confidential survey.

Read the transcript

Rebecca Gwilt (00:15):

Welcome back to Decoding Healthcare Innovation. Today I'm joined by Cynthia Plotch, co-founder of Stix. Cynthia is an Inc 100 female founder and a member of Forbes Next 1000. Super impressive super hustle. I've really enjoyed getting to know her. Cynthia and her co-founder are passionate about making sure women have the products and education and support they need to make confident decisions about their bodies and their health journeys. Cynthia's company is active in all 50 states and offers pregnancy, ovulation, UTI, yeast infection tests and related products. Cynthia, welcome to the pod.

Cynthia Plotch (00:56):

Thank you. So great to be here and what a lovely introduction.

Rebecca Gwilt (01:02):

So glad to have you as well. So we've got a bit of heavy content to get into today, but before we jump into that I'd like to start this pod as I start all others with you. So your journey to here, where is here, how did you make your way to co-founding this sort of rapidly growing femme centric consumer brand?

Cynthia Plotch (01:23):

Yeah, so right out of college, my co-founder Jamie and I met through this fellowship called Venture for America. And so we got to know each other but really just became friends. That was the whole context for the start of our relationship. We went our separate ways for another year. By the way, I always tell my story next to Jamie is because they are one and the same. So went our separate ways for a bit and then ended up joining on the founding team of a produce company direct to consumer.

Rebecca Gwilt (01:56):

Right? This is Hungry Harvest.

Cynthia Plotch (01:58):

Hungry Harvest. Yes, yes. And I always say that through that experience, Jamie and I became passionate about two things, creating better experiences for the female consumer and working together. At which point Jamie always either laughs or rolls her eyes depending on who I'm saying it to, <laugh>. So I'll just bring a little bit of that energy here. And we sat with that and we thought about that for a long time and we knew that we wanted to start something together. And then one day I was buying a pregnancy test and I ran into my boyfriend's mom and

Rebecca Gwilt (02:32):

Ouch.

Cynthia Plotch (02:33):

Yes, yes. Just there's nothing else to say but that. Yeah, call Jamie in tears. And honestly the Stix was born.

Rebecca Gwilt (02:43):

That's amazing. And I say this far too often, but so many of the founders that I talk to have a very, very personal story about their business and I love to hear them. This is one of my favorites, mostly because it's super embarrassing, but it's ok, but I love to hear it.

Cynthia Plotch (03:02):

Nobody, no, nobody ended up in the emergency room with cancer. It's in healthcare, I'm like, this is about as good, honestly, you can get for a family story.

Rebecca Gwilt (03:11):

That's true. That's true, that's true. So what is it like to build a women's health company? You came from a far less regulated industry for sure, but still consumer focused and this is the decade of the woman. We get into <laugh> some other aspects of that as well, but what has it been like to build a women's health company? Any insights for those who are starting the journey after you?

Cynthia Plotch (03:42):

Starting any company is impossibly hard, starting a company and one where you try to raise capital for a problem that the people across the table from you, nine times out of 10 will never experience is infinitely harder. I have to say, I always like to acknowledge when I say that that comes with the immense privilege I do have in being a white woman and a CIS woman. And there's a real lot of privilege that comes there, but at the end of the day, less than 2% of VC funding goes to female funding companies. It's hard.

Rebecca Gwilt (04:12):

Can you just repeat that again? Less than 2%.

Cynthia Plotch (04:15):

2%. I think Q1 it came down to 1.7, so

Rebecca Gwilt (04:21):

Yeah, it's 2% down.

Cynthia Plotch (04:24):

It did. Yeah, 2%. And on a bad path. And I think when we're talking about something that is so disconnected from the lives of people who at the end of the day are really the ones making decisions and controlling money and the economy and all of those big scary things not to get into our bodies piece, which we'll get to in a second.

Rebecca Gwilt (04:44):

Oh, we're going to get to our bodies. We're going to get to our bodies piece.

Cynthia Plotch (04:47):

Well, I know it just becomes infinitely harder.

Rebecca Gwilt (04:51):

Yeah.

Cynthia Plotch (04:51):

Yeah. I think the flip side is it's so motivating to work on something that is so important. It's unlike doing any other kind of work, I think when it is personal and also takes on a life so far beyond you and the impact that you have.

Rebecca Gwilt (05:10):

Yeah, absolutely. I, you've spoken before about what it's like to raise money from investors that are primarily male. Is there anything that you can tell me about that experience and are you seeing a shift there?

Cynthia Plotch (05:26):

Yeah, we definitely are seeing a shift in terms of that experience. I mean, I'm sure you've heard me say it many times, but 250 nos is the first time we went out to raise it was impossible and grueling. I think we're seeing a shift. We're seeing a bit of, I think a reckoning in general with VC. There's more and more female led funds and females, women in control and generally underrepresented investors and an increased focus on underrepresented founders as well. And so I do think we are seeing a bit of a shift, but on the flip side, that's my experience and the numbers don't lie. I don't actually think things are getting better for female founders right now, unfortunately.

Rebecca Gwilt (06:10):

Yeah, I mean there may be a lag, right? There may be a lag. Cause I've also seen a lot of energy around it. I just want to make sure that the dollars are going.

Cynthia Plotch (06:22):

Oh, I was going to say it comes back to making sure that women and anybody who is underrepresented as a part of the process, not just in terms of actually working at a venture fund or being an angel investor or putting dollars into something, but investors in the fund themselves because that's who really has control or sitting on the investment committee or making sure that women and people of color and generally underrepresented folks are in all the places where these decisions happen, I think is what will ultimately create that change. I think when it comes to women's health specifically, this feels like the most grassrootsy bit of the venture world I would say. I think we're all really lifting each other up, which is pretty beautiful too.

Rebecca Gwilt (07:04):

Yeah. So as of this recording and we're currently late May Stix is in the process of launching Restart, which is your company's first emergency contraception product. And before we get into the sociopolitical landscape of all of this I'm interested in some basic information about the product. Cause I'm not sure everybody is clear on what this is. So can you talk a little bit about what is emergency contraception? What are some misconceptions folks may have about it?

Cynthia Plotch (07:39):

Yes, this is my most important thing to talk about, not necessarily my favorite. So emergency contraception, the morning after pill Plan B is probably the one that you've heard of or you've seen at CVS. Basically it is this dose of hormone it's called, levonorgthestrel is the name of the hormone. It's always given at 1.5 milligrams. What you find across the board ubiquitously, and what it does is it just delays ovulation from happening to prevent fertilization. So what this means is you are able to stop pregnancy before it happens by telling your body, just don't release that egg yet. And that keeps any opportunity from fertilization from happening. Okay. I'm going to say that three more times in other words.

Rebecca Gwilt (08:24):

Right, because this is different than a pill that sort of terminates pregnancy after fertilization has occurred.

Cynthia Plotch (08:33):

Correct. This is all pre-fertilization. This is not an abortion. This does not affect any fertilized embryo that may already be in existence. This is just preventing that opportunity for that embryo to form.

Rebecca Gwilt (08:50):

Got it. Got it. And what does sort of the demand for emergency contraception look like in the US?

Cynthia Plotch (08:58):

Well, changing quickly. We've seen it double in the past 15 years as regulation around emergency contraceptive, conception contraceptives have opened up, but what we have seen is these new booms in demand for this product tied to increasing regulation about access to reproductive healthcare. So when SB8 first passed in Texas, there was a run on the morning after pill on emergency contraceptives. We have seen that now play out across the country since that leaked SCOTUS decision on Roe v. Wade since we've seen laws in Oklahoma, Mississippi, Florida, all over the country.

Rebecca Gwilt (09:38):

And so part of what your Restart, Restart program is going to do is provide an avenue for access to this product. Do you have a sense of what the major barriers are to access at this point?

Cynthia Plotch (09:53):

Yeah, so I think a lot of it is the myths around it. Honestly. We talk to our own customers in 60 odd percent of our customers. So people who were spending a ton of time educating about their bodies think that emergency contraceptives have a long-term impact on their health. So many people, the majority of women think that it has long-term impacts. Many women, almost half of all women think it's the equivalent to an abortion. And what that does is creates a lot of fear around this product. If you think that if you take it, you're going to become infertile or you're going to get really sick, or it'll have this unknown impact in the health of your uterus, or if you think it's an abortion and that's not a decision you are personally ready to make in that moment, that's going to keep a lot of people from using this product when they really need. So I think the top piece of this problem of access is rooted in education and a system that isn't set up to educate us properly. I think the other piece here is making sure that we're getting it to people, anybody with the uterus who might need it in a way that feels and works best for them. So that's a representative brand that's thinking about discretion and privacy and protecting that for the consumer at all costs.

Rebecca Gwilt (11:08):

So speaking of privacy, <laugh> and protecting women you will not be surprised to hear that in the last few weeks since the leak, since the week of Alito's draft of the Roe v Wade opinion I have personally been hearing from a great many women and given my line of work, many of whom are femtech founders or female founders about how reproductive rights are likely to change in this country. Significantly, many of these at least the business owners are quite hesitant to speak out because, well, because it's always a gamble when you involve personal and political belief system and your business. But this issue is so core to the values of a lot of those in the femtech community, and I know it is for you as well and for some even core to their business I can sense it's a really hard thing to navigate at present.

Cynthia Plotch (12:05):

Yeah it is. So sticky is the word I keep using, but I think what's important to remember as business leaders is to be able to block out a lot of the political noise and focus on what our communities and our country actually wants. More than 70% of people in the country believe that abortion should be accessible in some form or in other, the vast majority of this country does not believe that Roe v Wade should be entirely overturned. Now there's a lot of different thinking about what that should mean, what limitations on access should exist versus no limitations. But I just want to say that again, three out of four Americans don't agree with this decision. This is not representative of our country and this is not representative of definitely the community we are building here at Stix And I think that's an important thing to remember because there's a lot of noise from every side right now about the politicalization of women's bodies. But the truth is we need to listen to the people who we're actually talking about and that is people with uteruses here. And I would definitely encourage every business owner to remember and to think about that. I think the other piece and is that the amount that we're hearing that too on our end?

(13:21):

So we as a part of launching Restart, have just launched today is Thursday, so Monday May 23rd, we launched the Restart donation being where we're working with brands and community partners to build this monetary amount of Restart that we're going to be able to distribute to anybody who needs it in the country. No questions asked, if you need Restart and you can't afford it, we've got your back. And we're working with amazing brand partners here to amplify this message and to contribute into this program. But it was honestly upsetting for myself, my co-founder of my team to see the number of brands who just wouldn't touch this with the 10 foot pole.

Rebecca Gwilt (14:05):

Is it, why is it important, especially today, things have changed a lot in the last even 10 years around the way to build businesses. Why is it important for companies to lead with their values even on controversial issues or possibly, especially when there are controversial issues?

Cynthia Plotch (14:35):

So Stix is a consumer business, so I don't necessarily know about how a B2B business, a SaaS business would do this. But I can tell you as a consumer business consumers and the newer generations, millennials and Gen Z are more and more making decisions and making purchasing decisions that align with their values, whether that be about sustainability or access or inclusivity or whatever else that means. I think we see that so strongly evident in the fashion of beauty industries where we're seeing huge push towards size, inclusivity towards shade and color inclusivity towards being representative of queer folks and focus of different gender identities. And then I think we're also seeing it happening a ton around sustainability there too. More and more people's values are significant drivers of their decision making and at a time where there's so much unknown in the world right now, not just about our health, but about the economic future that we're heading into. It's a really scary time to be a human today, I think. And so I think more and more you have to give your customers a reason to pick you and values and alignment and standing up for what you believe in is an important piece of that.

Rebecca Gwilt (15:54):

It's still a gamble though, isn't it? I mean, I'm sure that you and your team had tough discussions about this. I love the confidence and I am with you with what you're trying to do but I think it is still incredibly brave. You've got folks that quite frankly paid you a lot of money to help you build your business who all have opinions about this, many of whom may not align with you on this. I would love to hear a little bit more about how you navigated this decision making because I think it's quite inspiring.

Cynthia Plotch (16:34):

Thank you. And I think there's a lot of people that we are or will make angry by making this decision. Our biggest priority is the health and safety of our team and our community. And so that means we've done a lot to protect our physical and psychological safety as individuals on the Stix team. Because I think honestly that's where our biggest risk is right now is there's a lot of people who do a lot of crazy things and that we need to make sure that we're keeping ourselves safe. So from a risk perspective, honestly, that's the thing that most keeps me up at night more than anybody's dollars. It's the health and safety of my people. So I would say that's the first thing when it comes to risk and that is not something to take lightly. That is a significant thing that we are all choosing to take on to put ourselves in this position.

(17:22):

And then the other piece is how we navigate this decision from a business standpoint. So I think what is really unique about this moment is that it's not just an opportunity to stand up on our values and put out something into the world that we so strongly believe in. This is the opportunity for us to build a business that we want to build. Restart is going to be a pillar of Stix future, not just in our fight for access and our fight for true care, but as a pillar of what we want to be able to offer and honestly provide and sell to our customer base. There is not just this social thing behind what we're doing. This is a, there's a business case to make this decision here too. And so we are lucky to have investors who are able to see that. I think we've always built Stix as a mission driven for profit company as a socially conscious brand. And so I don't think it's come as a great surprise that we found this opportunity to do really well and to do really good.

Rebecca Gwilt (18:27):

The other thing I've been watching you do is you know, mentioned this a little bit earlier, but create partnerships. So create sort of a larger ecosystem that hopefully is speaking with the same voice and talking to the same consumers. How important is it for folks that are in your space and possibly adjacent to your space to come together on this? I guess I'm also interested in the business case for that versus the sort of activist case.

Cynthia Plotch (19:04):

Yeah, I think the activist case is obviously clearer. I think the business case is fairly clear too. I think, like I said before, as female founders building women's health centric companies, we have this opportunity to rise tides, lift boats. I think we have this opportunity to amplify each other to make each other all better. Women's health is a massive piece of the industry. Health is another thing that you could actually call it for 51% of the population in this country. So we're not talking about super, super niche coffee mug providers. We're not all out here in crazy competition with each other. We can all win. And I think coming together and amplifying each other and building each other up will allow us to win from a business perspective too.

Rebecca Gwilt (19:54):

Super, super powerful. And I could just sort of grill you on this for <laugh> for hours but we're going to wrap this for now. If any of you listening are interested in joining a conversation with other femtech leaders to discuss how the pending Supreme Court decision and state level legislation may impact your business or if you just want to chat with other folks in this space Nixon Gwilt Law, my law firm has convened a reproductive tax task force and we've put a link in the show notes for you just to join into that conversation if that's something you're interested in. Cynthia, if folks want to contribute to the donation bank for Restart or otherwise sort of join forces with Get Stix and its partners I'd love to hear a little bit about how they could get involved.

Cynthia Plotch (20:47):

So anybody can go to our website, getstix.com, and there you'll see front and center, the ability to donate to the Restart donation bank. Just $20 can help cover the cost of one dose of Restart for somebody who needs help getting access to it. So it's definitely an every dollar count sort of situation.

Rebecca Gwilt (21:09):

And thank you so much. I will head there after this recording. If you haven't already, please subscribe to Decoding Healthcare Innovation follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter. That's all for this episode. Thank you so much for listening and we will see you next time.

Cynthia Plotch (21:24):

Thank you for having me.



Digital Health, Healthcare Access, Teleprescribing, Women's HealthNixon Gwilt LawDobbs, Roe v. Wade, abortion access, reproductive and maternal healthcare, cynthia plotch, Stix, emergency contraception