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Polly Rodriguez , Unbound Babes
Known for sending vibrators to members of Congress in support of reproductive health , and tussling with New York City ’ s MTA over sexism in subway ads , Unbound Babes is on a mission to destigmatize sexual wellness . We speak with co-founder and CEO Polly Rodriguez .
By Nicole Kirichanskaya
Inside Retail : What was your professional background prior to launching Unbound Babes ? Polly Rodriguez : I have definitely pivoted careers a couple of times . I started out in government , working for [ then-Missouri senator ] Claire McCaskill . Then I worked for Deloitte , focusing on brand strategy for Fortune 100 companies . Following that , I worked at a dating start-up called Grouper .
IR : What inspired you to launch Unbound Babes ? PR : I was around really active groups in New York that were specifically trying to promote femme and nonbinary entrepreneurship , and I met my co-founder , Sarah Jayne Kinney , through one of those groups . Actually , she was the one who presented this idea about how painful a process it is to buy these [ sexual wellness ] products for the first time . I really related to it in a lot of ways because I had gone through a cancer diagnosis when I was 21 years old [ which resulted in early-onset menopause ]. I had a less-than-ideal shopping experience when trying to buy lubricant and a vibrator while going through radiation treatment and chemotherapy . It was the first time that I was faced with the reality of what it ' s like to navigate your sexual health as a femme or nonbinary [ person ] or any marginalized identity in the world .
At the time , we were really close to a lot of the early direct-to-consumer ( DTC ) start-ups , like Casper , Warby Parker and Glossier , and a lot of the people who worked for them . It just seemed really obvious to us that there was this huge opportunity to use
the tools of DTC for an industry that , for a very long time , has been predominantly run by older white men and family businesses that have existed for 50 to 100 years . Oftentimes , that leads to a lack of innovation , a lack of femme and nonbinary leaders and founders in the space . And the products that were available [ then ] really reflected that lack of diversity . So we decided to start the business in 2014 .
IR : What challenges did you encounter in your journey to launch ? PR : When you ' re a first-time founder , especially a first-time female founder , you don ' t have that same network – from people who have done this before , to investors who will stick their neck out for you and introduce you to a banking lender . Honestly , we took out a bunch of credit cards , which was terrifying , because in the beginning , we didn ' t have the money to make our own products . We sold third-party products through an e-commerce website , where we created a lot of educational content that was compelling , and the business very slowly started to scale and grow . We spent a lot of time talking to our customers , who were really evangelical about the brand , and despite all the doubt that we got from external sources , we knew that our customers loved what we were doing . Ultimately , that was what mattered .
IR : What sets Unbound Babes apart from other sexual wellness retailers in the industry ? PR : Our two biggest demographics are Gen Z and Millennials , so we tend to skew a little bit younger . We are also focused on
36 www . insideretail . us September 2023