
LAUNCHING:
Gabby Edlin
01.
What is your professional title, purpose or passion?
CEO and Founder of Bloody Good Period. The charitable organisation working to achieve menstrual equity in the UK.
03.
What did you want to do when you were a child and what changed?
I wanted to be an artist, or more specifically a fashion designer until I was about 17. I was absolutely obsessed with it - I have drawers full of designs, and used to make my own clothes. Then one day it didn’t feel meaningful to me any more. I think it may have been around the time I discovered feminism to be honest. Naively, at the time, I thought the two were mutually exclusive. Obviously, now I know that not to be true, but at the time, fashion did not feel feminist to me as a teenage girl.
05.
What's the best career advice you've ever been given?
Your perfect job may not have been invented yet, so you might have to do it yourself. (spoiler: I did!)
07.
What is the best thing about your current working environment?
It’s a bunch of people who really, genuinely care about what we do. There are five of us at BGP, and we share an office with ethical fashion label Birdsong. There’s loads of feminist shouting, political chat and a generally upbeat, encouraging vibe.
09.
Where do you see yourself in five years' time?
I don’t think I’ll be running BGP anymore. Not only do we have designs on not existing in our current provision in five years, but there’s nothing worse than founder syndrome in an organisation. I’m sure it’ll break my heart but I’ll have moved on to something else exciting!
11.
Tell us more about a charitable organisation or project you think is great.
Well obviously us (Bloody Good Period) but also my friend Seyi Akiwowo runs an amazing and very necessary organisation combating online abuse, called Glitch.
13.
What drives you?
Assume you are probably wrong about other people, and work from there.
15.
Any final comments?
Always ask other women for specific advice; just don’t ask to “pick their brains.”
02.
What does a normal day look like for you?
Oh god, I haven’t had a normal day in 3 years! It will generally some combination of replying to emails, meeting with my team, speaking on a panel, on the phone to reporters, writing, reading...painting things red...
04.
What have you achieved that you feel most proud of?
Just creating my own organisation that runs in a feminist and forward thinking way. BGP is more than just the service we provide to asylum seekers and refugees, we are also a feminist movement and it’s essential our organisation reflects that. I feel proud every day that a small idea I had has touched thousands of people, and even, sometimes, inspired them.
06.
Tell us about a a woman who inspires you
There are far too many to name but inspiring me today... I would have to say Liv Little (creator of gal dem).
08.
What was your biggest failure?
I’ve had so many failures, and I don’t mean that in an annoying, start-up bro way. Just real, crap human ideas that you put out there, because you have to, and that just flop. Probably my biggest “failure” though, was school. I didn’t get particularly great A levels (and I went to a school where anything less than top marks was considered average to poor) but I was determined to get into uni so I worked extra extra hard to get in a couple of years later which taught me I could achieve what I wanted if I pushed myself harder.
10.
What do you like most about yourself?
I think I’m a good judge of character.
12.
How can we make the world more inclusive and accepting?
Assume you are probably wrong about other people, and work from there.
14.
What skills have been key to your journey so far?
Tenacity, kindness and a sense of humour.