Love For Red Timeline: A Look Back Through the Last Five Years
By: Madeline Riske // June 2025
This June, Love For Red is celebrating its five-year anniversary. To mark this milestone, we hosted a party celebrating our fight against period poverty in Iowa, and we’re taking a moment to reflect on some of the highlights from our journey. Here’s a look at what we’ve accomplished since our founding in 2020:
2025
Highlights: 58 donees added, 122 total donees
87,737 products donated so far in 2025, cumulative total of 201,896 products donated till date!
January: We hosted the 2025 Day on the Hill at the Iowa Capitol, advocating for menstrual product accessibility in schools.
March: As a direct result of our advocacy, HF 543 passed in the Iowa House Education subcommittee and full education committee with unanimous bipartisan support, requiring schools to provide menstrual products in bathrooms. Our founder, student ambassadors, and leadership testified at the public hearing.
May: HF 883, the succesor of HF 543, passed the Iowa House Appropriations subcommittee with unanimous bipartisan support. This bill requires school boards to ensure that feminine hygiene products can be accessed by female students without cost in the women’s restrooms in school buildings in the districts where students in grades 6-12 are educated.
2024
Highlights: 31 donees added, 64 total donees
62,437 products donated in 2024, cumulative total of 114,159 products donated
January: Our founder was named a Des Moines Register “People to Watch in 2024”
We established our Board of Advisors and had our first advisory board meeting
February: We hosted the 2024 Day on the Hill at the Iowa Capitol, advocating for menstrual product accessibility in schools
May: We won a pallet of $1000 worth of period products (again!) from the National Foundation for Women Legislators.
2023
Highlights: 16 donees added, 33 total donees
28,298 products donated in 2023, cumulative total of 51,722 products donated
February: We hosted our first Day on the Hill event at the Iowa State Capitol, advocating for free period product access.
Our founder was featured in Iowa Department of Human Rights’ “People You Should Know” video series.
April: We hosted our first Iowa City Event: Let’s Talk Period Poverty.
June: We had our first community booth at a festival!
August: We established our Student Ambassador program with 9 ambassadors. In current day (2025), we now have over 24 ambassadors!
We published our first Tiktok video.
October: Our founder was featured on the Iowa Public Radio’s Talk of Iowa Series.
We launched our first organization newsletter!
December: We established our Leadership Team and had our first leadership meeting.
2022
Highlights: 3 donees added, 17 total donees
11,474 products donated in 2022, cumulative total of 23,424 products donated
February: Love For Red became an official 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
May: We had our first public presentation at a local event: the APEX Spring Showcase.
June: We celebrated the state of Iowa eliminating the tampon tax.
July: We held our first members/supporters meeting.
August: We made our first presentation to a Public School Board for the Waukee School Board and hosted our first community outreach event.
December: We began operations in Iowa City.
2021
Highlights: 8 donees added , 14 total donees
8,670 products donated in 2021, cumulative total of 11,950 products donated
February: Our founder was Featured on Axios.
We made our first school donation, donating 480 products to Waukee High School.
July: We reached a milestone of 10,000+ menstrual products donated in just over one year! That’s equivalent to over 500 periods aided.
November: Our founder was featured in Fabulous Iowa.
2020
Highlights: 6 donees
3,280 products donated in 2020 to 7 shelters
June: We made our first-ever product donation (800+ pads and tampons)
August: We hosted our first fundraiser
Thank you to every person who has been part of Love For Red’s journey over the past five years. To our volunteers, donors, student ambassadors, and every supporter who has advocated for us in the fight against period poverty: we are endlessly grateful. This community’s passion and dedication have brought us to where we are today, and we can’t wait to see what milestones the next five years hold!