ABOUT

Brief
Warning: this entry is going to talk about periods, wombs and bleeding. If you’re embarrassed by this or faint of heart… keep reading as you’re exactly the reason this campaign exists.
Over 50% of the UK has periods – but ‘women’s problems’ are still dismissed, silenced and ignored.
We were tasked by Libresse to shatter this culture of silence and empower people to speak up and be heard. To share how they feel, to force a conversation about endometriosis and pain, to scream when they’re traditionally muzzled.
With this campaign we wanted to offer people suffering with intimate pain the tools and words necessary to communicate their suffering. We want to close the gender pain gap, one story at a time.

Concept
Let’s start with terminology – menstrual pain isn’t ‘women’s problems’ – it’s a real, physiological issue that most people with wombs will experience.
We are told to ‘put up with it’; taught that period pain is ‘normal’. To some degree it is – your body needs to expel uterine matter, which requires some muscular contraction, but as our medical partner on the project GP Dr Shireen Emadossadaty would say: “Period pain is common, but it’s not normal and it’s not something you should be suffering with.”
Extreme period pain can be a symptom of chronic pelvic conditions, such as adenomyosis, vaginismus, polycystic ovary syndrome or endometriosis. The issue is that the male-oriented, traditionalist medical system makes no distinction between pain levels, and assumes that some ‘just don’t do periods well’. Too often, people with wombs aren't listened to; they’re dismissed, misdiagnosed, ignored.
And this unconscious medical bias, a dearth of research and a continued lack of funding leaves us suffering undiagnosed and untreated for years. Take for example endometriosis; although it affects one in 10 people who have periods, it takes an average of seven and a half years for diagnosis.
We knew silence and the culture of secrecy around pain was a powerful insight; according to Libresse's Global V Taboo Tracker, half of people worldwide believe period and menstrual pain should be endured in silence. So we decided to bring noise to spaces where people are traditionally silent, to rip through the quiet with our message.
We landed on museums as being the perfect metaphor for institutional silence, a place where people are cowed into quiet and where artwork can challenge some of society’s most uncomfortable taboos.
But at a time when physical exhibition spaces were closed, we had to get creative. Welcome to the world’s first Pain Museum – a virtual space to educate and engage society on the extent of womb pain and how it is overlooked, underfunded, and often ignored.
Launched to mark Endometriosis Awareness Month, the Pain Museum is a harrowing, unflinching journey of intimate pain across three exhibition rooms – the Experiencing Pain Zone, Ending Suffering Zone, and Taking Action Zone. Through a mixture of stats, animations, videos, visceral art, it takes people on an expressive deep dive into pain, telling the #painstories that need to be heard. A place where those suffering can feel understood and know that their story is heard.

Execution
The Pain Museum was developed by Ketchum’s in-house production team to explore the gender pain gap one story at a time. The visual narrative journey starts with a visceral and bloody red colour palette in the Experiencing Pain Zone as we confront the reality of the gender pain gap and hear first-hand experiences of pain and suffering. We didn’t want to tell sufferers’ stories for them – again, that’s an act of silencing. So worked with Lauren Mahon, who suffered from endometriosis in her early 20s, to tell her story and share her journey to diagnosis with us in a powerful video.
Next we visit the Ending Suffering Zone to contextualise pain through confronting artwork. Each piece created based on a unique understanding of pain from an endometriosis sufferer. Descriptions, including Inner Nails, Womb War, Bowling Ball Bruising have been brought to life by artists, many of which themselves have endometriosis. Collectively these artworks form the Pain Dictionary, which has been designed to help women define their pain to their GP.
Finally, in Taking Action, the viewer is called upon. The backdrop lightens as we end in a place of optimism and hope for the future. The voice of hope is Dr Shireen, a GP in London specialising in women’s health.
She encourages people to open up the conversation around period pain, encouraging women to see their GP and to be persistent on getting treatment.
Designed to reach a broad audience, the Pain Museum is hosted on the Libresse website and explorable in English, Russian, Hungarian, French, Spanish, with a Mandarin version currently in development.

Results
To ensure this reaches an audience beyond Libresse’s own, we knew we had to secure earned impact too. We launched the Pain Museum with a virtual media Q&A event, featuring our partners Lauren Mahon and Dr Shireen. Press from across national, consumer and trade were invited to learn more about #painstories and visit the museum.
In the first two weeks of the Pain Museum’s virtual doors opening, we’ve seen over 5000  visitors to the #Painstories page. We’ve secured 130+ pieces of coverage across consumer, trade and digital including hitting the pages of Glamour, Huffington Post, Cosmo and Metro, with a total reach of +172 million. This also includes coverage in French, Turkish, Spanish and Italian titles.
With this award entry and this campaign, we’ve talked about periods and pain. A lot. Loudly. That’s because we believe people do not need to suffer, living in pain, without being heard or feeling they can share how they feel. We wanted to offer women suffering with intimate pain the tools and words necessary to communicate their suffering. And while it won’t happen overnight, we are closing the gender pain gap, one story at a time.