Tushy is the New Way to Wipe... Your Tushy
Chances are when you think of a bidet you think of some fancy foreign bathroom in a faraway land. You think of a king or queen, who, not wanting to be bothered with pesky toilet paper (pinky up!), would rather have a spritz of cool water to clean off their dirty bits after a trip to their golden throne. These days however, bidets aren’t so out-of-reach. They’re not just for the rich, and they’re not just for foreign lands, in fact, they're most likely in a bathroom near you… and if they’re not, they will be soon if Tushy has anything to say about it.
Environmental entrepreneur and “She-EO” Miki Agrawal, created Tushy with the intention of reducing global wastefulness and turning people into born-again bidet lovers. Her rap sheet of creating noteworthy companies that make a difference is long. She’s the woman behind THINX (you’ve seen the subway ads all over NY—underwear for women with periods); she’s the woman behind Icon (underwear for women with leakage); she’s the woman behind WILD (an organic farm-to-table pizza restaurant with three NY locations); she’s one half of the twin sister set who are getting people up in the wee hours of the morning to boogie down at a DAYBREAKER morning rave; and then, as if that wasn’t enough, she’s a bestselling author and an ex-professional sports star (soccer). Yowza.Growing up in Montreal to immigrant parents (her father is from India and her mother from Japan), a sense of gratitude for what she had was instilled in her and her siblings from a young age. “We truly won the lottery of life to be born to a country that has the privilege that we do,” Miki explains of her desire to make a difference. “We’re on this planet for just a short amount of time so it’s our duty to give back as much as we can.”And she’s doing that one bidet at a time with Tushy. Shocked that toilet habits haven’t changed in our country and inspired by the commonality of bidets in countries like India and Japan, she set out to educate America on the topic.
Here are the facts: Americans use an average of 57 sheets of toilet paper every day, and 1.5 rolls per week. A single roll of TP takes about 37 gallons of water to make, it has to be bleached with chemicals, and then, there's that whole tree problem. 15 million trees are chopped down every year to make these massive amounts of rolls that we so nonchalantly use.Additionally, years of rubbing on those sensitive spots of our nether’s ultimately takes a toll on our bodies. Hemorrhoids happen. UTI’s happen. Yeast infections happen. Anal fissures... no thank you! These can all be greatly reduced with a simple shooter of water to clean you up.Tushy has created a sleek attachment for your toilet that sprays after you make your number. It’s refreshing! It uses no electricity but works with your toilet’s flusher system to provide a gentle concentrated stream right to your booty.The attachments are easy to install. They are less than $100, and— New York bathrooms calm down!— they aren’t big and bulky; they will fit. And because the creator is Miki, and she’s basically the Mother Teresa of all downstairs mix-ups, for every Tushy bidet that is sold, one family in a developing country will gain access to clean community toilets. Tushy has teamed up with Samagra, an organization that builds toilet facilities for those that don’t have them, helping to solve the problem of poor sanitation throughout the world.
The change that Miki is creating with Tushy and the rest of her companies is massive. They are markets that have not been tampered with for far too long and she is going in and reshaping what they mean. “I choose to focus on changing the culture, lifting the taboo, and getting rid of the stigma. By using innovation and design we can make these topics beautiful and sexy, and make products that make people feel powerful,” she explains. There’s no doubt she will do just that, and in the case of Tushy, she’ll start from the bottom and work her way up.Lindsay DeLong is the Managing Editor of The Fullest. She still swears she's fancier every time she bidets. Find Lindsay at lindsay@thefullest.com or on social media via @lindizzaster.
