health

Lauren Steinberg rebranded the term “feminine hygiene”and bestowed the “coochie,” “twat” and/or “vajay-jay,” as Queen of all kingdoms. The USC alum earned her spot on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list with the creation of her intimate wellness brand, Queen V. Steinberg launched Queen V in 2018 to educate women on their vaginas and vaginal areas after having a tough time with her own.

On March 16, The Stand NYC turned into the Queen V head quarters for an evening of “Vagina Trivia” and girl talk with comedian Mary Beth Barons who hosted the event celebrating the company’s new line of products; including wipes, lubricant, probiotic supplements and more.In the midst of tasty cocktails, light bites and Vagina tunnel photo ops, The Knockturnal had the opportunity to chat with the CEO.

The Knockturnal: Tell me about the products and how you got your business started. 

Lauren S: I’ve been around vaginas my entire life! Not only because I’m a female, my dad’s a gynecologist as well. So for me, growing up vaginas were just something that was always talked about and as I got older, I started to get infections down there. Long story short, I basically went to the drug store to go buy products that would cure me of my infections. Got there and the entire aisle was so confusing and embarrassing. I ended up buying a bunch of products, went home, nothing worked for me. That’s when the idea of Her Queen V was born. Queen V just takes a really fun, easy approach to a topic that I think a lot of people with vaginas just seem to find really confusing and embarrassing. So what we’ve done is broken intimate wellness down into three steps. Step one is maintaining your “V.” Maintaining your “V” is all about keeping everything fresh and your microbiome balanced. Step two is helping your “V” so when something goes wrong and your microbiome balance is out of wack, how do you fix it? And then step three is enjoying your “V” and that’s all about self care, self love without worrying about getting an infection. Everything’s color coded according to the category it’s in. So it’s super easy to understand what everything does. 

The Knockturnal: I think it’s safe to say you’re a feminine hygiene pro by now. What’s the main misconception you often hear from women that you have to correct?

Lauren S: I think the term “feminine hygiene” in general is kind of outdated now, at this point. I’m trying to broaden it to “intimate wellness” because I feel that’s meeting where we’re at. It’s very sad. A lot of people will DM me and they’re really nervous to go see a gynecologist for the first time. I think that they think the gynecologist is going to judge the way their vagina looks and that there’s a certain way a vagina is supposed to look and smell, like what’s normal? When in reality, we’re all different. All of our faces are different so all of our vaginas are different as well. There really is no such thing as a “normal” vagina. Obviously, if you think something is off go to the gynecologist, but I think that’s the number one thing. I don’t want people to not go to the gynecologist because they’re afraid of what their vagina looks like, so that’s why we have these mirrors here. The thing is, Queen V is all about befriending your body. How do you befriend your body if you’ve never even seen your vagina? 

The Knockturnal: Well you’ve been doing such a good job educating. Congratulations are definitely in order. What was your favorite part of the journey?

Lauren S: You’re making me emotional. I mean, I think as a founder there are just so many highs and lows and for me, I’m growing as a human being and as a person. I love using my platform for education, it’s really important to me. About two years ago now, I found out I have the BRCA gene, which puts me at super high risk for breast and ovarian cancer. So for me, if people are not feeling comfortable going to the gynecologist, it’s a big problem. So I try to just use my platform to make everything a little bit less scary and more lighthearted. I think I’ve been able to do that over the years and not take myself too seriously as a founder. 

As of March 21, Queen V products are available in select Walmart stores and on the company website.