Global retail sales grew 1% over the past four years. According to this year’s annual report from the World Federation of Direct Selling Associations (WFDSA), the direct selling channel saw a 2.3% year-over-year decrease in global sales in 2023, amounting to $167.6 billion. While this was a decline, it is still above pre-pandemic sales levels in 2019. The arc of the industry’s revenue, which increased during the pandemic in 2020 and 2021 by 2.2% and 2% respectively, shows the channel’s resilience amid political upheaval, economic and supply chain disruptions and new post-pandemic strategies.
The report included a list of the world’s billion-dollar direct selling markets, which listed 21 countries. The United States, Germany and Korea rounded out the top three within this list. Globally, sales representatives numbers followed the sales trajectory, rising in 2020 and 2021, before falling in 2022 and 2023. Global sales representatives in 2023 totaled 102.9 million.
“The global direct selling channel—direct selling companies and their independent representatives—responded to the challenges as opportunities and delivered goods and services to people around the world,” the WFDSA said in its report. “These direct sales of over half-a-trillion US dollars from 2020 to 2023 had positive impacts on local communities across the globe, providing people with goods and services, and household income through a flexible entrepreneurial business opportunity.”
