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Know Thyself: Q&A with Revital U CEO Andy McWilliams

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This Q&A is part of the July 2018 Cover Story

Q: How does being cloud-based give you an advantage over companies with large headquarter locations and lots of employees?
In the startup phase it’s a great way to control expenses since you are not putting money into infrastructure and things you don’t need like office space in the beginning. For us it was great way for us to get into the game and put our money where it belongs, which for us was marketing and communications.

Q: Why are having trusted suppliers essential to your success?
They are incredibly important to us. We don’t like the word “supplier” or “vendor” and prefer to call them “partners” because that’s what they are since we are outsourcing a big majority of our business to them. I’m a big believer in the “know thyself” principle. I know what parts of the business we excel at and where we don’t. And we went and found partners who are experts in those areas where we needed help.

Q: What is the number one factor in choosing partners for your business?
Trust is the number one factor. You are in business with them, they just don’t work for you.
And we know as much about their business as they do about ours. We have earned each other’s trust because they are in it with us. And that’s the difference between a partner and a vendor.

Q: Is there a risk of allowing partners to get too close?
When we were first starting the company, I had a little of that old legacy thinking. It was hard to let go and allow our partners access information to what we wanted to do. But what we found out is when you have a good business model, they can see your integrity and what you are trying to do and they know it will be a good thing for them as well.

Q: What are the weak spots that outsourcing alleviates?
I didn’t want to build a traditional company inside a network marketing company. I wanted to do what we do best. You can call that a weakness, but we think we are building a much stronger company for the long run by finding great partners we can plug into those areas we need and let them go to work.

Fragile or Agile?

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Disruption is coming. How nimble is your company to weather the inevitable storm?

Ten years ago, when we needed a ride, we called a cab by default. Then came Uber and Lyft, to the dismay of taxi drivers. Twenty years ago, when we wanted to buy new clothes, we drove to the mall. Then came Amazon, forever changing the fates of brick-and-mortar stores and shipping carriers. Oh, what a difference disruption makes.
Technological disruption isn’t new, but it’s accelerating. Consider that it took about 80 years for Americans to adapt to the dishwasher. Yet the consumer internet became commonplace in less than a decade.

Another example of how disruption is changing the landscape of the marketplace is China. Currently, China is home to nine of the world’s 20 biggest internet companies by market cap while the U.S. has eleven. Five years ago, China had two and the U.S. had nine.

These are some of the key insights revealed by venture capitalist Mary Meeker, who released her highly anticipated Internet Trends report in May 2018. The slide deck is crammed with timely tech stats and upcoming trends. The message is: Disruption isn’t done.

Agility vs. Stability

In today’s market, agility is what’s now. Agility is the ability of a company to react to changing market forces. What about stability? Isn’t that a critical component of business success?

The experts of our time say you need both agility and stability today. Truly agile organizations are both stable and dynamic at the same time.

Take the smartphone. It has a fixed hardware platform that basically doesn’t change. But it also contains space for new and ever-changing apps. Just like the agile company that possesses a stable backbone with the dynamic capability to change in the face of disruption.

Even if you’re now an established industry leader—even if fortune has clearly favored you—remember that fewer than 10 percent of the non-financial S&P 500 companies in 1983 remained in the S&P 500 in 2013.

A 2018 article from McKinsey & Company, The Five Trademarks of Agile Companies, says we are moving from an “organization as machine” model to a new business paradigm of “organization as organism.” The agile company is dawning as the new dominant organizational paradigm. Rather than organization as machine, the agile organization is a living organism.

A machine is inflexible, unmoving, bureaucratic. A living organism is nimble and quick on its feet. It adapts to the environment quickly. If companies want to stay successful, they must act with agility.

History is Our Best Teacher

How agile is your organization? What if the equivalent of Uber came your way? Would your company be quick enough to respond to the market headwinds?

Lean Business Model Benefits
Whether your company is a small startup, mid-size or legacy direct selling leader, your business will benefit from a lean philosophy in the short- and long-term. Here are just a few of the benefits of operating from this business paradigm.

Engaged Employees
By placing responsibility for your company’s success on your employees directly—makes them feel like their contributions are critical to your company’s success, from the receptionist to the CEO.

Business Growth
Focus on the essentials—discarding what doesn’t work for your company or doesn’t matter to your customers. As a result of this streamlining, you’ll save your time, money and energy for things that truly matter to your business growth.

Customer Focus
An integral piece of the lean philosophy is putting customer service front and center. This means sincerely listening to complaints and problems and then acting on that input rather than only paying attention to positive comments. As a result, your products and services are bound to improve.

Businesses large and small would do well to heed the history lessons of their predecessors, suggests Baba Prasad, CEO of the Vivékin Group and author of Nimble: Make Yourself and Your Company Resilient in the Age of Constant Change.

Companies like Digital Equipment and Ericsson were once considered leaders in the marketplace—sure bets. But they failed because they could not think and act differently from what they had always done.

“DEC, or Digital Equipment Corp., is an example of how companies can just die even if they’re huge,” Prasad says in a podcast. “It was a $14 billion company in the early 1990s, with offices in 95 countries. But in a matter of six to seven years it folded, because it didn’t anticipate the emergence of the microcomputer. Compaq ultimately bought it.”

DEC is a classic example of a company that was not nimble, he says. “If you don’t have an agile approach, you die,” Prasad adds. “Many companies have folded when they didn’t have agility.”

Ryan Napierski, President of Nu Skin, touched on this during his speech at the DSA Annual Meeting last month. “The way we build our organizations… if we are not flexible, if we are used to working in waterfall type orientations, we can’t move as quickly as we need to move and compete in today’s world,” he says. “The ideal organization regardless of size has to be nimble and have the ability to pivot as the market changes.”

What You Can Do Now

Is there anything you can do right now to prepare for disruptive times ahead? How can you make your company more lean and mean and agile, readier to adapt to change?
Being agile and lean doesn’t mean a reduction in staff—it’s about how your organization operates as a whole. Are your people empowered to make decisions without you? Can third-party supplier partners help take some of the load off of you in some respects?

It’s about engaging your employees in the effort to stay agile, lean and profitable. Are you empowering them in making decisions to be a part of the solution? One of our industry’s own is doing just that.

In May 2018, Young Living announced it would be incentivizing its employees with a new employee profit-sharing program as part of its plan to become a $2 billion company this year. The company hopes the new plan will also help them reach other goals that tie in with agility—such as cultivating their culture and attracting top talent.
The point is to think of ways to get employees to “think like a CEO,” so they will be motivated to go the extra mile and take responsibility for helping you stay agile and profitable. It takes everyone working together.

In today’s times, all businesses—from legacy companies to startups—should perform a self-assessment to determine where they are on the agility scale. If you haven’t thought about this in a while, now is a good time to reflect on the question all companies must answer.

Is your organization agile enough to weather the coming disruption storm? It’s a question you should reflect on and ultimately answer.

Strategic Pivot: ASEA’s infrastructure build out readies them for growth

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When they launched nearly ten years ago, ASEA married the highly personal and culturally infused aspects of direct selling to a traditional, Fortune 50 corporate strategic planning structure. The mission: Take a revolutionary cellular health product to the masses worldwide.

Charles Funke

Charles Funke

 

ASEA
Founded: 2009
Headquarters: Pleasant Grove, UT
Top Executive: Tyler Norton, Founder/Chairman of the Board; Charles Funke, CEO; Jarom Webb, President; Scott Aldred, COO
Products: Cellular Health, Skincare, Nutrition

The sheer nature of revolutionary products poses challenges and ASEA recognized the double-edge of a scientifically complex product. Three years ago the company rebranded, planted a flag in the cellular health direct selling space and set about reinforcing the infrastructure necessary to transform and sustain their business on a global scale.

Fortune 50 to Cellular Health Leader

When Verdis Norton retired to Park City, Utah in his mid-50s, he wasn’t thinking about direct selling, and it’s unlikely anyone had heard the term Redox. In fact, “antioxidant” was a new buzzword, and Verdis was fresh from the Fortune 50 corporate world where he was vice president of strategy for Kraft Foods, reporting to the CEO in Chicago.

Strategy consulting work for a biotech company positioned Verdis perfectly to learn about a unique biochemistry area called Redox and a patented core technology—years in development—that promoted communication and ultracellular signaling in the human body. Impressed, he and a group of investors purchased the intellectual property, research, and patents in 2008. A year later, ASEA Redox, a cell signaling liquid supplement, launched commercially.

“We’ve run this company like a legacy company from Day One.”
—Tyler Norton, co-founder and chairman of the board

“Fact is, it was a product and a cause vision to get it out to the world as quickly as we could, once we learned and understood its universal benefits,” says Tyler Norton, Verdis’ son and ASEA co-founder and chairman of the board.

ASEA RENU Advanced

ASEA RENU Advanced

Despite the moral imperative for speed felt by the founders, which also included CEO Charles Funke, ASEA approached the direct selling business model with a Fortune 50 mindset and adopted strategic planning principles and processes that are now sacred, annual practices.

“We were profitable inside of our first 12 months and have been every year since, and that’s largely due to those disciplines. We’ve run this company like a legacy company from Day One,” says Norton.

Strategic Link

Strategic Link is a pioneering element of ASEA’s strategic plan for its business. The end game is to address key internal and external business concerns with no more than five and no less than three core strategies, which drive ASEA to financial outcomes and address qualitative challenges and issues. Strat Link is updated annually and includes a three-year outlook.

A series of cascading initiatives link all resource allocation and operating planning back to five areas of focus: product development and validation, new and existing market expansion, associate experience, culture and talent development (corporate and field), and operational excellence and financial management. Ninety-five percent of ASEA’s dollars trace back to these areas.

ASEA Diamond Summit Event

ASEA Diamond Summit Event

“Strategically, we are putting those five areas of emphasis out there and aligning resources, time and attention of our team to driving those things forward,” says Norton.

These are things they do every single year to make sure they are making the right decisions for the business. It’s not one guy calling the shots. “It’s a collaborative effort with all the best research and study in place, so that we are doing things strategically for the long term,” says Justin Wilson, senior vice president of sales.

“We’re often told we’re not flashy and we’re actually okay with that. We will take sustainability over a meteoric rise and corresponding cliff any day,” Funke says.

Redox – It’s Complicated

How do you get someone to understand something for which he or she has no context? That was and is ASEA’s Redox challenge.

“The upside: it’s very cutting edge and scientifically validated. We have patents on our technology and how we produce the product. We have all these people in the field that love the product. The downside: the field is filled with laymen and not Ph.D. scientists. It’s hard to explain the underlying functionality in the body,” says Becky Cox, vice president of marketing.

“We’re often told we’re not flashy and we’re actually okay with that. We will take sustainability over a meteoric rise and corresponding cliff any day.”
—Charles Funke, Chief executive officer

But does the sales field need to be an expert to sell Redox? ASEA has worked hard on good, solid science to help people understand what actually happens in the body and why cell signaling is so important. Their duplication model relies heavily on award-winning video and collateral materials to avoid Associate paralysis and inaccuracies when the science gets too complicated.

“We continually remind our field we don’t need to explain the mechanism of action. We only need to tell them it works, how it’s going to help, point to all the studies and the video if they have more detailed questions,” says Cox.

ASEA has come a long way, but Wilson believes they’ve only scratched the surface. One way ASEA hopes to make redox science more accessible is with new products that can make a difference in the world of cellular health.

ASEA first diversified its product line in 2014 when research and development stabilized a molecule that made its first topical skin product possible. A high-end, ultra-concentrated Redox eye serum and complementing skin care essentials (sans Redox) followed.

Intense, launch-product loyalty proved tricky with a hesitant field, but ASEA slowly transitioned Associates away from its ties to a solitary product by pre-releasing information and pre-launching products like its new nutritional line.

International Growth

At the time 69-year-old Verdis Norton, now retired, founded ASEA, his deep, abiding conviction to make a difference in people’s lives took the lead. His son says he wasn’t processing that through regulatory and compliance chalk lines, so ASEA has had to learn to operate within those boundaries.

“Our product is one that does not fit neatly into a classification in most countries, so we have had to establish very good relationships with regulators to educate governments about our product and the benefits of it,” Funke says.

It takes time, patience and a very active compliance department to navigate regulatory requirements in the 31 countries where ASEA operates and in 21 European markets where products are marketed differently. This group also monitors Associate activity for compliance.

Initial international expansion trailed from the U.S. on to Europe and to some degree Australia, New Zealand and Mexico, but left Asia at a cold stop. Funke says one of the biggest impediments to ASEA’s international growth, particularly in Asia, was its IT platform.

So an IT overhaul began. The far-reaching decision impacted every aspect of ASEA’s business and took two years to complete. In July 2017, ASEA transitioned to a customized system that opened aggressive growth potential in Asia.

H.Q. – Pleasant Grove, Utah

Recognized as one of the state’s best places to work by Utah Business magazine for two years, ASEA’s CEO feared they wouldn’t make the list in 2017. “We put an enormous amount of stress on the organization,” Funke says. “Within a time frame of a little under three months, we flipped the switch on the IT conversion, completed construction of a brand new building, moved in, held our international convention and opened two Asian markets.” But ASEA made the 2017 list.

The move into ASEA’s new headquarters, 47 miles south of Salt Lake City, is yet another important infrastructure milestone. It’s a place where Associates can come in, shake hands, and spend a minute in an open space where light passes from one side to the other. They can learn a little ASEA history, see their faces on the walls and understand how important they are to the business.

Less than a mile away is ASEA’s production facility, where the company controls 100% of their Redox-based product manufacturing. Everyone on the line is an ASEA employee. Visitors can tour the facility, peering through windows into production and bottling. From here, products ship by rail or truck to boats bound for 18 distribution centers around the world that stock ASEA products.

“It all goes back to infrastructure. These were all things that we needed in order to set us up to be able to have significant growth in the coming years,” Funke says.

Moving Forward

“We’ve grown every year, year over year. We had a record year last year. We’re on pace for significant double digit growth. We just built and finished out a brand new corporate office that’s a world-class facility. We’re a mile away from a 40,000 square foot production facility, which will be integral in scaling our business for future growth,” says Norton.

“We’ve grown every year, year over year. We had a record year last year. We’re on pace for significant double digit growth.”
—Tyler Norton

This inflection point comes as ASEA pivots from a two- to three-year operational and scalable infrastructure strategy to one of operational excellence and execution. Their expanded product catalog now allows a shift in product messaging toward universal appeal and should help diversify their customer base and Associate field that skews older.

They also have a social media strategy in place to get more traction, to get online influencers and to not only enhance their online reputation in search standings, but also be visible to a younger group of people who are more solely online versus the previous generations.

ASEA corporate headquarters located in Pleasant Grove, Utah

ASEA corporate headquarters located in Pleasant Grove, Utah

SEO efforts to drag down negative chatter are underway and two full-time, corporate social media hires work to increase online reputation and manage ASEA websites. Three key vendors help on the third party side.

“We have a few leaders who are millennials who have come up through the ranks and are very active online. When you see a powerful online direct seller go after it, they do amazing things,” says Cox. What takes a decade to build on paper, can happen in 12 months online.

“Our first wave of associates trended older and approached the business with a traditional networking mindset, but we have a growing wave of younger leaders that are looking for their audience in new and innovative ways. The first wave sees their success, and many of them are exploring these new techniques to reach a wider audience.” says Shane Martindale.

“We know if you don’t cultivate culture, the natural tendency as you grow is that it will go away. One day you wake up and you’re not the same company that attracted a lot of people to begin with.”
—Charles Funke

Many Associates acknowledge this is a great strategy, but aren’t capable of doing it themselves. “We recognize the untapped growth potential through generational diversity and are developing ways to educate and train our associates on how to leverage new technology in their business building.” says Martindale. Will ASEA someday lend a hand with that social media process for its field?

That’s tied up in the functionality of the company’s back office provider, Cox says. Some back end systems are a “hot mess” with interfaces that linking different systems together or bolt options on to standard systems. But ASEA’s new, from-scratch IT platform is customizable, Cox says, inferring that with proper lead time corporate social media management may be an option.

All that said, ASEA is acutely aware that theirs is a belly-to-belly business. Its culture is ethos based and a corporate ETHOS Academy at national conventions teaches corporate principles ranging from human interaction to the EP Ratio—managing ego and economic drives beneath principle, people and purpose. Maybe it’s too traditional and not high velocity or sexy, but it has substance, Wilson says, and people are drawn to it.

“We know if you don’t cultivate culture, the natural tendency as you grow is that it will go away. One day you wake up and you’re not the same company that attracted a lot of people to begin with,” Funke says.

“The goal here was to get ourselves, clearly foundationally set before we throw a lot of wood on the fire. We have significant double-digit growth happening now and it doesn’t feel like we’re stretching the business out. We have strong senior leadership positions and strong field leadership that knows our culture and raises that flag well. We’re ready to grow,” says Norton.

7 Points for a Successful Partnership

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A strong partnership divides the effort and multiplies the effect.

I wrote a book called Intentional Living, and out of the 100-plus books I’ve authored, this one is the most important I’ve ever written. One of the things I teach in this book is the value of what I call Front End Thinking. This kind of thinking is 10 to 1 more valuable than back end thinking. If you are intentional you think on the front end. You say to yourself where am I going? What am I trying to accomplish? What do I need to see and say? If you think well on the front end, your odds of having success are going to be much higher than if you think on the back end (“Oh my, what did I do? How can I change this?”)

There is a statement that says all’s well that ends well. That may be true, but let me tell you what’s better: All’s well that begins well. You can’t end well if you don’t begin well. Intentional living starts you down the right track of ending well.

I say that because in order to have a successful partnership you need to start well on the front end. Your success in your business is based on your ability to get along and partner well with other people and companies.

There are seven points to consider to for a successful partnership:

Place Their Agenda At The Top Of Your Agenda

When you partner with someone, they need to know where they stand in the relationship. And when they know they are at the top of your agenda it makes a major statement in their mind. When I was around 21 years of age I heard the late Zig Ziglar say, “If you will first help others get what they want, they will help you get what you want.” As he spoke and moved across the stage, I felt as if he were talking to just me.

Add Value On A Daily Basis

That was a major shift for me when I heard Zig say this because I was doing the exact opposite. I realized that up until that point I had been putting my needs and wants ahead of others, asking people to help me accomplish my goals and dreams.

But what I needed to do was focus on the needs of others. This changed my life and the way I taught leadership. I needed to add value to them first. I committed to becoming a ladder builder instead of a ladder climber. I needed to add value to others first. When you add value to yourself you add. But when you add value to others you multiply.

Resource You With Influence, Ideas, And Tools

So what does it mean to resource with influence? It means I am going to introduce you to people that I influence, which in turn will help increase your influence. The most important question you can ask someone who you are trying to gain influence from is who do you know that I should know? That question has opened up so many doors in my life.

“Your success in your business is based on your ability to get along, and partner well with other people and companies.”

If Influence asks who do you know that I should know? Ideas asks what do you know? Every time you meet with your partners, keep your eyes and ears open for fresh ideas you can implement in your own business.

Tools asks the question what do you use that I should use? What are the tools, systems and practices that have proven to be successful for your partners? A system is like a freeway, it gets you to where you are needing to go the quickest. Practices are the things you do that bring the desired success.

Tailor Your Services To Meet Their Needs

The key to tailoring is based on your questions. You have to be someone that asks good questions. Here is the challenge. The more you know someone, the less questions you ask. The more we know someone the more we come with answers, not questions. And when you are coming to the table with all the answers instead of questions, you are starting to live a life of assumption, which can bring a quick death to the relationship. And when you run out of answers, you run out of relationships.

Never Violate The Trust You Have In Us

If you are going to partner with me, I am never going to violate the trust you put in me. Because everything works on the basis of trust. Remove trust and you’ve lost the relationship. The highest compliment a person can say about you is that they can count on you.

Exceed Expectations In Everything You Do

Seventy percent of people don’t meet expectations. 25 percent meet expectations. And only 5 percent exceed expectations. And it’s those 5 percent that are going to walk away with the business. The least you can do is meet expectations, anything below that is total failure. I want meeting expectations to be your ground floor and exceeding expectations to be your ceiling.

Respect The Relationship, And I Will Grow In It

I believe respect must be earned daily. I feel we sometimes confuse honor and respect. You honor a person for what they have done in the past. You respect a person for what they do. I could live off of honor the rest of my life, but I want to live off of respect. Always contribute and gain respect for what you are doing now. Gain honor down the road for what you accomplished, but gain respect for what you doing now.

Place your agenda at the top of our agenda.
Add Value on a daily basis.
Resource you with influence, ideas, and tools.
Tailor your services to meet their needs.
Never violate the trust you have in us.
Exceed expectations in everything you do.
Respect the relationship, and I will grow in it.

Partner with Life-Valued People

When seeking partners, don’t choose people based on what they say they can do or based on what they did once. Choose based on their regular behaviors. That’s how you know what they really value.

Too often our choices are made by what we think we could or should do rather than what we usually do. We are all human, so we should give everyone the benefit of the doubt. But we also need to be realistic. We need to have a picture of what we’re shooting for.

Picking the right partners is crucial to taking our lives to the next level. It is a key practice in intentional living. But we can pick the right partners only if we know what matters to us. In just a second I’ll offer a quick guide to help you assess your personal values, which will in turn help you pick the right partners.

What Are Your Values?

To find like-valued people, you need to know what you’re looking for. Think about the values most important to you for making a difference in the lives of others. As a starting point, I look for people who embody these 12 qualities:

  • Thinks about others first
  • Thinks bigger than self
  • Has a passion that’s contagious
  • Offers complementary skills
  • Is great at support
  • Possesses a can-do spirit
  • Has an expanded influence
  • Holds an activist mindset
  • Is a proven ladder builder
  • Stands out from the crowd
  • Creates teamwork
  • Makes a difference

Which of those is important to you? Put a check mark by them. What additional qualities or characteristics not listed are important to you? Write them down. This becomes your starting list for finding like-valued people.

“REMEMBER: Great partnerships make you better than you are. They multiply your values, enable you to do what you do best, allow you to help others do their best, give you more time, help you fulfill the desires of your heart, and compound your vision and effort.”

Outsourcing Fulfillment? 5 Things to Know

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“Should I outsource my fulfillment?” As a direct seller, you might be reading this and asking this very question.

Perhaps it’s a decision that kept you up at night several years ago as you spent countless hours crunching numbers and sifting through RFPs. Or, maybe you’re currently undergoing an RFP process and are having a tough time choosing the company you feel is the right match for your business.

Whatever the case may be, outsourcing the fulfillment function is a necessary means in helping you focus on running the elements of your business that you know best; whether it be product development, sourcing, creative, media and financials. And depending on where you are in the business development stage, the nuances of these elements can vary.

Let’s take a look at each of these stages:

A startup company has a lot of balls to juggle. Managing costs is one of the greatest concerns. You might be tempted to reduce costs with a Do-It-Yourself approach to fulfillment. However, keep in mind that a DIY approach will divert your attention from more critical areas of the business, adds little value to influence your success or failure and in short, is a huge drain on your time and resources. Additionally, as a startup, you have the most to gain from a third party’s scale and buying power in areas such as supplies and shipping costs.

An established direct-seller knows firsthand the life of a startup. They’ve been there, done that. Many have learned not to carry the burden of fixed infrastructure required for a fulfillment operation. It doesn’t matter if the space is leased or owned, the fixed-cost is punitive. For direct sellers who already have fixed-costs (i.e. a building with a warehouse in the back), the objective should be to eliminate that cost via sale or sub-lease.

Even the “Big Guys” can improve profitability and reduce risk through outsourcing fulfillment. While there may be significant volume and buying power, and on the surface it appears that they handle fulfillment profitably, the achilles heel relates to the cyclicality of sales. This is a result of both product seasonality and campaign scheduling. Unit costs may be low when a campaign is active, but during periods of reduced or no activity, fixed costs keep adding up (we’ll dive into this a bit more below). By outsourcing, the fulfillment function is a nearly 100% variable cost.

The fact is, at any size or stage in the game, businesses can always benefit by outsourcing. Take note of these five factors when considering partnering with a fulfillment provider:

  1. Quantifiable Cost– Outsourced fulfillment provides a mostly variable cost component to your campaign. If you sell, you ship. If you ship, you incur known and predictable costs. As you’re building campaign financials, outsourcing allows for a tighter budget. If you predict activity, the fulfillment cost can be projected accurately. Compare this to doing fulfillment on your own. Try to think of all the cost factors you will be budgeting for: warehouse space, taxes, utilities and labor. It is very likely you won’t anticipate every single factor that needs to be included. Even if you can, you don’t know how to predict the variability of each over time; which makes your entire financial plan risky. With outsourcing, you will largely pre-negotiate costs on a transactional basis.
  2. Expertise – When hiring a third-party logistics provider these days, experience matters. Fulfillment is a lot more complicated than most people think. To do it accurately and effectively, you need specialized systems, labor, management and expertise. Even established direct sellers with their own distribution centers fulfilling B2B orders should think twice before trying to utilize these resources for consumer-direct fulfillment. They’re very different and the landscape is very dynamic. Carriers and freight programs are ever-changing, technology is evolving and consumer expectations are becoming more demanding. An experienced fulfillment provider is on top of these changes and can shift you into more advantageous programs quickly. Outsourced fulfillment centers often have years of experience across many product lines, campaigns and industries. All this accumulated knowledge is applied for the benefit of each client. Finally, every successful fulfillment provider has mastered labor management. Would you like to be an expert in this area? Or would you rather create, market and sell your products?
  3. Lower Costs – Beyond the discussion of fixed vs. variable costs, outsourcing your fulfillment will enable you to leverage the scale of your provider. Fulfillment providers ship a whole lot more than you do. Therefore, their shipping rates are lower and give you a competitive advantage. In many cases, the savings in this category will pay for the services. The same can be said for supplies and other consumables. Ride the coattails of your provider.
  4. Location – The location of your fulfillment center plays a major role in reducing transit time (and saving on your shipping costs in the process!). If you handle your own fulfillment, you are stuck with your own geographical location. Most direct sellers are reaching an audience nationwide, or even global. Choosing a provider with strategic facilities will help greatly. For example, by incorporating just two facilities in optimal locations you can achieve a 2-day ground transit to over 90% of U.S. households. Those without enough distribution centers (or with sub-optimally positioned DC’s) will be burdened with the costs of express and priority shipping if they are to meet the demands of today’s consumer.
  5. Depth-of-Service Options – Think about what services are important to you, both today and in the future. Many fulfillment providers offer the basics: warehousing and shipping. But others go way beyond and offer far more value. These complementary services can save you from having to manage these processes in-house or through several additional vendors, and include customer care, kitting and assembly, reverse logistics, product refurbishment, order management technology, data analytics, subscription management, marketplace integration, payment processing and more. You may have needs for several of these functions, and with the right provider you can create a package that is provided by one supplier, simplifying your management efforts.

In summary, think carefully about how you handle fulfillment today and give outsourcing serious consideration. And as you do your research, be sure to take the time to explore each provider’s value proposition. Your selection may yield an invaluable strategic partner that will pay dividends long into the future.

Ayal Latz is a lifelong entrepreneur and is the Founder and President of a2b Fulfillment, a progressive 3PL specializing in Order Fulfillment, Customer Care and Value-Added Business Services.

Public Direct Sellers: Q1 Momentum Continues

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The six publicly traded direct selling companies we follow, whose stocks are listed in the U.S., Herbalife (HLF), Medifast (MED), Nu Skin (NUS), Tupperware (TUP), USANA (USNA) and London-based Avon Products (AVP), began 2018 in much the same fashion as how they exited 2017. On balance, trends continue favorable.

In aggregate, on an equal weighted basis, the group average organic sales growth for the six companies in Q1 of 2018 was 11 percent, the second straight quarter of double digit growth. But below the surface there are divergent trends. Nutrition and skin care-based companies like Medifast (OPTAVIA), Nu Skin, USANA and Herbalife Nutrition have shown more favorable trends lately, while Avon and Tupperware have shown slowing trends in recent quarters.

Organic growth rates at MED are for OPTAVIA, the company’s Direct Selling division.

Companies outside the U.S., Oriflame and Natura, have also been performing well with organic sales growth in the mid- to high-single digits recently. Both companies, which are more Cosmetics, Fragrances and Toiletries (CFT) focused but with some exposure to skin care and wellness, are undertaking substantial initiatives to move to digital platforms. More orders are coming in from mobile devices via company-developed apps, and distributor productivity is increasing as more of them are moving to digital platforms.

Organic Sales Growth Past 5 Quarters (YOY Percent Change)

Company reports, Lane Research estimates. Group Average is equal weighted. Organic growth rates at MED are for OPTAVIA, the company’s Direct Selling division.

Source: Company reports, Lane Research estimates. Group Average is equal weighted. Organic growth rates at MED are for OPTAVIA, the company’s Direct Selling division.

OPTAVIA

With a new name and what we sense is a new sense of purpose, Medifast’s OPTAVIA led the way with what we estimate was sales growth in excess of 50 percent in Q1 year over year. OPTAVIA is now over 90 percent of Medifast’s total revenue and it’s continuing to increase. OPTAVIA-branded product sales were 58 percent of the total company’s consumable units in Q1, up from 17 percent a year ago. Active Health Coaches increased by nearly 30 percent to 16,700 in Q1, marking the third consecutive quarter of double-digit growth for that metric, which had been mired in the 12-13,000 range for many years. In our view, we feel the acceleration coincided directly with the name change of the company from Take Shape For Life in July 2017. That will prove to be a seminal event in the company’s history, in our view, signaling 100 percent management focus and support of the brand, providing it with the resources it needs to grow.

Nu Skin

Also posting double-digit organic growth was Nu Skin on the heels of its highly successful launch of the ageLOC LumiSpa skin care system in most markets except China, where it was launched in Q2. Concurrent with the LumiSpa launch is the introduction of several products at lower price points more suited to social sharing, such as Powerlips ultra-long-lasting lip fluid at $25 and the AP 24 Whitening Toothpaste at $20. These offerings will be lower priced, higher velocity items ideally suited for influencer marketing over social media. Interestingly, LumiSpa itself, while retailing at a much higher $199, is still much lower than other recently introduced skin care systems, such as the ageLOC Me system, where the starter kit retails at $480. So while social media influencers can build their network with the lower ticket, higher velocity products Nu Skin offers like the $199 LumiSpa potentially brings it into the mix as a social selling option.

USANA

USANA sustained its steadily re-accelerating growth trends in Q1 with organic sales up 8 percent after bottoming 4 quarters ago at 2 percent. The recent improving growth trends can be attributed to the success of the launch of Celavive, USANA’s new skin care brand introduced at last year’s convention, as well as the return to firmer footing in China, the company’s largest market where recent promotions have gained good traction. With momentum already building in China, the launch of Celavive there in Q4 of this year coupled with the rollout of the company’s new We-Chat social selling platform bodes well for continued sustained top line momentum for USANA coming out of 2018.

Herbalife Nutrition

While organic sales growth at Herbalife Nutrition was only modest in Q1, up 1 percent, all of its top line metrics beat expectations on a somewhat difficult comparison when the company raised prices in China at the end of Q1 2017, which borrowed from Q2. So while volume points at Herbalife, the company’s closest approximation for global product demand excluding currency fluctuations and pricing changes, were relative flat in Q1, expectations were for a mid-single digit decline. While China was soft as expected, every other major region exceeded expectations, indicating a broad firming in the business after 2017 that saw volume points decline 4 percent. Perhaps most notable was that North America returned to modest positive volume growth in Q1 after 4 quarters of volume point declines as the U.S. business focused on the May 2017 deadline for compliance with the July 2016 FTC ruling. This is a quarter sooner than we forecast. It seems that Herbalife is back on the offense after several years of having to play defense.

Conversely, Tupperware and Avon continued recent soft trends, each with organic sales growth declining 4 percent in Q1.

Tupperware

For Tupperware, the outlook for each major region either deteriorated or stayed the same as of the Q1 release. In the regions that deteriorated, management attributed the softness to company-specific near-term issues in Europe and in South America. It sounds like issues in both regions should resolve themselves in relatively short order. While growth in Indonesia and India continues to be soft, the outlook for Asia didn’t change. We note that those markets are smaller than they used to be and the comparisons get much easier beginning in Q2. Meanwhile, most of the other emerging markets are performing well for Tupperware, particularly China, CIS, Mexico, South Africa and Malaysia/Singapore. Therefore, we are fairly confident the 1 percent organic sales growth in Q1 for Tupperware’s emerging markets, which accounted for 70 percent of total company sales, will begin to move back to what we would view as a more normal upper single digits trend line sooner rather than later.

Avon Products

Avon’s 4 percent organic growth decline was a deceleration from the 2 percent decline in Q4 of 2017. Each major region showed greater sequential decline from Q4 trends, except Asia, which was the same. Momentum has stalled and it is broad-based. It appears the honeymoon for new CEO Jan Zijderveld is coming to a close. Investors will be closely watching for Avon’s latest turnaround plan under this new management team, which is expected in the fall after a thorough review of the business. Until then expectations should remain low.
The underlying fundamental strength for publicly traded direct selling companies as a whole did not go unnoticed by the stock market in Q1, with our Lane Research Direct Selling Index up 14 percent in an overall market that was down modestly. Even this was understated since Medifast (OPTAVIA) was not in our index in Q1 because it had started the year at under $1 billion in market capitalization. That will change. After appreciating 34 percent in Q1 and another 55 percent since, Medifast’s market capitalization is now $1.7 billion. We will add the stock to our index retroactive to April 1, 2018.

The Retail Apocalypse Myth and The Path Back to Growth

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We want to hear from you!

Why do you think direct selling’s U.S. numbers are down? Sound off by clicking the following links to share your thoughts:

Question #1: In your opinion, what are the main reasons for the downturn in direct selling?
goo.gl/xH9KaU

Question #2: What do we as an industry need to improve to compete in the marketplace?
goo.gl/gbzG9i

The 2018 DSA Growth & Outlook survey is out and for the second straight year U.S. revenue numbers are down. So how can direct selling return to growth?

In the wake of highly publicized bankruptcies, store closings, and layoffs from some of America’s largest retailers, publications like The Atlantic and Bloomberg Businessweek have published recent stories on the “retail apocalypse.”

However, a widespread “retail apocalypse” is an exaggeration to say the least. While many retailers have experienced challenges, the overall retail sales in the U.S. grew 4.5 percent, representing a 1.7 percentage point increase in growth from the prior year. And last year’s retail growth outpaces U.S. GDP’s 4.1 percent growth rate. (See chart at right)

U.S. Retail Sales Growth Outperformed GDP Growth

U.S. Retail Sales Growth Outperformed GDP Growth

The U.S. retail sector is rapidly evolving and is as strong, if not stronger, than ever. And, a strong overall retail sector and labor market pose favorable macro-economic conditions for direct selling to thrive.

Despite a 1.8 percent decline in estimated retail direct sales in the U.S. in 2017 and a decline in people involved, there are many promising opportunities to return to growth. To do this direct selling must play to its key strengths, capitalize on its key differentiators, and quickly learn from innovative retail leaders outside of direct selling.

Ever Evolving Retail Landscape

Credit Suisse predicts that a quarter of all malls in the U.S. will close within the next five years. Forbes estimates that 10,100 stores closed in 2017, perhaps the worst year on record. Retail casualties so far in 2018 include Toys R US, Nine West, and Claire’s. And, large department stores like Sears, JC Penney, and Macy’s have all continued with significant numbers of store closures.

Certainly, some retailers have been impacted by the rapidly evolving retail landscape. A Fast Company article titled “The Future of Retail in the Age of Amazon” says, “Cultural tastes have changed. Malls grew too quickly, at twice the rate of the population, from 1970 to 2015. Many retailers succumbed to quarterly earnings pressures, invested in share buybacks rather than their stores, became saddled with private-equity debt, or failed to keep pace with digital trends. What we’re seeing now, industry executives say, is a rational, albeit painful, course correction.”

However if you look at the retail numbers, the overall retail sector is experiencing growth. Forbes reports that despite 10,100 closures, there were 4,080 net store openings in 2017. The retail sector isn’t collapsing.

It’s evolving.

What Areas Of Retail Are Doing Well?

1. E-commerce

With giants like Amazon and Walmart (and its jet. com) leading the way, e-commerce is certainly a large component of overall retail growth. Euromonitor research below indicates it’s not expect

ed to slow down anytime soon:

Internet Retailing in the U.S. ($Billions)

Internet Retailing in the U.S. ($Billions)

Even with this explosive growth, e-commerce still represents less than 10% of retail.

2. Omnichannel not multichannel

There’s a trend toward online retailers expanding into brick & mortar (e.g. Amazon with Amazon Books, Amazon Go, and Whole Foods, Warby Parker, Blue Apron, etc.). Similarly, some of the traditional brick and mortar retailers experiencing the most success are the ones that have invested in an online platform that seamlessly complements the in-store experience. Warby Parker wanted to create stores that felt like “an authentic extension of the e-commerce brand.”

3. Experiential

Ulta Beauty is investing heavily in the in-store experience by providing extensive samples and salespeople with personalized recommendations. The company is one of the fastest growing retailers, let alone cosmetics companies.

4. Discount

Companies like Dollar Tree, TJX, and other discounters are also growing fast. For example, Dollar Tree is expecting to open more than 600 stores in 2018. This discount growth could be attributed to continued thrifty mindsets following the recession, stagnant wages, etc. And consumers may increasingly enjoy a “treasure hunt” experience of finding the best deals.

Where Does Direct Selling Stand?

According to the Direct Selling Association’s 2018 Growth & Outlook Survey, after reaching an all-time high in 2015, direct sales decreased 1.6 percent in 2016 and 1.8 percent in 2017 to $34.9 billion in the U.S.

U.S. Retail Sales ($Billions)

U.S. Retail Sales ($Billions)

The direct selling wellness sector is still the largest at $11.8 billion in retail sales, but it experienced its first decline in over 10 years. Wellness is followed by services, home & family care/home durables, personal care, clothing & accessories, and leisure & educational in order of size.

In terms of the salesforce, there were 18.6 million people involved in direct selling in the U.S. in 2017. The industry is down 9.3 percent from 2016. One driver of this decline is that companies moved people who were previously categorized as independent representatives away from their discount customer category and into the preferred customer programs. Another possible reason for salesforce decline is increased competition with the collaborative economy for independent contractors.

How Can Direct Selling Return To Growth?

1. Leverage both brick and mortar and ecommerce

When done right, direct selling can combine the best of both worlds with brick and mortar and e-commerce, while leveraging its key strengths/differentiators: personal relationships and coaching, supporting a local businessperson, and providing a low-cost, low-risk way of starting a business.

Sales by product/service group

Sales by product/service group

2. Focus on value proposition not cost of products

“The best retailers are embracing what makes them special to counteract Amazon’s quest to dominate commerce.” – Fast Company

Direct selling tends to offer more premium products, making it much more of a challenge to compete on price. This is not inherently bad, as trying to compete on things like price can be a race to the bottom.

Katrina Lake, CEO of Stitch Fix, an online subscription and personal shopping service, says that part of the crisis that we’re seeing with retail right now is that if your retail store is merely a place for transaction where you tender cash and you take a product home, and that’s the only value that your store delivers, then you are in trouble. “I think part of the race to the bottom that we’re seeing is that if you’re in that business, then you are now in a global marketplace that’s all competing for cheapest and fastest.”

Warren Buffett echoes the same sentiment, “The single most important decision in evaluating a business is pricing power. If you’ve got the power to raise prices without losing business to a competitor, you’ve got a very good business.”

Similarly, direct selling may struggle to compete with shipping. Retail giants like Amazon and Walmart are able to offer low cost/free shipping at a loss because they’re able to cross-subsidize with their more profitable parts of their business to prioritize growth and aggressive pricing at the expense of profit.

Benefits of Each Retail Channel

Benefits of Each Retail Channel

3. Embrace omnichannel not multichannel

Many consumers and salespeople desire a comprehensive, cohesive approach with all of the channels complementing one another in an authentic way that improves the customer experience.

4. Enter strategic partnerships to improve on weaknesses

Although most direct selling companies aren’t well equipped to beat Amazon on shipping directly, they can certainly better compete by entering into strategic partnerships to improve shipping and logistics to better meet customer expectations.

5. Focus on preferred customer programs

It’s easy to think that Amazon offers free two-day shipping. However it’s actually not free. It’s only “free” if you’re a part of Prime Member, which requires a $119 yearly fee. Over 100 million people now have Prime, representing one of the most successful preferred customer programs in retail.

There’s a current industry trend toward creating preferred customer programs. Part of this is the result of resegmentation: companies re-categorizing people that signed up as direct sellers only for the discount on product purchasing for their own use to preferred customers. But, as we’ve seen a cascade of other companies following suit and resegmenting, they’re realizing enormous business value to this.

This transition naturally leads to an increased focus on customers. It allows direct selling companies to have much better data and insights into motivations and behavior of both customers and salespeople. As author Peter Drucker says, “What’s managed improves.”

Monica Wood, Global Consumer and Member Insights at Herbalife Nutrition (and DSA Industry Research Committee member), says they have always known that distributors and members join Herbalife Nutrition for a variety of reasons, including support, great-tasting science-backed products, or the business opportunity, both for part-time income or a full-time business opportunity. “Segmentation has allowed us to more clearly identify our distributors’ and members’ current goals, and to align our resources, communications and promotions more effectively to help them achieve them, and to better support them as their goals change over time,” she says.

Another company that’s seen added value and growth from segmentation is Isagenix. Jeff Kaufman, Director, Customer and Field Insights at Isagenix (and Industry Research Committee Chair), said that in 2017, Isagenix implemented its Customer First Program. “This program was created in part to help us better distinguish between members who simply want to purchase products and those who also wish to participate in the business opportunity,” he said. To do this, they encourage new members to join as customers first. Then those customers interested in the business opportunity may enroll as Associates when they are ready.

Following are some of the program’s benefits:
• Simplifying the enrollment and ordering process
• Eliminating the need to collect a customer’s Social Security number when first enrolling
• Making customer membership more attractive
• Providing the ability to direct relevant and unique communication to each segment
• Expanding and protecting the business opportunity

6. Capitalize on desire for supplemental income

Unemployment is low, nearing full employment, but other metrics that measure the health of labor market, such as wage growth and people quitting their jobs, remain stagnant. The challenge is that with the emergence of the collaborative/gig economy, there are now more opportunities than ever for part-time, flexible contract work. For example, the Internet Association says that 23.9 million people are currently in the “online labor force” in the U.S.

Now is certainly an exciting time for retail with the need for evolution more important than ever.

Let’s Continue the Conversation

Stay tuned for a series of Direct Selling News articles to further explore why direct selling is down and what it can do to recover. At the 2018 DSA Annual meeting last month we held a workshop to discuss initial thoughts from some company executives who attended. We want to continue the conversation and would love your input. Take the survey!

We want to hear from you!

Why do you think direct selling’s U.S. numbers are down? Sound off by entering the following link in your phone, tablet, or computer browser to share your thoughts:

Question #1: In your opinion, what are the main reasons for the downturn in direct selling?
goo.gl/xH9KaU

Question #2: What do we as an industry need to improve to compete in the marketplace?
goo.gl/gbzG9i

NameBen Gamse is Market Research Manager at the U.S. Direct Selling Association.

Times They Are A Changin’…

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A few months ago I was in need of a tux for our Global 100 Celebration event. So like most people I went to one of the big anchor stores at a nearby mall. Not finding the selection satisfactory, I thought I’d venture through the mall to check another store. What I saw when I entered the heart of the mall was quite astonishing: vacant store after vacant store as far as I could see on the bottom and top levels.

Todd Eliason, Publisher and Editor in Chief

Todd Eliason, Publisher and Editor in Chief

Retail is the most visible example of how technology is disrupting brands big and small. But no industry is immune, direct selling included. Being an established industry leader today doesn’t ensure you will be one five years from now, even a year from now. Our writer Brittany Glenn takes a look into how direct selling companies can adapt to these changing market forces, and it starts with assessing how agile or nimble your organization is in adapting to change. As Nu Skin President Ryan Napierski said last month at the DSA Annual Meeting, “If we are not flexible as an organization we can’t move as quickly as we need to move to compete in today’s business climate.”

This leads us right into our cover story, where we highlight several direct selling companies who have bucked the traditional startup model with the help of cloud technology, great supplier partners and a lean business structure. You will hear from many of these CEOs on why they chose this route, as well as the cost savings and operational advantages of a virtual/lean run business.

We also have included a complete roundup of the U.S. Direct Selling Association’s Annual Meeting, including the topics that were covered, leadership changes, policy initiatives, and research that went into the 2018 Growth & Outlook report that was released at the meeting. Although sales in the U.S. were down 1.8 percent from 2016, overall global growth remains steady with a 1.6 percent increase from 2016.

To help initiate a conversation about how direct selling can get back to year over year growth in the U.S. market, DSA Market Research Manager Ben Gamse presents a few ideas for you to ponder in the News in Brief section starting on page 8. We would love to hear your comments, so be sure to look for the link in the sidebar that will take you to a survey to share your thoughts.

Finally, writer Beth Douglass Silcox takes a look at ASEA, who 10 years ago set out on a mission to take their ASEA Redox cellular health product to the masses worldwide. From day one they have approached the direct selling business model with a Fortune 50 mindset and adopted strategic planning principles that not only have benefited their field but have helped them grow as a result.

Since becoming the Publisher and Editor in Chief a few months ago, I have been able to get to meet so many great people from our industry, most recently at our Global 100 Celebration event and DSA Annual Meeting. Please feel free to drop me an email (teliason@directsellingnews.com) and let me know how we are doing and how we can better serve you and this great channel.

Lipstick Global Market to Exceed $17 Billion by 2023

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According to ResearchAndMarkets.com’s new report “Global Lipstick Market by Product Type (Gloss, Matte & Others), By Distribution Channel (Supermarkets/Hypermarkets, Departmental/Grocery Stores, Multi Branded Retail Stores & Others), By Region, Competition Forecast & Opportunities, 2013–2023,” the global lipstick market is expected to cross $17 billion by 2023 due to the rising number of product innovations, increasing disposable income and rising demand from young and working women across the globe.

Other market factors driving the lipstick market globally are the increasing preference for organic cosmetics, rapid urbanization and increasing internet usage, coupled with the growing demand for lipsticks across major developing countries.

Additionally, marketing strategies such as advertisement of products on social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other websites by lipstick manufacturing companies are anticipated to further aid the global lipstick market over the coming years.

The report discusses the following aspects of lipstick market globally: lipstick market size, share & forecast; segmental analysis – by product type (gloss, matte & others), by distribution channel (supermarkets/hypermarkets, departmental/grocery stores, multi branded retail stores & others), by region; competitive analysis; and changing market trends and emerging opportunities.

Companies featured in the report include L’Oreal International, Christian Dior SE, Shiseido Company Limited, The Este Lauder Companies Inc., Revlon Inc., Coty Inc., Avon Products Inc., INGLOT Cosmetics, Chanel S.A. and ABLE C&C Co. Ltd.

For more information on the report, click here.

Young Living Hosts Employee Service Day for Sleep in Heavenly Peace

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Young Living Essential Oils, the Lehi, Utah-based direct seller of essential oils, recently conducted a day-long service project to benefit Sleep in Heavenly Peace (SHP), an organization dedicated to building, assembling and delivering top-notch bunk beds to children and families in need.

This corporate fundraising event included 500 Young Living employees in Utah to make 60 bunk beds for 120 Utah children in need. In addition to the manpower used to build the bunk beds, the D. Gary Young, Young Living Foundation donated $10,000 to the SHP Foundation to cover the cost of building materials, linens, mattresses and other supplies. Young Living will deliver all beds completed.

“Studies show there is a close association between sleep and a wide range of cognitive functions, including attention and memory,” said Jared Turner, Young Living president and chief operating officer. “As a global industry leader, Young Living understands its responsibility to the local Utah community and sees this project as an important step in facilitating wellness among our most vulnerable citizens. We are proud to help Sleep in Heavenly Peace give children a respite from the trials they face daily, giving them a safe space of their own to sleep comfortably.”

Additionally, Young Living employees and members had the opportunity to make additional financial contributions to the build through a dedicated portal on the D. Gary Young, Young Living Foundation website.

“We are grateful for the overwhelming support from Young Living and its members,” said Lehi Utah Chapter President of Sleep in Heavenly Peace Matt McEwen. “Having their own bed can have such a lasting impact on a child’s overall physical and mental health, and Young Living’s efforts have enabled us to change lives by providing hope and wellness to hundreds of individuals every week.”

Primerica Achieves Record Sales in June; Canada Headquarters Moves to New Office

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Duluth, Georgia-based Primerica, Inc., a leading provider of financial products to middle income households in North America, recently announced that it achieved a record $9.1 billion in Term Life insurance face amount issued in June.

For the second quarter, Primerica’s Term Life face amount issued grew 2 percent over the prior year quarter.

“Thanks to the hard work of our sales force, many thousands of Main Street families throughout North America now have life insurance protection,” said Primerica CEO Glenn Williams. “I am extremely proud of the leadership provided by our representatives. They continue to meet the financial needs of record numbers of families, and I look forward to all that we’ll accomplish in the future.”

Primerica also noted that its Canadian headquarters in Mississauga, a suburb of Toronto, will relocate to its new facility later this month. The timing of the move coincides with the company’s 2018 Canadian Convention, which will be held July 27-28 at the Toronto Congress Centre.

“We will remain in Mississauga as we relocate to 6985 Financial Drive, where we will occupy over 43,000 square feet of leased office space that has been completely designed to our specifications,” said Williams. “It is a state-of-the-art office where we can conduct business, continue to grow and add staff and help more Canadian families become financially independent.”

According to the company, in the second quarter Primerica Canada achieved a record 12,000 life insurance licensed representatives, solidifying its position as the country’s largest life insurance sales force. This Canadian growth helped Primerica’s North American sales force surpass 130,000 life insurance licensed representatives as of June 30, 2018.

OPTAVIA Helps ‘Cake Boss’ Star Buddy Valastro with Weight Loss

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OPTAVIA, the lifestyle brand of Medifast, was recently credited by Food Network celebrity Buddy Valastro as the reason for his dramatic weight loss.

Valastro, the owner of New Jersey’s legendary Carlos’ Bakery, recently shared an Instagram photo showing his new look. In the comments section of the post he said, “A lot of people have been asking me how I’ve slimmed down lately so I just wanted to share that I’ve used the OPTAVIA program. I’m not being paid to say this and it should be noted that I think everybody is different and you should do whatever suits you but this is what I’m doing and I’m very happy with the results so far!”

OPTAVIA helps people with lifelong transformation through its Optimal HealthTM approach. Its proprietary products and programs are based on more than 37 years of experience and have been used by more than 1 million clients and recommended by more than 20,000 doctors since 1980.

OPTAVIA was No. 56 on this this year’s Direct Selling News Global 100 list of the top direct selling companies in the world.