Carol Judson has sold Tupperware, Shaklee, AVON and Kara Vita as an in-home sales consultant.
But after her husband, Tom, took a job as Aloette’s president, Judson started making extra spending money selling the brand – an aloe-based skin care line based in Atlanta.
She usually sells more than $1,000 in two shows and gets to keep 41 percent in commission.
“I’m liking this money,” she said from her Norcross home as she hosted eight women for a recent Aloette party.
Judson is part of a growing company called Astral Brands. The midsized, privately-held company has between $25 million and $50 million in sales annually.
But a new CEO and private equity partners want to greatly expand the company’s size and reach in the United States and overseas.
The company has three sister brands sold through multiple channels, which is the basis of its business plan to leverage suppliers and economies of scale.
Aloette is sold in-home; Pür Minerals is sold by retailers such as ULTA and Dillard’s as well as Regis Salons; and CosMedix is sold in professional channels, such as medical spas and doctors’ offices. All are also sold on television and online.
JuE Wong, CEO, took the helm in September, charged with growing the company and potentially opening the door for the private equity firm to buy more consumer brands.
Still, the small company will face hurdles as it competes for consumers and distribution against mega cosmetics companies such as Procter & Gamble’s CoverGirl and Olay juggernaut L’Oreal, which also owns Lancome.
Wong believes the company will succeed because it uses superior quality ingredients that don’t fight against the skin.
A native of Singapore, Wong has worked with top companies including PepsiCo, Cargill, NV Perricone and ZO Skin Health by Dr. Zein Obagi.
One of the main things she brings to the company is a partnership with public broadcasting.
CosMedix and Pür Minerals products will be part of an informational program produced to help drive pledges starting June. The program also will confer credibility on the brand, she said.
Television sales drive tremendous volume, Wong said, without the overhead of retail distribution.
Soon, she said, CosMedix will appear on the QVC channel, to follow in the footsteps of Pür and Aloette, which both have done $750,000 in sales in appearances over 24 hours on home shopping channels. Compare that to about $35,000 in Pür sales during a two-day retail event, Wong said.
Virginia Lee, a senior analyst with Euromonitor International who covers the skin care and cosmetics industry, said that having a product on TV heightens consumers’ interest.
“Companies have said that following their brands’ appearance on TV, they actually get more customers in the stores,” she said. “I would say that whereas 10 years ago, having your beauty brand on TV was kind of embarrassing, it’s no longer that way. A lot of prestige brands are now on the Home Shopping Network: Origins, Bobbi Brown, Clinique.”
But retail distribution is also important and harder to carve out. Lee said it’s not easy for a small company such as Astral Brands to compete against global giants when stores such as Walgreen’s and Wal-Mart have taken shelf space out to widen and clean up aisles.
The economy also doesn’t help.
Euromonitor data show that U.S. spending on skin care and cosmetic products declined 1 percent in 2009 to about $58.9 billion
Astral Brands chairman, Bob Cohen, said the global recession was making retailers change radically. That was among the reasons he decided to seek equity partners and a new CEO.
Cohen is a former Aloette CFO and largest franchisee who ended up buying the company, moved it from Philadelphia to Georgia, then bought CosMedix and founded Pür.
“It wasn’t time to have on-the-job training,” Cohen said. “We needed a seasoned expert” in global retail distribution.
Wong is already having some early success.
CosMedix will appear this summer in salons at Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus. And she’s working on increasing retail distribution of Pür.
As for Judson, as an in-home sales consultant, she likes that Aloette is a consumable product, unlike Tupperware which lasts forever, she said.
At a recent Aloette party at her Norcross home, she had three attendees book parties and she sold about $759 in product.
Women at the party liked how the products smelled and felt on their skin.
“Carol gave me a line to use a few weeks ago, and I really liked it,” said Stella Jackson of Norcross. She said she just turned 48 in June, and had been looking for products. She liked the products so much, she decided to host a party for her friends.
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