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Mary Kay Ash, 1918-2001: She Started a Skin Care Company That Has Sales of More Than $2 Billion a Year |
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Independent representatives sell products in peoples' homes in
more than 30 countries. Transcript of radio broadcast: |
VOICE
ONE:
I’m Mary
Tillotson.
VOICE
TWO:
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Mary Kay Ash |
And I’m
Steve Ember with the VOA Special English program PEOPLE IN AMERICA. This
week, we tell about one of the most successful American businesswomen.
Mary Kay started a company in nineteen sixty-three with a five thousand dollar
investment. Today, Mary Kay Cosmetics is an international company worth
thousands of millions of dollars.
(MUSIC)
VOICE
ONE:
Mary
Kathlyn Wagner was born in the state of Texas in nineteen eighteen. For
much of her childhood, she cared for her sick father while her mother worked
long hours at a public eating place. Mary Kay married Ben Rogers when she
was seventeen years old. They had three children before he left home to
serve in World War Two. When he returned, their marriage ended.
Mary Kay looked for a job so she could support her children.
Mary
Kay began selling different kinds of products. At first, she sold
books. Later, she visited peoples’ homes to show how home care products
such as cleaning fluids and equipment helped ease housework.
One
night, Mary Kay was showing these products at the home of Ova Heath
Spoonemore. Later in the evening, Missus Spoonemore began giving her
guests some home made skin care products. The products were developed by
her father, J.W. Heath, in Arkansas. Mary Kay tried the skin care
products and found they made her skin smooth.
VOICE
TWO:
Mary
Kay was successful selling home care products. Her supervisors praised
her work. But they never increased her earnings. She left the
company after a man she trained was given a more important job than she had.
Mary
Kay said later that she learned from this experience. It taught her that
men did not believe that a woman could succeed in business. She decided
to prove them wrong. So she bought the rights to Mister Heath’s skin care
products and started her own company. She paid five hundred dollars for
the legal rights to the products.
VOICE
ONE:
The
Mary Kay Cosmetics company began operating in Dallas, Texas, in nineteen
sixty-three. Mary Kay’s twenty-year-old son Richard was the company’s
financial official. The idea was to sell skin care products through
demonstrations in homes and offices. Nine sales representatives were
chosen to sell the products.
The
sales representatives were independent workers. They bought products like
soaps and skin softening liquids from the company and sold them at higher
prices to friends, family members and other individuals. Mary Kay decided
that each representative who brought other sales women into the company would
receive part of the new person’s earnings. That way, experienced sales
representatives would be willing to help train new ones.
Mary
Kay told the women who worked for her that to be successful in life a person
should put God first, family second and work third. She said women must
discover how to be good wives and mothers while at the same time learning how
to succeed in work.
(MUSIC)
VOICE
TWO:
Two
years later, in nineteen sixty-five, the company was selling almost one million
dollars worth of products. Mary Kay once said that success came fast
because she did not have any time to waste. She was already forty-five
years old when she started the company. She said a woman needs money fast
as she gets older.
Now
Mary Kay Cosmetics is one of the largest direct sellers of skin care products
in the world. It develops and tests skin care and beauty products for the
face, body, hair and nails -- many more than it started selling in nineteen
sixty-three. Today, Mary Kay Cosmetics has sales of more than two billion
dollars a year. It has more than one million sales representatives in
more than thirty countries around the world. You can find Mary Kay
products and sales representatives in Argentina, India, the Czech Republic,
Kazakhstan, and China, to name a few.
VOICE
ONE:
Every
year since nineteen sixty-five, Mary Kay Cosmetics has held a yearly conference
in Dallas for its sales representatives. The first one took place in one
large room. Mary Kay cooked food for two hundred people and served it on
paper plates.
As the
company grew, so did the conference. Now, more than thirty-five thousand
sales representatives and company officials pay to attend education meetings at
the yearly conference. A special event at the three-day conference is
Awards Night. That is when prizes are given to those representatives with
the most sales for the year. Awards Night also includes a show in which
famous singers and dancers perform.
The
Awards Night winners receive special paid holidays, jewels, furs, and pink
Cadillac automobiles. In Germany, winners receive a pink Mercedes Benz,
and in Taiwan they are given a pink Toyota. By nineteen ninety-four,
seven thousand cars had been given to sales representatives. The cars are
pink because Mary Kay products come in pink containers. Mary Kay liked
that color.
VOICE
TWO:
Mary
Kay believed that recognizing good work is the best way to increase a company’s
sales. She said her company tried to have competitions in which everyone
has a chance to win. She did not want to organize the kind of competition
where someone has to hurt another person in order to win.
So the
Mary Kay competitions are designed around the idea that it is best to compete
with yourself. That means every individual is
trying to do better then she did last week or last year.
Competition
winners are rewarded well. For example, winners of one of the
competitions get a gold pin called the Ladder of Success. Sales
representatives earn a pin by selling a large number of products. Then
they earn jewels for the pin as they increase their sales. Each jewel is
placed higher on the ladder than the others. The pin of a top sales
representative is covered with diamonds.
(MUSIC)
VOICE
ONE:
Mary
Kay’s third husband, Mel Ash, died of cancer in nineteen eighty. She wanted
to help find a cure for the disease. At first, she helped organizations
raise money for research. Later, she started the Mary Kay Ash Charitable
Foundation, a non-profit group that provides money to support research about
cancers affecting women. In two thousand one, the company and foundation
expanded their goals in an effort to help stop violence against women.
Through
the years, Mary Kay Ash received many business awards. She was named one
of America’s twenty-five most influential women in nineteen eighty-five.
She became a member of the National Business Hall of Fame in nineteen
ninety-six.
VOICE
TWO:
Mary
Kay Ash wrote three books. The first book, “Mary Kay,” told the story of
her life. More than one million copies in several languages have been
sold. She described her business ideas in the book “Mary Kay on People
Management.” Her third book was released in nineteen ninety-five.
It is called “Mary Kay--You Can Have It All.” The money earned from its
sales went to help fight cancer.
Mary Kay
Ash continued her involvement in her business until she suffered a stroke in
nineteen ninety-six. She died in November, two thousand one.
Business
experts say she was an important business leader who cared about people.
Mary Kay sales representatives say she developed a way for women to earn money
and still spend time with their families.
VOICE
ONE:
One
example is Valerie Yokie. She started selling Mary Kay products twenty
years ago. She was an official at Georgetown University in Washington,
D.C., but left her job to stay home with her two small children. She
became interested in the Mary Kay Cosmetics company because it was a way to get
started in a business for a small amount of money. She paid less than one
hundred dollars for her supplies.
After
one year and one half, Missus Yokie became a director of the company and
started helping other women become successful Mary Kay representatives.
Soon after this, her husband lost his job. Then he developed
cancer. Valerie Yokie has supported her family for twenty years through
Mary Kay Cosmetics. She is an extremely successful businesswoman.
She has won many prizes in Mary Kay competitions, and receives a new pink
Cadillac every two years.
Valerie
Yokie’s story is similar to those of other Mary Kay representatives. They
agree that Mary Kay Ash changed the business world. They say she opened a
door for women by providing them with a way to earn money that balances work
and family.
(MUSIC)
VOICE
ONE:
This
Special English program was written by Nancy Steinbach and produced by Caty
Weaver. I’m Mary Tillotson.
VOICE
TWO:
And I’m
Steve Ember. Listen again next week for another PEOPLE IN AMERICA program
on the Voice of America.