One more thing about Watkins products in Walmart...

IF...people were actually out there BUILDING their Watkins businesses, Watkins would NOT have tried this. The current statistics concerning Watkins reps and the brand awareness that's out there reflects this.

Several years ago, Watkins hired a marketing research firm to evaluate their business. One staggering fact they found was that only .4% percent of North American households were currently being serviced by our independent Associates. Be sure you notice the decimal point in front of .4%—that's not four percent, but rather four-tenths of one percent. In other words, we're only reaching one family out of every 250. They also found that many people had never heard of Watkins products and that many who had did not know we were still in business.

That's WHY Watkins chose to market a few of our products through some other avenues. BUT--if the reps actually got off their butts and went out and WORKED their businesses, we wouldn't need this.

Mark Jacobs, the president of our company, and his father, Irwin, are dedicated to Watkins, its reps, and to helping us succeed with this business. I placed my trust in them and their company five years ago, and they've never let me down.

Here's some other examples of branding, and brand awareness that other companies do:

Starbucks sells bottled coffee drinks in Target stores and specially packaged coffees in grocery stores. The benefit to Starbucks goes far beyond the small profit they make on those drinks. People who otherwise would not have thought of going to a stand-alone Starbucks coffee shop may remember seeing the Starbucks name and may choose to visit a Starbucks store the next time they drive by or the next time they're thinking of coffee (and this could happen even if a person didn't buy any Starbucks product from Target or didn't remember where they saw the Starbucks name).

Six Flags amusement parks has advertising on Coca-Cola cans that offers discounted park admission for people who bring the Coke can to the park. It likely costs a lot of money for Six Flags to be featured on the Coke cans, but one of those cans may be right in front of someone to jog their memory when they're trying to think of something fun to do. It can bring many more people to the amusement park, resulting in bigger profits for the park.

From what Watkins has seen, ONE independent Watkins representative can sell more products just doing ONE "Good Tastings" home party event than their local Walmarts can sell in an entire MONTH!

It's really up to the REPS--because they can reach more people, and sell more products, just by working their businesses. :)

You can look at something like this negatively, or you can look at the facts here and realize that it's NOT that Watkins is planning on doing away with their independent reps OR selling out to the corporate machine...that this IS what it is--it's an effort to reach MORE people about Watkins products.

There will always be people in a business that look for an excuse of any sort to "pack up their tents and go home". Those type of people will find any excuse to NOT work their business, or to quit anyhow. I won't be one of those people. Watkins is a GREAT business, and still is, and will be for years to come.