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MOVING
the Sarah Lee brand in the background, Fuller Inc.,
America’s second-largest direct selling firm, formally
launched its reentry in the Philippine market under a
new company name and logo but with the same set of
name-recall brands.
After
more than a year since Tupperware Brand Corp. bought
Sara Lee Corp.’s direct selling business for $557
million in cash, Sarah Lee Direct Selling Philippines
Inc. will now sell Playtex, Wonderbra, Nutrimetics,
Hanes, Zwitsal and Champion brand-products under the
Fuller Life Direct Selling Philippines Inc.
“This is
our first month under Fuller but nothing has changed;
these are the same brands we used to carry before,”
Fuller Life managing director Pablo B. Perez told
BusinessMirror.
Perez
said the company would use the same business model of
person-to-person selling through its 150,000 sales
representatives—the company calls them independent
business managers or IBMs—nationwide. These IBMs, he
said, numbered roughly the same as during Tupperware’s
acquisition year, 2005.
Perez
personally aims to double that number and triple the
sales in the next five years.
“We came
from a strong growth in sales last year, and I expect it
to hit double-digit this year,” he added, declining to
cite figures.
Orlando,
Florida-headquartered Tupperware disclosed last month
that its beauty units acquired in December 2005 sold
$135.8 million worldwide.
Perez’s
optimism is based on three things: the catalogue of
products the company plans to come out every two weeks,
more incentives for sales agents who are mostly women,
and the introduction of more products these agents would
sell.
This
month, Perez said they introduced to the market jewelry
products under the Accent brand, adding to the existing
400 products that Sarah Lee has been selling for the
past 14 years in the Philippines.
Fuller
Life director for operations Mina Bato cited some of
these products as under the Kiwi brand (shoe polish) and
Eskinol (facial cleansing).
According to Bato, most items the IBMs sell are imported
like the Kiwi brand, while the firm has accredited local
manufacturers for the Eskinol and Hanes brands. |
