Herbalife began more than 29 years ago as a young man’s dream. Mark Hughes was just 18 when his mother, Joan, died of an accidental overdose of prescription weight loss pills.
A part-time model and actress in LA, Joan struggled with her weight for many years and found a convenient and effective way to lose weight as a single working mom in the late 1970’s with little alternatives to diet pills. Diet drugs are highly addictive, have horrible side effects and make it difficult to sleep so Joan also took sleeping pills and unfortunately overdosed and died.
This event and Mark Hughes’ life situation affected him so profoundly that Mark decided to make a difference in the world by finding a safe and effective alternative to the diet drugs and pills that killed his mother.
Mark was interested in nutrition and in particular Chinese herbs. He studied these herbs and traveled to all parts of China to speak with the Chinese herbalists and discovered firsthand the incredible health benefits that these herbs have on the human body. The discovered Chinese marrows used these herbs as their medicine for thousands of years.
Although he had no medical background, never finished high school, no business background and had no money, Mark managed to find some who would listen to his idea and with their help and support and a year of testing and refining together they formulated “Formula 1”. A meal replacement made with soy protein, vitamins and herbs. Mark wanted to help people lose weight by replacing 2 meals a day with this formula, thereby reducing calories while still getting 100% of all the nutrients cells need for optimal health. And “Cellular Nutrition” was born.
In February 1980, at the age of 23, Mark acquired his first customer for the product, his grandma Mimi, who lost 20 pounds and introduced 20 of her friends.
Word spread quickly that people not only lost weight because of this product, but because their systems were cleansed by the herbs, they started looking younger, got more energy, blood pressure normalized, and many other health benefits followed, and finally In its first year, Herbalife had sold more than $2 million.
Now, armed with a whole bunch of incredible health AND income credentials, the company grew rapidly.
1981 $10 million
1982 $52 million
1983 $148 million
In 1984, Herbalife had $402 million in sales, making it the fastest growing company in US business history, breaking all sorts of records and doing remarkable things based on three very important factors.
1) The product. From the start, Mark determined that Herbalife products would be made using the latest in science, technology and medicine and that no time, effort or expense would deviate from that Purpose #1. The products would be the best food for the human body that money could buy. Combining more than 6000 years of Chinese herbal wisdom with Western nutritional technology and making it consumable, easy to prepare and tasty was certainly a task, but Mark Hughes and the team of doctors and scientists pulled it off.
Today, Herbalife’s product line includes weight management, targeted nutrition, external nutrition and personal care. All made with natural herbal ingredients and all designed to cleanse and nourish the body’s cells for maximum health results.
2) Personal coaching. Mark recognized the need for a “personalized” approach to weight loss. He knew that selling products off the supermarket shelf would reduce their effectiveness, so Mark decided the best way to “change the world” was through multi-level marketing. Through MLM, the consumer would not only receive the best products, but they would also receive the best service if they had a Herbalife Distributor by their side as their personal coach.
3) The Compensation Plan. Mark realized that in order to achieve his dream of “making the world a healthier place” he needed a highly motivated team of Distributors, so Mark created the Compensation Plan to outperform everyone else.
- The Compensation Plan pays a maximum of 50% on all sales. From students to moms to cab drivers and even your family doctor, selling means helping someone improve their health and thereby adding a few hundred or thousands extra dollars to your monthly income.
2nd Reward Distributors who have built an organization to help with The Dream. From 1 to 100,000 distributors, you’ll be paid fairly for your entire team, including wholesale commissions of up to 25%, royalties of 15% and infinite bonuses of up to 7%, vacation and worldwide sales bonuses of 1% of annual sales. Overall, Herbalife pays back 73% of all product sales to its distributors, making it the highest paying and fairest compensation plan in the entire industry.
Today the records speak for themselves. 29 years in business, 70 countries, $3.8 billion in 2008, listed on the New York Stock Exchange, Nobel Prize-winning scientists, UCLA Medical Advisory Board, over 100 million RECORDED testimonials, the Herbalife Family Foundation, serving children at risk around the world and landmark sports sponsorship deals including LA Galaxy and David Beckham are just some of the achievements. But most unbelievably, Herbalife is officially the “No. 1 Weight Loss Company Across the Globe”!
It is true that “one man can make a difference!”. Mark Hughes proved that anyone with a dream and the determination to make it happen can change the world for the better.
If you like the sound of this company and are interested in learning more, then click here… Herbalife
Thanks to Christopher Reid
