‘Avon Ladies’ of Uganda Sell Vital Medicine Cheaply Door-to-Door
LatestDoug Wilson (it’s an outdated Weeds reference people, — please try to keep up with my creaky analogies) isn’t the only yearning male entrepreneur who saw the simple brilliance in adapting Avon’s door-to-door cosmetics peddling strategy to fit his own schemes. The ironically-surnamed Chuck Slaughter, founder and president of the not-for-profit company Living Goods, has discovered that the ‘Avon lady’ business model is perfectly suited to undercutting the counterfeit prescription drug market in Uganda, and delivering life-saving drugs and medical goods to the country’s poorest residents.
Obviously, Slaughter and his Living Goods team are far more altruistic than Doug Wilson and Celia Hodes, but where would we be without constant television references? Hopelessly lost and without any frame of reference, that’s where. Though one might be tempted to think of direct cosmetics sales as an almost tawdry business compared to the distribution of vital supplies in a struggling east African republic, Slaughter drew his inspiration from Avon’s origins as a 19th century innovation to reach out to rural American women. He explained: