Because the nation’s warfare with Russia rages on, 1000’s of Ukrainian girls have turned to the multi-level advertising firm’s pink-packaged choices to assist their households.
By Lauren Debter, Forbes Employees
In the weeks following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Marichka Lukyanova was inundated with messages from household and associates checking in to ensure she and her two youngsters have been secure from the air strikes in Lviv, the place she lives. They have been secure, fortunately, however Lukyanova feared that her enterprise promoting Mary Kay cosmetics can be one of many casualties of warfare.
“I mentioned to myself, Marichika, who will want your cosmetics if there’s a warfare in your nation?” recalled Lukyanova.
However one message stunned Lukyanova: Even in these early weeks of the warfare, certainly one of her shoppers wished to purchase extra Mary Kay facial cream earlier than she ran out. “She didn’t wish to age, even when rockets have been flying overhead.”
American multi-level advertising firm Mary Kay has proven shocking endurance in the course of the warfare, with a rising Ukrainian salesforce of an estimated 70,000 girls hawking its make-up, even when it means navigating frequent air siren alarms, shelling and blackouts. In response to interviews with 16 individuals promoting Mary Kay merchandise on the bottom, the cosmetics have develop into a lifeline for some seeking to assist their households or make extra cash as Ukraine’s financial system has suffered from the warfare.
“For a lot of, it’s the solely supply of revenue. Many now have husbands, brothers or youngsters preventing,” mentioned Elena Krivchenkova, 58, who has been promoting Mary Kay merchandise because the 90s when the corporate first launched in Ukraine. “It’s a solution to distract themselves from the horror of what’s taking place.”
However it’s been powerful going, and the salespeople have been confronted with a war-torn financial system and double-digit inflation — skincare and cosmetics gross sales in Ukraine fell 13% to $189 million final yr, in keeping with GlobalData — together with the challenges inherent in Mary Kay’s enterprise mannequin.
Like different multi-level advertising corporations, Mary Kay depends on particular person individuals not simply to promote its merchandise to their family members, associates or others of their social circle, however to recruit them to promote the merchandise, too. There may be usually an intense stress to recruit due to the pay mannequin: Consultants, as Mary Kay calls them, earn more money once they recruit new individuals, and their recruits recruit new individuals. Most individuals make little or no cash working for a multi-level advertising firm, warns the Federal Commerce Fee.
“They aren’t serving to,” mentioned Robert FitzPatrick, a critic of multi-level advertising corporations who has researched the trade for greater than 20 years. He famous that a majority of these corporations can prey on people who find themselves determined, “promoting themselves because the final finest hope” however not delivering, he added.
Mary Kay itself has suffered from skepticism about its enterprise mannequin: Gross sales worldwide fell to $2.5 billion in 2022, down from $3.6 billion 5 years earlier, in keeping with Forbes’ record of America’s largest personal corporations.
“We transformed the shelter right into a magnificence salon.”
“Like the remainder of the world, we proceed to actively monitor the scenario in Ukraine,” mentioned Mary Kay spokesperson Crayton Webb. “Our management in Ukraine is actively participating with workers and the unbiased gross sales power, doing all the things they’ll to make sure their security and supporting the viability of the enterprise.”
Dallas-based Mary Kay, well-known for giving out pink Cadillacs to its prime salespeople, arrived in Ukraine three many years in the past, the place it discovered a burgeoning workforce of ladies anticipating revenue. Whereas it has a powerful presence there, Russia stays an excellent greater market — its fifth largest — with 180,000 consultants. However in contrast to main manufacturers like Starbucks and McDonald’s and different outstanding multi-level advertising corporations like Herbalife and Amway that closed up store within the nation after the invasion, Mary Kay nonetheless operates there. It has needed to traverse a tangle of sanctions by staying.
“We now have many Impartial Magnificence Consultants in Russia who additionally depend on Mary Kay, in lots of circumstances, for his or her livelihood. Once more, we stay dedicated to our mission,” Webb mentioned, including the corporate ensures “full adherence to all legal guidelines and sanctions.”
Many of the Ukrainian consultants that Forbes spoke to say they oppose Mary Kay’s choice to stay in Russia, however appear resigned to it. “I strive to not dwell on it as a result of I can’t affect it,” mentioned Krivchenkova. “In Russia, there are numerous girls who’ve survived solely because of their Mary Kay enterprise. They didn’t need this warfare.”
The corporate’s operations floor to a halt in Ukraine after the warfare began due to the extraordinary bombing in Kyiv, the place Mary Kay’s principal warehouse is positioned. In these first few months of warfare, consultants resorted to promoting no matter merchandise they’d readily available to assist themselves and their households. Some consultants have hosted charity magnificence marathons the place a portion of gross sales are donated to the warfare effort.
Tatiana Korniychuk, 50, started hauling her Mary Kay merchandise into the bomb shelter throughout air alerts, letting girls strive new cosmetics whereas they waited for the time to cross. “We transformed the shelter right into a magnificence salon,” mentioned Korniychuk, who lives in Zhytomyr.
Maryna Chaikivska, 29, offered tubes of eye cream, cleanser and charcoal face masks she had stocked in her workplace after the warfare broke out. She mentioned that netted her about $1,000 a month, paying the payments for six months. Her husband had misplaced his job at a pharmaceutical firm after bombing in Kharkiv severely curtailed manufacturing capability and was heading to the frontlines to place his medical diploma to make use of treating injured troopers.
“Mary Kay introduced colours to a troublesome interval of life.”
“There was no different method out,” mentioned Chaikivska, who continued to pitch Springtime skincare regimens and bottled-up concoctions that might assist fight stress-induced breakouts and wrinkles to her 1,500 Instagram followers.
Chaikivska, who lives in Lviv, used to maintain some $15,000 price of stock readily available, however now she worries about one thing taking place to it. She heard about one other guide who misplaced all her stock after her home was hit by explosions and went up in flames. Now she retains a 3rd of that quantity of stock readily available.
Three months into the warfare, Mary Kay started delivering the cosmetics it had in its partially destroyed Kyiv warehouse. By late 2022, it was slowly starting to ship new merchandise as its consultants rebuilt their buyer bases after tens of millions fled the nation in quest of security. Greater than six million Ukrainians stay exterior the nation’s borders. (Mary Kay’s Webb says the corporate shipped merchandise “as quickly as attainable.”)
That’s had a dramatic affect on companies constructed on prime of the multi-level advertising firm. As a result of so many shoppers and consultants have left Ukraine, Elena Krivchenkova mentioned that the incomes on her 2,000-person crew have fallen by a median of 30% in the course of the warfare.
Consultants have additionally been impacted by rolling blackouts, which make it troublesome to get on-line to pitch merchandise. Six months into the warfare, Natalia Sokratova, a 35-year-old former trainer, purchased a generator so she may proceed posting to Instagram, internet hosting on-line tutorials and checking in along with her crew. Others have purchased SIM playing cards from totally different wi-fi suppliers, in order that if one supplier struggles to offer Wi-Fi they’ll strive one other supplier.
Some have struggled to make a lot cash from promoting Mary Kay cosmetics. Natalia Marynets, a skilled lawyer who started promoting in 2023, spends two or three hours a day on Mary Kay and has recruited 16 consultants, however nonetheless solely makes about $200 a month.
Mary Kay didn’t reply to questions on how a lot the common guide makes in Ukraine. It doesn’t launch earnings figures besides in Canada, the place it says the common guide makes $200 a yr.
For lots of the different girls Forbes spoke to, the extra revenue, nonetheless incremental, wasn’t the one good thing about working as a Mary Kay guide in the course of the warfare.
“Mary Kay introduced colours to a troublesome interval of life,” mentioned Olga Boysyan, a former pharmacist who joined the corporate final yr. She instructed Forbes promoting cosmetics is a welcome distraction when she’s ready to listen to from her husband and son, who’re serving within the military.
“I’ve a possibility to distract our girls from negativity and on the identical time give them a superb temper,” Marynets mentioned. “Even in the course of the Second World Warfare, purple lipstick was like an antidepressant for ladies.”
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