‘Visibility of products is our next goal’

Forever Living Products (FLP) recently celebrated its 40th anniversary with a global rally in Dallas, Texas, USA and a localised week-long celebration accompanied with a health walk in Lagos. The firm’s Country Sales Manager, Mr. Daniel Ikechukwu, spoke with BERTRAM NWANNEKANMA on the firm’s achievements among other issues. Excerpts:

Forever Nigeria has always played a key role in Forever Africa at Global Rallies. How did it go for your contingent and how did you perform?

Forever Living Products Nigeria actively participated in this years’ global rally. Altogether we had 272 members in our contingent.

To me, it is not a question of the number, because we would have loved to go with more people, because countries from the Scandinavian, Japan and Hungary, came with more people.

That is where we want to get to, a point where we will have 1,000 Nigerians at the rally.

Our performance was good, however, it could be better. Like the name implies, it is a rally.

People are happy and excited, countries came with their local drums and the objective is to showcase themselves as a country.

Now, when you have 272, you cannot compare their performance in line with excitement, with a country with 1,000 or with 1,200 people.

We would have loved to go with more people to create a high level of excitement.

With the Chairman’s bonus, we were represented though not at all levels. We had 18 people who collected cheques across the different categories.

The implication is that, 18 families were financially elevated and came back with cheques ranging from US$5,000 to US$150,000.

This is something remarkable. However, this is not where we want to be?

We know the difference that more and bigger cheques will make in the lives of our people; this is what we want to achieve.

We want more people to see the opportunity that our business presents and run with it.

Why did Forever Nigeria embarked on such an elaborate celebration for its 40th anniversary in Lagos?

All the glamour is in line with our 40th anniversary celebration. There are very few companies in our industry that can boast of being 40.

For the over 10 million Forever Business Owners that we have globally, 40 years means 10 million individual Forever stories.

For us, it is 40 years of touching lives, 40 years of business excellence, 40 years of putting smiles on peoples’ faces, 40 years of getting it right and above all, it has been 40 years of using aloe vera to make people and families look better and feel better.

FLP Founder, Mr. Rex Maughan, must have been excited at this 40th anniversary?

We are forever grateful to Rex and Ruth Maughan, who had this vision 40 years ago and made it available to all of us. Without them, we will not be here today.

Despite Rex’s age, his passion for the business and love for our business owners is just the same as it was 40 years ago.

Now in Greg Maughan, we have a strong and visionary leader who understands the business thoroughly and knows exactly where he wants us to be.

The past 40 years have come and gone, what is key to us is the next 40 years to come.

Now we have an identity, we are Forever, we are the Aloe Vera company – the biggest grower and manufacturer of Aloe Vera.

Back home, there have been these celebrations. Tell us about them?

One of the basic principles that our business was founded on is to empower people to serve one another.

The event of the 40th anniversary is quite significant.

However, amidst the 10 million business owners that we have presently, only about 15,000 made it to Dallas.

Therefore, countries were given the mandate to further extend the celebration in their respective countries.

So for Forever Living Products Nigeria, we decided to kick-start our celebration in Lagos.

Our objective is for the over 25 million people in Lagos to know more about our products and business opportunity.

Our dream is to have a Nigeria that will understand and embrace total wellness.

With the use of our products, Nigerians can live healthier lives.

Hence we started with a Health Walk in the Mainland and another on the Island.

We also wanted people to know how it all started. Yes, we are 40 years globally, and 18 years in Nigeria.

We wanted our people to know the values that the company is built on.

These same values we know will guide them in the next 40 years to come.

With a very dynamic business environment and a continuous boom in the E-commerce marketplace, we felt the need to teach our people how to better protect our brands hence protecting their business.

We pride our business as a lifestyle and being something that is willable, we want all to build and protect a business that will outlive them.

The cocktail dinner was positioned at presenting to Nigerians the huge possibilities that abound in our business.

Irrespective of status in the society, we strongly believe that you deserve a healthier live.

We want all to drink in the benefits of aloe vera so that they can be alive to do any business of their choice.

The new focus must be alien to your Forever Business Owners. How are they reacting?

People are excited because like they said, this is the first time they are doing this. Change is the only constant thing in life.

In our rebranding process, our objective is to have value-adding events. In doing this, we have to be open to new ideas and learn new things.

We have to present our business the way it ought to be. Our business concept and idea need to be made visible to the crème de la crème.

With a strong focus on healthy living, we want Nigerians to be alive for their families and loved ones.

Most importantly, we know we have products that can help them achieve all these.

Presently, our visibility is not at optimal level. Therefore, our focus is to create that visibility.

With visibility comes increased awareness, hence the need to access and use the products.

We are very convinced that every home deserves a bottle of Forever Aloe Vera gel for total wellness.

Are you ready for the consequences, the boom that could result from these efforts?

Of course, everything we are doing is deliberate. There is nothing that we are doing that is by chance.

Every single step that we take is a deliberate attempt at rebranding.