BEIJING (AP) – All-expenses-paid trips to reward top salespeople aren’t unusual, but direct marketing companies that are the Chinese versions of Amway, Avon and Herbalife are taking it to an extreme by sending thousands abroad on package tours.
One company is sending 12,700 salespeople to Thailand on a tour that continues until next week. The Infinitus herbal supplement company has outfitted the sales reps with uniforms, the same luggage and even the same umbrellas.
Earlier this month, a medicinal products group sent 6,000 of its representatives to France where they set a world record by massing the most people to spell out a phrase that included their own firm’s name. Yet another Chinese direct seller sent 7,000 people to California last year.
“We are making history!” vice-chairman Xu Guowei of the Perfect China cosmetics company crowed in California during the retreat and package tour. “We have taken 86 flights, stayed in 26 hotels,” he said. “Our group’s attendees have spent $10,000 each this visit.”
The tours are at the intersection of several trends in a country with a predilection for package trips: an explosion in overseas travel, surging national pride and the phenomenal growth in the past decade of direct sales companies. The companies are splashing cash and seeking publicity following a period in which they were banned as pyramid schemes.