Mark Ewell

The latest Direct Selling Association industry numbers are in! And they tell us a lot.

Of initial concern might be the overall sales trend in the direct selling industry which we declined by 4.3% from $29.8 billion to $28.33 billion in the US.

However, when compared to the tanking of retail sales, I have to say that the direct selling industry has really held its own.

This is all while the number of direct sales people in the US increased by 6.6% from 15.1 million to 16.1 million people. So, overall, the industry is gaining strength in numbers. I expect that sales will recover as the concerns about the economy diminish.

The top three product categories comprise almost 70% of total US industry sales with Home/Family Care/Home Durables (cleaning products, cookware, cutlery, etc.) at 23.9%, Wellness (weight loss products, vitamins, etc.) at 22.8%, and Personal Care (cosmetics, jewelry, skin care, etc.) a close third at 21.3% of the market share in the US.

Interestingly, face-to-face selling still makes up 78.1% of total sales with 73.3% of those sales happening in the home. This is in spite of all the talk about the internet and its dominance in the industry. Internet sales came in at a scant 7.3% for the year. There is a lot of room for growth here.

The West and the South remain the strongest regions at 28.6% and 34.8%, respectively. The Northeast is the smallest market at 15.8% of sales in spite of its proportionally larger population base.

Of all the participants in the direct selling industry only 43.3% are in it to make money. Business builders comprise 20.1% of the industry and retailers comprise 23.2%. Most work part time with 92.5% working less that 30 hours per week. The vast majority of these prefer face to face interaction [64.3%] while 25.4% prefer party plan or group selling.

Demographically, 82.4% of direct sellers are women, 57% are between the ages of 35 and 54, and 22% are 55 and over, a number larger than the 22% of participants that are between 18 and 34. The vast majority are married [77%] and 71% have some level of post high school education.

Figures such as these are very useful. And, if you go to the DSA website, you can get these numbers back to 2000. Use them as part of your story as you talk to potential business partners and take advantage of the figures to determine who you should be targeting and how you should be approaching them.

To the top!

Mark