GOOD MORNING WORLD
I have not ever met Frank L. VanderSloot. Never heard of him till this week. I watched him on a talk show and seemed like a good man. You know how you can get an impression of a person by their demeanor? I thought to myself, I would enjoy talking to this man! I liked some of the things I heard him say in the interview. The only Van der Sloot I ever knew of before was connected to the arrests in Aruba – not so nice a person and no relation. So I thought I would go see just who this Mr. Frank VanderSloot was on the internet.
It turns out he is very very rich. The bio on the internet sidebar from en. wikipedia.org said:
Frank L. VanderSloot is an American entrepreneur, radio network owner, rancher, and political campaign financier. He is the founder and chief executive officer of Melaleuca, Inc. His other business interests include Riverbend Ranch and Riverbend Communications. VanderSloot also serves on the board of directors and executive board of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. In 2011, the Land Report listed him as the nation’s 92nd largest landowner.
en.wikipedia.org · Text under CC-BY-SA license
I decided to look further and discovered he has a blog dedicated to him!!! I could not find the author of the blog. There was a comment that the author considered Frank VanderSloot a mentor. The design was a WordPress theme. I wish I could name the author. What I can do is say the author documented his words with links. Another thing I can say is the author really like Mr. VanderSloot. From what I read so did I. It is hard not to like someone who works hard for a living.
So I looked up Melaleuca. It too has its own website and facebook page and a foundation.
It turns out that it is a company like Herbalife and Amway. It is a pyramid business. Having worked in one of those with BeautiControl, I cannot condemn them. It is like anything else if you work hard you will be rewarded. If you do not you will complain.
Frank was born August 1948. He is younger than I am!!! He put himself through college with no loans. He sold cheese from his own cow, worked in a Laundromat, sold beef jerky in bars and taught Dutch! In 1972 he graduated from BrighamYoungUniversity with a BS in business. He went to work for ADP, Cox Communications in Vancouver, Washington. In 1985 when he was a VP at Cox he was approached by his brother in law about an opportunity to take over the helm of their Oil of Melaleuca, Inc., a startup business based in Idaho Falls. According to the blog his wife was homesick and this seemed to be a good way to get back to Idaho from Washington.
When he got to Oil of Melaleuca, Inc. in 1985 he discovered it was a ‘mess’. It was based on the tea tree market and that the company owned 80% corner of the market when it was more like 5%. The FDA then came calling as it was reported that the products were being hyped with much exaggeration. The other item is that VanderSloot did not like the multi-level practice of people being lured to buy $5000 of inventory. Oil of Melaleuca, Inc was shut down by the partners later that same year.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_L._VanderSloot
Melaleuca, Inc. [edit]
In 1985, VanderSloot founded Melaleuca, Inc., a multi-level marketing company that sells environmentally friendly[30][31] nutritional supplements, cleaning supplies, and personal-care products,[1][13][32][33] and he has been president and chief executive officer ever since. Melaleuca operates internationally, with U.S. operations centered in Idaho Falls, Idaho, and Knoxville, Tennessee.[34] Customers buy directly from Melaleuca’s website[35] or retail locations and[36] “independent marketing executives” receive commissions from Melaleuca for each purchase made by people they refer and by people their customers refer, through seven “referral generations”.[37] The company refers to this arrangement as “Consumer Direct Marketing,” a term it has trademarked.[38][39][40][41] Half of the legacy distributors from Oil of Melaleuca left after the new company was formed.[1]
Inc. magazine included Melaleuca on its Inc. 500 list of the fastest-growing private companies in the United States every year from 1990 to 1994 before inducting the company into its Hall of Fame in 1994.
As any company of this kind they have endured their share of investigations into its practices. Still I like the story that I think speaks to Mr. VanderSloot’s own beliefs of working for a living.
According to a 2004 article by Phyllis Berman, Melaleuca’s sales flattened in 1998, and VanderSloot “discovered that some senior directors were living off their residuals and doing little in the way of recruitment.”[1] This resulted in “a new policy that reduced payments to those who didn’t either bring in new converts or help others do so.”[1]
Again I worked for a multi-level company and I know you have to share your business to grow your business and having been part of a couple of different teams it can be fun as you work together!
I have taken way too much time on the business part of this post. Yet it goes to who Mr. VanderSloot is in Idaho. He bought a cheese farm to save the industry. Again from Wikipedia.
Snake River Cheese factory [edit]
In 1994, VanderSloot was approached by two dairy farmers with a plea to invest in the Snake River Cheese factory in Blackfoot, Idaho, after Kraft Foods had announced a decision to close it.[73] Kraft had operated the plant since the early 1920s.[74] In response, VanderSloot bought a $1 million interest in the plant, and an investment company assumed control, but the operation closed anyway within six months. VanderSloot then paid off a $2 million debt the company owed to the dairymen, staffed the plant with his own personnel and supplemented the milking herd with two thousand head of cattle.[75][76] He promised that all five hundred people whose jobs depended on the plant would remain employed and leased the plant to Beatrice Cheese, a subsidiary of ConAgra.[77] In 1999, the facility netted $278 million in sales. The next year, VanderSloot sold his interest in the company to Suprema Specialties[75][78] after Beatrice broke its lease.[79][80] VanderSloot again promised that employees would keep their jobs.[81] In 2006, the factory, which by then had been renamed as the Blackfoot Cheese Company, was sold to Sartori Foods.[82]
One of my favorite stories I read about this man had to do with his belief was in a Forbes article.
http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2004/1011/089_2.html
Most Melaleuca sales folks work hard and listen to VanderSloot’s advice about cleaning up their lives. Cathy Blandino of Las Vegas recently sent him a package containing the shredded remains of her 36 credit cards, on which she owed $64,000, all paid off over five years with help from her company earnings (she scaled back her efforts and brought home $5,800 last year). “We could never have done this without Melaleuca,” she added in a note.
VanderSloot reinforces the message. When one of his sales staff pays off a home, he flies to the nearest airport, shows up and throws a mortgage-burning party. Over the last four years he and his wife, Belinda, went to 31 such events. That’s on top of all the incentives to spur sales, from $2 inspirational tapes and an annual Fourth of July party in Idaho Falls (the largest display of fireworks west of the Mississippi) to the lure of car payments and exotic vacations with Frank and Belinda for the biggest producers.
Corny though they are, these gestures go the heart of VanderSloot’s values: hard work, decent rewards and simple living.
Seems like a nice guy. Tough businessman as reported in the following articles.
http://www.capitalpress.com/newest/JO-VanderSlootDonation-082812
http://www.salon.com/2012/02/17/billionaire_romney_donor_uses_threats_to_silence_critics/
The interview I saw was on “Your World with Neil Cavuto”. Frank VanderSloot has been audited by the IRS three times. He was placed on an ‘enemies list’ by the Obama Campaign. The following interview might have been lost or pooh pooh before this week.
The interview I watched with Neil Cavuto was this same man as well spoken as you saw in the above video. Check out the one I saw this week.
A most important thought from Mr. VanderSloot in this interview I believe is:
“He (ref. Obama) has to expect they’re going to do something when he put the list out there.
He made the list. He put the target up there. He knew something was going to happen.”
The best line from a man who has incurred the wrath of this government is:
“I am hopeful that our country will no longer go down that path.”
I end with where I began. This is a man I would like to meet. I like his demeanor. I like his story. I like that he protects his family, business and good name. After all the Bible says it best in Ecclesiastes 7:1. “A good name is better than fine perfume…”,
Thank you Mr. VanderSloot for showing us that there is a there there with the IRS Scandal.
…..ONWARD TO MORE MISADVENTURE…
ktsquared 