Amway, Biomedical Research,,, And Elton John?
What Do Amway, Biomedical Research, And Elton John Have In Common?
If you say the names Jay Van Andel and Rich DeVos at a marketing event or around anyone that has been in the MLM and network marketing industry they will immediately think of Amway.
If you say the name Jay Van Andel in the town I grew up in people think of Elton John, NCAA Hockey, AFL Arena Bowl Games, Kenny Chesney, Trans-Siberian Orchestra, The Who, or The Harlem Globetrotters. The Van Andel Arena was named in 1996 for it’s largest benefactor, Jay and Betty Van Andel.
Jay and Betty Van Andel also founded the Van Andel Institute in 1996 to enhance lives through biomedical research and education. With their son David Van Andel now as the CEO, the primary focus of the Van Andel Institute is cancer research but studies also include osteoporosis, Parkinson disease and diabetes.
And the DeVos name? That makes people think of the DeVos Children’s Hospital. DeVos Children’s Hospital and the Van Andel Institute collaborate in a fellowship program focused on the diagnosis and treatment of pediatric cancer and blood disorders.
The DeVos name also makes the people in my area think of the DeVos Place and DeVos Performance Hall. This facility includes a 40,000 sq ft ball room and a performing theater. It is host to conventions, ballet, opera and broadway shows.
All of these are within a short distance of the Amway Grand Plaza (which puts any other hotel in the area to shame) and the Gerald Ford International Airport in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
I’ve never been a part of the Amway opportunity, but I don’t need to in order to know the good that has been done by Van Andel and DeVos. The second largest city in Michigan is host to their contributions to society.
The terrible reputation and trash talk that the MLM industry gets usually comes back to focus on Amway. The success that Jay Van Andel and Rich DeVos with Amway is seen throughout West Michigan. Before believing or spreading more trash talk about Amway, look up the places and foundations mentioned above because they do more than I can begin to mention.
I am proud to say that I grew up in the home state of Amway!
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Brilliant, well written, and powerful post Stephanie! I myself was in Amway for a few years and I knew that the founders had done a lot but I never realized how much they had done until I read this. Thank you for putting this together and getting it out there. It doesn’t matter if you are in Amway or not, it really goes to show what MLM can do for the greater good of people and society as a whole.
That is really cool. I never knew that, thanks!
Network Marketing is Freaking Awesome. I too spent some time in Amway, and even though I would take a painful flogging to being recruited into it again, I learned what I believe to be Millions of Dollars worth of information by being a part of the organization.
Nice Post Steph.
-Aki
Steph,
Very well written post on Amway & the Van Andel & Devos families. My wife & I went Ruby in Amway nearly 10 years ago & had the opportunity to fly to Grand Rapids at Amway’s expense & spend 3 days up there staying at the Amway Grand Plaza hotel, touring the city & the Amway World Headquarters. It was amazing to see the impact the leaders of a network marketing company can make on a city. The biggest mistake Amway ever made was letting some of their greedy distributors take over the training of the field reps & some of their products being overpriced.
The cool thing Amway has done in the last couple of years is put controls in place to get rid of the greedy distributor leaders producing useless rah rah training material, lower prices & institute field sales training to help their reps be more profitable. They’ve also been running commercials which have significantly helped the company.
Today I am relatively new to working with Numis & still have a significant on going income from Amway & am very fond of the company. They posted their biggest year ever in 2010 – 9.2 billion in sales. I see Numis being a great compliment to my online business portfolio & I appreciate you writing about them.
Great stuff on getting syndicated on David’s email. That’s great stuff.
Dan Rice – Online Amway Profits recently posted..7 Attraction Marketing Tips To Create Your Facebook Profile To Generate Leads For Your Network Marketing Business
Thanks Dan, I’ve never been in Amway but can’t thank the company and it’s founders enough not only for what they’ve done in MLM but what they’ve done in my home state.
Dave is a cool guy, known him for over a year now and learned a lot from him. He interviewed me for a testimony on the Numis Tools program too
Except I think he still has me listed as either a 1 or 2 star on the site LOL