Kansas City Star

July 22, 2011

Silpada gets silly, celebrates success

A year after being bought by Avon for $650 million, Silpada Designs is still led by its local founders. Just as planned.

But the Lenexa-based direct sales company specializing in sterling silver jewelry has turned to its 125-year-old owner for advice as it rolls out online ordering to complement its home party selling.

That’s one of the initiatives highlighted at Silpada’s annual convention, which started Thursday and runs through Sunday at Bartle Hall. About 4,400 Silpada sales representatives were expected to attend.

“Silpada Designs is the fastest growing sterling silver jewelry company in the world,” said Bonnie Kelly, who founded the company in 1997 with best friend Teresa Walsh. “We’re launching our new catalog, with all our fabulous jewelry, so many … colors and great sassy earrings. You name it, we got it.”

The jewelry is now sold by more than 33,000 representatives across the country, as well as in the United Kingdom and Canada. To expand the brand name, the company recently launched online ordering — but it has turned over those orders to local representatives who will get a 30 percent cut of sales, just as if they sold it at a home party. An average home party nets the representative about $300.

“We can touch customers we haven’t touched before. But we never compete with our representatives,” said Jerry Kelly, Silpada’s president and chief executive officer, and husband of Bonnie.

Silpada also recently tested television commercials on cable channels and got a promising 10,000 leads. The theme of this year’s Silpada convention is “Girlfriends for Life” and included a pajama party for about 600 of the company’s top representatives Thursday night, workshops on Friday and then the “World’s Largest Jewelry Party” Friday night.

Silpada also announced a children’s line Friday. The seven pieces — a ring, three necklaces, two pairs of earrings and a stretch bracelet with the words “I love you” etched in English, Spanish and French — range in price from $17 to $44.

Like a “big sister,” Avon is there when Silpada needs advice and sent a couple of people to the Lenexa headquarters to help with the online launch this spring.

Avon’s North American revenue — excluding Mexico — fell 2 percent for the first quarter, and the company said it would have fallen 10 percent if Avon hadn’t bought Silpada in mid-2010.

View this article on kansascity.com.

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