Avon Calls On Russia Cosmetics Giants Vie For Share Of Huge Market In Former Soviet Republic

There are more than 15,000 Avon ladies in Russia, and not one of them rings the doorbell.

Bowing both to security fears and old-time Soviet etiquette, Russian representatives of the world’s largest direct-sales cosmetics company do not go door to door, any more than their American counterparts do these days. They do not even make house calls to established customers. Instead, they sell lipsticks, wrinkle creams and facial toners in factories, airports, beauty parlors, laboratories and, sometimes, from a park bench.

“Russians are afraid to open their door to strangers,” explained Mariya Gerasyova, 31, the company’s national sales director.

“And even if they know you, they don’t want you to see how their apartments look, the lack of repair, the dirt.”

But Russian women have swept aside almost every other cultural inhibition to embrace the latest capitalist profit custom sweeping the Russian economy - direct-sales marketing.

Avon Products Inc. of New York and its main rival, Mary Kay Cosmetics, a unit of the Mary Kay Corp. of Dallas, have invaded the Russian market the last two years and recruited an all-female army to sell tens of millions of dollars worth of beauty products each year.

And Russia - with its swelling rolls of unemployed or underemployed professionals - is a recruiter’s dream. Thousands of women trained as engineers, physicists and teachers are grabbing an entrepreneurial opportunity that even five years ago was both illegal and socially taboo.

“The professional qualifications of these women are unbelievable,” declared Susan Kropf, president for new and emerging markets at Avon, on her first visit to Russia last month. “When the first Russian coordinator I met told me she was a surgeon, I fell out of my chair.”

Mrs. Gerasyova, similarly, is a trained linguist and a reserve lieutenant in the Russian army.

As a result of their new-found wealth and independence, many of these newly minted entrepreneurs have undergone a more radical make-over of their lives than ever took place during the collapse of the Soviet Union five years ago.

“When I started, my husband was always furious,” said Svetlana Morosova, 29, an area manager for Avon. “He couldn’t stand the fact that I was making more money than him, that I had changed, become more selfassured and independent,” she said.

Her husband, a policeman, earns less than $200 a month.

Eighteen months ago, Mrs. Morosova, who has advanced degrees in mathematics and economics, was sitting at home with her twins, a boy and a girl who are now 4 years old, struggling to find part-time accounting work when a friend introduced her to Avon. She made her first sale to other young mothers at a children’s playground.

She is now a manager, a job that pays close to $2,000 a month in a country where the average salary is $120.

If many Russian women view the American cosmetics industry as an economic godsend, the industry is embracing Russia - with a population of about 150 million hungry for Western-style goods - as a marketing paradise.

For Avon, which is already active throughout Eastern Europe, Russia is one of several hot emerging markets, which also include China, South Africa and Latin America.

For Mary Kay, which has less experience in emerging markets, the former Soviet bloc is the focus of its overseas growth.

The American companies’ penetration of Russia is all the more impressive given the country’s 70 years of Communist indoctrination against private enterprise, which some people still refer to as “speculation.” “For the older generation, selling is still viewed as shameful,” Mrs. Gerasyova, Avon’s national sales director, said.

But another Soviet tradition played against that constraint: when shortages were acute, many women lined up for hours, bought in bulk and privately bartered cosmetics for meat, perfume for diapers. “We took it easy at first, contacting friends and relatives, the way it was always done,” Mrs. Gerasyova explained.

Avon representatives buy Avon products on credit, then resell them to friends, acquaintances and coworkers at a recommended retail price, pocketing a difference that averages 20 percent. They do not have to pay any cash up front.

Mary Kay representatives, who call themselves “skin care consultants,” have to buy start-up demonstration product kits for $85.

A single purchase can take a big cut out of an average Russian woman’s income, but many customers say they do not care. Natasha Matyonina, 28, a mother of one who earns less than $500 a month as a baby sitter, said she considers the Avon products she buys as necessities.

“I can go without a lot of things, but I can’t imagine not having makeup,” she said.