NOW was deeply affected by this war. In 2021, NOW’s exports were significant and our two largest export countries were Russia and Ukraine! Over 10% of our entire business was sold into these two countries. Our largest customer, iherb.com, took a major hit when it was not allowed to ship into Russia because of sanctions. NOW felt that as a supplier, and sales started to fall by double-digits in March 2022. We also felt this from supplies as Ukraine was the world’s largest producer of Sunflower products, including Sunflower Lecithin. Ukraine was also a top producer and exporter of corn, wheat, barley, and rapeseed. This all led to product shortages and higher prices for any product sourced from Ukraine or Russia. Fortunately, NOW’s export business was strong and we weathered 2022 with only a minor drop in sales. In 2023, NOW’s international sales leaped by 41% as demand for NOW brand and “made in USA” worked in our favor. We found strong partner- distributors in countries such as Brazil, Poland, Kazakhstan, and Czech Republic to help grow worldwide sales. It’s surprising, but about 50% of our 2024 business is now shipped outside the US! New Marketing Adventures In 2022, NOW introduced nine sizes of “NOW Walking Shoes”. Why? Well, why not! I was at a convention in Las Vegas and was inspired when I saw a booth full of salespeople wearing orange shoes. That gave the idea for our brand since orange is our main color and everyone wears some kind of shoes. Putting our NOW name on almost anything helps branding and keeps our name in front of customers. It took about a year to work out supplies, since these were custom made for NOW in China to our own specifications. The shoes are quite comfortable and we gave a free pair to all employees to show our true colors! They didn’t sell much at all, however, so we dropped the shoes after buying two full container loads. A while later, a co-worker gave me the idea of selling NOW brand organic socks. That made sense as long as the quality felt very good. We researched organic sock factories and found that Istanbul is the world capital for making organic socks. We contacted several potential factories and I had a chance to visit the sites to pick our best vendor with my wife, Beth, later in 2022. After a lot of design and sampling work, we settled on 75% certified organic cotton socks and began selling these in 2023. The price was right and we launched with two styles and two sizes each. But like the shoes, we were swimming upstream trying to sell socks and eventually gave away more than we sold. Sometimes ideas seem really good as concepts, but turning that into a profitable business is another matter. NOW marketing, meanwhile, got a big lift in 2022 when we experimented with a much bigger budget than normal. We hired our first ad agency, Hanson Dodge, and they helped us develop a new supplement campaign, along with media strategy. We measured the marketing activity and were pleased to see our “awareness” numbers increase – a measurement for what percent of people recognize a brand. In marketing it is often 138 BEATING THE ODDS
