Suddenly we were able to call potential customers and offer the amazing MaxEPA for practically pennies on the dollar. It was the easiest sale in the world and I latched on to it like an animal that won’t let go. We started to get a new wholesale customer every day as stores realized what a great value NOW was offering, while allowing them to compete with mail order companies that advertised in Prevention magazine. MaxEPA opened up doors to customers that might never have considered NOW because we had the right product at the right time in the right place. While some may call business breaks like this luck, I’ll call it providence and count my blessings. By 1986, MaxEPA was such a hit, and we had sold it so well, that 30% of NOW’s entire business was in this new, fishy supplement. Retail health food stores, which stocked 3,000 different products, sold up to 15% of total sales in MaxEPA alone during this period. As with all great ideas and products, generic knock-offs soon appeared and NOW, also, introduced a lower cost Omega-3 softgel with the same exact potency and composition. In response, R.P. Scherer began imprinting each softgel with the name “MaxEPA” to differentiate the original, documented and researched product from generic copies. For NOW, this was a coup, because in the past competitors had claimed that somehow NOW’s MaxEPA was inferior to theirs. Of course it was identical all along, made by the same supplier, but now the imprint guaranteed the quality and authenticity of NOW brand MaxEPA. One interesting side note to the MaxEPA story is that when a generic supply of Omega- 3 came out, the supplier cost was about half that of MaxEPA. As a buyer, I pleaded with R.P. Scherer to reduce its price substantially to compete with the newer offerings. It just seemed a matter of time before consumers woke up to buying a better deal, whether it had the magical ‘MaxEPA’ name on it or not. As with many profit centers, companies are very reluctant to reduce prices when the cost goes down or when the market dictates price competition. Fifteen years later the generic Omega-3 outsold MaxEPA by fifty to one, though it didn’t necessarily have to be. Twenty years later NOW discontinued selling MaxEPA, though other fish oil supplements became very popular Thanks to MaxEPA, NOW grew dramatically – 32% in 1986 and 38% in 1987 – with nearly 300 new wholesale accounts each year. Unfortunately, like many products that are over-hyped by the media, the bubble tends to burst quickly, sometimes for no good reason at all. In 1987, a report came out critical of MaxEPA, stating that since MaxEPA naturally contains cholesterol, it couldn’t possibly reduce cholesterol and might even cause cardiovascular problems. Since the media seems to love “cures” as well as “health frauds”, it picked up this story and drove MaxEPA into the ground. The product we counted on, and couldn’t bottle fast enough, quickly became an inventory problem, virtually overnight. Though R.P. Scherer later introduced a cholesterol-free version, and the negative report had erred badly regarding LDL and HDL levels, the bad news was overwhelming. It’s a sad thing to see bad things happen that shouldn’t. Too bad MaxEPA wasn’t the last important health product severely injured by the media. 1985-1988 51
