ABODE [Persona] I'm Tickled Pink Mary Kay offers a doorway to financial security for many women and prosperity for some. Theresa Addison is a local Mary Kay director who is following the principal of reaching success by making others successful. April 2007

Don Huntington

Like most Mary Kay sales consultants, Theresa Addison had her initial introduction to the company as a customer. From her first experience she said that she fell in love with the company's philosophy. Mary Kay isn't about selling products, but selling self-esteem. Theresa's consultant was teaching her to take care of herself. She believed what Theresa came to understand — that a woman is a better person when she looks good and feels good.

At the time Theresa was taking courses at Chabot Community College in Pre-psychology and Sociology, and was putting herself through school serving tables at Scott's Seafood Restaurant in Jack London Square.

Stepping into Life

Theresa said that the best thing that happened to her at Scott's Seafood was meeting the man who would become her husband. They met at the restaurant's break-room shortly after he had joined the company as a new chef.

The two of them became friends before they were lovers, Theresa said. Following a three-year engagement they were married in 1994. They traveled for a while and didn't have children until five years after marriage. "We had a lot of fun during those five years!" Theresa said with a smile.

When Mary Kay presented her the opportunity of becoming her own boss and making some money working part-time, Theresa said she leaped at it. Never in her wildest dream did she realize where the road would take her. For several years she just had fun with the company.

Theresa said that Dennis saw the implications before she did. "You should get serious," he told her. "I see the potential, and can see how much fun you are having doing this."

Under his urging it didn't take long before Theresa began seeing the bigger picture of what Mary Kay could offer to its consultants.

"Most obviously, we are all in line for free cars and for unbounded income opportunities," Theresa said. "Less obvious are the opportunities for personal growth that the company offers to its sales representatives."

In 1996 Theresa earned her first Red Pontiac Grand-Am while she was still working at Scott's Seafood.

"So there I was going to school, working part-time," Theresa said with a laugh. "And driving to my waitressing job in a glorious new car."

In 1999 she got pregnant with her first child and decided to focus on her family. She quit her job and in four months she had moved up the next rung at Mary Kay. Three weeks before giving birth, she had become a company sales director.

A couple of years later, in June 2003, she drove home the ultimate automobile prize — a Pink Cadillac. For the past ten years she's always been driving a new car. In the past four years her unit has generated $1.3 million in retail sales, so she said she's now qualified for her third Cadillac.

"It's fun getting one of these!" Theresa said. "You drive in with the old car, put your signature on two forms, and drive out with the new one."

In 1963 the company settled on pink for the Cadillacs, choosing a shade in one of the Mary Kay compacts. The company and General Motors have an agreement so that cars in that shade of pink are reserved for Mary Kay sales consultants.

"The color acknowledges our femininity," Theresa said. "Also, I think that it's a fun, flirty shade — the favorite color of the little girl that is within all of us women."

Sharing Success

Theresa freely admits that her new car reflects the performance of her entire unit, and not just her own efforts and abilities. "The car does not simply symbolize that I'm a top director," she explained. "But it means that I'm the director of a top unit, composed of a number of great salespeople and businesswomen."

Theresa admits that it's great to drive around in a shiny car, of course, and to keep receiving checks in the mail with a gratifying number of zeros before the decimal point. However, she said that the real buzz in this business comes from assisting other people in climbing the ladder of success.

Mary Kay isn't a multi-level marketing company, but is built on an open business plan of sales units that can spawn off an unlimited number of offspring units. They have a 50 percent commission rate, plus bonus checks that come from the unit's success. Anyone in her unit can become a star recruiter when she has at least three people on her team, Theresa said, and can eventually spin out her own unit.

In her role as director Theresa teaches, motivates, and coaches other women to reach the goals that they set for themselves. "We're helping other women to have profitable careers," Theresa said, "while still putting their family first."

Theresa said that the company invests a lot of resources in trying to make people successful by offering training at all levels. "The company has been around for more than four decades; they've figured out how to do this."

Mary Kay is the best selling brand of skin care in the nation. The company got into that position, Theresa believes, both by manufacturing superior products and by instilling a set of positive core values in the mind and heart of every consultant.

"I think that many companies talk about 'core values,'" she said. "But these are built right into the center of Mary Kay's business plan."

The company values faith, but doesn't cares if a person is Catholic, Mormon, Jewish, Jehovah Witness, Baptist, Lutheran, or nothing in particular. Theresa said that she has all these varieties of faith represented in her own unit. But the leaders seek to model the spiritual principle that life works best when people maintain proper priorities in their lives, which consists of God first, then family, and only then business.

She said, "There's liberation in working for an organization that keeps pressing the point that allegiance to the company should NOT be the most important thing in their employees' lives! Not even the second most important thing!"

Working Toward the Goal

Nothing in the world is easy, and people who are successful in their Mary Kay businesses must make sacrifices. Theresa said, "The Company has a saying, 'The higher you go in the company the more bloody wounds you have received.'"

"My husband and kids know that I work hard to reach my goals, but sacrifices are always made with the full support of the members of my family."

Theresa's business helps her with her family responsibilities. Like so many moms with children in our family oriented community, Theresa's kids are her motivation.

"The larger picture of why I do what I do doesn't have to do with Cadillacs or paychecks, but has to do with them." Theresa is glad that she's there to see her two children, Devon (age four) and Olivia (age seven), off to school in the morning, for example, and is waiting for them when they come home in the afternoon.

Because of her success with Mary Kay, Theresa's husband was able to be a stay-at-home dad for a year. He established a great relationship with the kids as a Mister Mom. He cleaned the house, maintained the car, and produced her newsletter. As a former executive chef, he did all the cooking, of course.

"He is better around the house and far better in the kitchen than most women," Theresa said. And then added, "Dennis is my backbone; he is my strength!

During his time off Dennis had sufficient time to get certified through Allied Business School and is working towards his dream of becoming a Real Estate Appraiser.

Theresa never tries to impose her values upon others, but simply helps them come to realize their dreams through the power of her example.

She maintains that it is no mere belief but a fact supported by the data of numerous observable and repeatable cases that maintaining that order of God-Family-Business improves the quality of a person's life.

Theresa said that a woman usually becomes more successful in business, for example, by keeping business in its proper place. She and Dennis try to model the practice of doing everything with passion, and break the word down as an acronym:

P Purpose

A Attitude

S Self — take care of your self!

S Spiritual

I Invest in relationships

O On it!

N Never ever give up!

"We model other practices," Theresa said, "by observing the Golden Rule, as well as practicing integrity and honesty." By her own example she tries to provide answers to questions like, How do you treat people? And, How do you treat people in front of other people? How do you treat your friends? And How do you remain both loving and strong?

Theresa thinks that the business helps her to model life values for her children. At their early age they are beginning to understand that you have to decide what you want, and then you have to work hard to make it happen.

Theresa said that her kids can see that sometimes that she fails to meet her goals, but then she just gets back up and tries again. "They're starting to figure out about patterns for success by watching me," Theresa said.

Second-grader, Olivia, is a student at Loma Vista. "Even at seven years of age Olivia can see from my example how to treat other people and how to succeed at the things you choose to do,"

Theresa's professional goal is to empower women and see what each of them can do with the opportunity. Some of them might make an extra thousand dollars a month, perhaps. Or make ten thousand a month, if they will.

"I would love to mentor women who would end up being more successful than me. That would be a great payoff!" Theresa thinks she would be more pleased than they by their success.

"In fact, she said. "I would be tickled pink!"

For more information about Theresa Addison or Mary Kay Cosmetics call 800 marykay OR go to www.marykay.com/taddison.