In the early days of the American Way Association, before Amway was even formed, distributors (now IBOs) sought out products in the marketplace to sell.
Jody Dutt remembers his dad trying a water softener kit, car generator, and battery additive. "Dad came home with a chemical set and practiced the pitch on Mom," says Jody, who would have been about 9 at the time. "They were never planning to be a manufacturer; they were going to be manufacturer representatives." Each distributor was encouraged to bring sellable product ideas to the AWA and if the AWA took on the product everyone could promote it, and it would carry the insignia (a seal balancing a ball) as an official AWA Product.
When Amway was founded, the Association and Corporation worked together to develop products for distributors to retail. At one time, an IBO could sell as many as 450 products, most of them created and manufactured by Amway, with the Board’s input. Although today the product selection has been pared to suit the market, Amway and the IBOAI continue to partner to bring to the marketplace products best suited for IBOs and their customers.
