Description
Book SynopsisThis first history of Avon traces the direct sales company's growth from its earliest days into an international corporation that operates in more than 60 countries and has had more than 4 million female representatives.
Trade ReviewManko details Avon's history from its origins as the California Perfume Company through its expansion in the 20th century....For most, Avon was not a career but a small supplement to their household economies. Manko differentiates the experiences of the women who made up the direct sales force, most of whom worked for Avon less than two years, offering profiles of women who rarely served as company executives until after the sexual revolution. Using their social networks to sell beauty products door-to-door, middle-class women were able to enter the labor force without challenging traditional stances on women's work. The book also explores Andrea Jung's appointment as CEO and the corporate charity initiatives she instituted to support women with breast cancer and anti-domestic violence causes....Useful for business or gender studies programs. * Choice *
Katina Manko's thoroughly researched and deftly written book on Avon products presents a fresh take on the beauty and fashion industry, one that breaks with and demystifies the cliches of the past. [...] Manko's nuanced tale of a company, an industry and a group of women evolving over time will make a lasting contribution to our understanding of how economics and gender typically play out. If we are to build a distinctively gendered theory of economics from which to understand women's disadvantages and to fight for their financial liberty, books like this are essential. * Linda Scott, The Guardian *
Ding Dong! Avon Calling! is a lively and informative account of a firm that sold women cosmetics and promised them entrepreneurial independence. By taking Avon Ladies seriously as economic actors, Katina Manko reveals the nuances and complexities of gender, race, and enterprise, challenging our very notion of what counts as a business. Anyone interested in the economic history of the twentieth century must read this book. * Wendy Gamber, Indiana University *
Manko skillfully combines deep archival research and personal narratives to provide a nuanced study of how Avon gave women the opportunity to earn money and assume corporate responsibilities, yet retained a gendered culture which reserved top management for men. * Geoffrey Jones, author of Beauty Imagined: A History of the Global Beauty Industry *
In this thoroughly researched and beautifully written book, Katina Manko deftly weaves together the history of an iconic American company with that of the women sales agents who helped build it. Equal parts business, social, and women's history, Manko unravels the larger story of women's growing need and desire for an income throughout the twentieth century and the ways in which direct selling—marketed as a form of entrepreneurship—enabled them to simultaneously stay within gender norms of motherhood while also moving beyond them into the wider world of business enterprise. * Debra Michals, Merrimack College *
Katina Manko's Ding Dong! Avon Calling! is a compelling business history of the steady rise and the rapid fall of a direct-sales colossus. An American company created by a man and managed by men, Avon enlisted an army of middle-class white women to sell its products and image to other middle-class white women. Its business model was based on women's need and desire to function simultaneously in commerce and in the home. Manko describes a business culture built upon the suspect notion of women as independent contractors, leaving open the question of whether such a model was supportive or exploitative. In the age of Uber, Manko has given us a piquant exploration of the blurred lines between owners, managers, sub-contractors, and female working stiffs. * Mary A. Yeager, University of California, Los Angeles *
Adding much to the study of women and business history, Manko's fresh and sophisticated contribution uncovers a precursor to our gig economy that for too long has been dismissed as nostalgia. Manko's nuanced examination of the inner workings of Avon reveals contradictions and continuities in paternalistic decision-making that nevertheless opened the door for both beauty sales and female entrepreneurship that operated often as a side job. * Julie A. Willett, American Historical Review *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction Chapter 1: David McConnell and the California Perfume Company, 1890-1929: Direct Sales Strategy and Structure Chapter 2: "Now You Are In Business For Yourself": Representatives, Gender, and Business, 1890-1929 Chapter 3: The Work and Business Culture of California Perfume Company Traveling Agents, 1890s-1930s Chapter 4: "The Dawn of a New Era": Introducing Avon Products and a Depression-proof Business Strategy Chapter 5: The Men and Women of Avon: Creating New Corporate Territories, 1936-1946 Chapter 6: "Ding Dong! Avon Calling!": Selling Women's Economic Personality in Post-War America Chapter 7: Women of Enterprise: Avon and the Women Who Wanted it All Epilogue Notes Index
