On Wednesday, Aug. 29, 2012, Hurricane Isaac made landfall in
southeast Louisiana, following nearly the same path Hurricane Katrina
took exactly seven years earlier to the day.
While countless DSA member companies have provided assistance and
support to those affected by Hurricane Katrina on that fateful day in
2005, still others have responded in a moment’s notice to various
natural disasters across the country.
Similar to Other DSA companies outreach, when a catastrophic tornado
devastated Joplin, Mo., last spring, Jordan Essentials executives and
independent consultants alike felt the direct impact immediately.
While
Jordan Essentials’
headquarters is located just over an hour outside Joplin, many with the
company—as well as their close friends and families—lost their homes in
the disaster. “The Jordan Essentials family mobilized almost immediately,” said
Nancy Bogart, the company’s chief executive officer. “We partnered with
our consultants’ families and donated kits with lotions and soaps and
our consultants rallied together and brought in cleaning supplies.”
The Jordan Essentials team united so quickly to help the residents of
Joplin that the company never needed to issue a press release or
organize an official event in order to draw a great turnout of
distributors and families who were eager to help.
“We knew many of these people—they were part of our own family,”
Nancy said. “It was such a quick effort to mobilize everyone. Our first
wave of outreach lasted for close to two months. We drove over to Joplin
after the tornado to help our own families but it was so bad there that
it was like something out of a movie. You felt what you could do, you
had to do.
“One of the most interesting parts of it was that we have a closed
Facebook group through which we communicate with members of our
sales force and we were able to communicate with one of our consultants
impacted by the tornado even while her emails and phones were down,”
Nancy continued. “She got onto our Facebook page and conveyed to us
exactly what people in Joplin needed.”
For months after the tragedy, Jordan Essentials distributors shared
their stories with one another, including several who spoke at the
company’s convention.
“It helped all of us to know we were able to do something,” Nancy
said. “Our distributors were so eager to help—they brought laundry soap,
sheets, clothing, everything…our whole front office was packed [with
donations]. It was an amazing feeling and it was so good for our
consultants to feel like ‘my company stood by me.’ A lot of companies
shut down in and around Joplin after the tornado and some people lost
their jobs, but our consultants never had to.
“I think that’s a great thing about the direct selling community—none
of us are simply working in a cubicle,” she continued. “Instead, we’re a
community and these people who were impacted were people we’ve known
personally, we’ve met their families, we’ve hugged them and we’ve
celebrated their successes. You do what you can for them and you find
out firsthand that you’re able to make an impact even after such an
awful event.”
Source: Direct Selling Association
