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With all the news lately about alleged excessive lead levels and questions about product safety and the FDA jumping in, Mannatech took no time in announcing that several of their products have been certified by NSF International an accredited testing laboratory.

The products, Ambrotose and Advanced Ambrotose Glyconutritional Supplements have had the purity of the products tested and reviewed and determined as being pure and safe.

NSF is a public health certification organization that works to review products and certify the efficacy of statements made on the labels. NSF reviews the contents of products and tests them to make sure that all ingredients present in the supplements are listed on the label and are safe for consumption. Rather than simply testing products, the NSF also requires visits to the manufacturing facility before they were complete the certification.

After careful evaluation of the two products, NSF found that they met requirements of the NSF/ANSI 173 Dietary Supplement Standard which is the only American National Standard for dietary supplements. Mannatech will be proudly displaying the NSF seal on their supplements and will put notice of the certification in all of their consumer product information material.

“NSF certification is just one part of the extraordinary quality and purity measures Mannatech adheres to throughout its product management process,” said Marika Berkley, vice president of global regulatory affairs and quality assurance. “In addition to selecting ingredients that meet our rigorous purity standards, Mannatech ensures all its manufacturers adhere to industry-standard GMPs. We continually monitor our manufacturing partners and conduct frequent in-house and independent tests of the efficacy and purity of our products.”

This is a great accomplishment for the company, and actually for any company, especially companies that sell dietary supplements. Dietary supplements are not as stringently tested and many are sold without having to meet any kind of safety requirements. Within the MLM industry there has been so much talk lately about high lead levels, especially with Herbalife which is being sued for dangerous lead levels in products. Just to stay in business, it might soon become necessary to have products tested and certified for safety.

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Finally some good news for Herbalife. The company has been plagued lately with lawsuits and bad press over high levels of lead in the products, and I’m sure will take good news anywhere they can get it.

The nutritional supplement company announced that it has received a letter from the L.A. office of the SEC saying that they have completed their year long investigation into the company and has recommended that no action be taken agains the company.

Here’s how it all started…..apparently in mid 2007, the SEC began an investigation into some suspicious activity involving the timing of trading of Herbalife securities by a mid-level employee. The SEC was also investigating the extent of personal use of Herbalife products by distributors and the company’s related policies and procedures.

Herbalife cooperated fully with the SEC and its investigation over the last year and even disclosed to the public the accusations as well as the fact that they were being investigated.

I’m sure this comes as a huge relief to the company that the Securities and Exchange Commission has investigated the company’s practices thoroughly and found no wrong-doing. This is a small ray of hope for the company who is going through some rough times lately. They are still not out of the woods on the lead lawsuit but this was a big hurdle to get over and one they can finally put behind them.

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This was an unusually active week in the MLM world given the surprising news of Weekenders going out of business and filing for bankruptcy without any notice to its Distributors. Some of the more clever burned distributors have started taking to eBay to hock their wares and recoup some money.

We also started seeing that Mannatech appears to be getting out from its own legal troubles by settling a case which has plagued the company for some time now.

In other legal news, Herbalife continues to be harassed by the lead suit that a woman has filed over claims that she has suffered liver damage from using their products. This latest fiasco stemmed from the infamous Barry Minkow who has Herbalife on his radar and just wont let go. This also comes at a time when the FDA has started cracking down on false claims made both from and against the industry.

Tupperware is the lasted MLM company to be affected by the US economy woes being hit with higher prices from Dow Chemical Co due to the rising costs of resin - one of the main components in Tupperware’s products.

In more positive news, the Stevie Awards were handed out and both Shaklee and USANA each won an award presented by the American Business Association.

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We told you last week of the latest Herbalife lawsuit in which a California woman is suing the company over claims that their products led her to be hospitalized for liver problems. The lawsuit is moving forward, and it looks like it will cause major problems for the company.

The woman’s attorney, Christopher Grell has just won a motion to subpoena two labs that have tested the products and will issue 60 day notices to government agencies, the Attorney General and district attorneys in California to begin the process of forcing Herbalife to put warning labels on their products. Grell filed the most recent motion in order to obtain information from the two labs, Covance and Eurofins, that tested Herbalife products and reported that they were safe and met safety standards set forth in Propositions 65 which sets limits for lead levels in nutritional products for the state of California

“Based on our recently filed law suit, it appears that multiple sources from Switzerland to Jerusalem to the United States are all arriving at the same conclusion; there is something terribly wrong with Herbalife products and our just filed law suit is further corroboration of that fact,” said Christopher Grell. “Lab tests do not lie and Proposition 65 is a law to protect people from consuming excess lead from, of all things, their nutritional products,” added Grell.

Mr. Grell will also attempt to show that Herbalife products are weight loss remedies and that the company urges consumers to take a combination of products as part of a health and weight loss “program” for optimal benefits, thus increasing their lead intake significantly.

Grell lost his wife seventeen years ago after she had an adverse reaction to an “herbal” tea. Since then, he has been on a mission to improve safety standards in the herbal and dietary supplement industry. In addition to practicing law, Grell is the co-founder of the Dietary Supplement Safety Committee. This looks like it will be a tough battle for Herbalife. It seems that the law is siding with Grell and Herbalife will have to hand over previous tests as well as submit products for further testing. If new tests find high levels of lead, Herbalife will have to make some big changes. We will keep you up to date as the case moves forward.

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