OpTree

Dietary Supplement maker Mannatech has just launched a tour across the US where company leaders will visit their associates and potential distributors to discuss the future of the company and building their businesses.

The tour, which will be called the “Whistle Stop Tour,” will travel across 10 cities. Mannatech’s new President, and CEO Wayne Badovinus, will be on the tour meeting the company’s distributors and discuss with them the company and its products. In turn, the distributors will get a chance to meet company leaders and learn more about the products and how to be a successful distributor. Of course in true Mannatech form, the website has no information on the Tour.

“The fuel to drive our growth is energy, enthusiasm, dedication, integrity, action - and most of all - passion. We know it all starts with our valuable team of independent Associates,” said Badovinus. “We all have the opportunity to turn weakness from the past into strengths for the future. Mannatech is a new company - we are moving forward and not looking back.”

Mannatech hopes to provide the tour will bring awareness of the company and promote it as a great way to earn supplemental company, especially during these rough economic times.

The tour will make 10 stops through the end of October. The Whistle Stop Tour will make stops in Lubbock, Texas, Medford Oregon, Branson, Missouri, Seattle, Chicago, Ft Lauderdale, Omaha and Two stops in Canada. The highlight of the tour will be a two day stop in Denver during which hundreds of current associate and new prospects will have a chance to discuss the company, its products and opportunities with Badovinus.

Maybe on the tour they will come across some people who can help them with their dreaded website. Love the company but it amazes me that their site is so bad! Their other site - Explore Mannatech - is so much better than the corporate one. They should ditch the corp one for the Explore one.

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We got word that defunct Weekenders has put its physical assets from its Ontario office up for auction.  The preview date is today from 10:00am - 5:00pm at 29 E. Wilmot St., Richmond Hill, Ontario

It looks like its everything from computers, servers, material, office furniture, etc.  What is amazing from the pics is that it looks like even the employees didnt get a lot of notice either considering there are mounds of papers on the desks - although it does look like some of the employees put stuff in boxes.

One thing that really worries us is that there is the potential for those computers to contain a lot of personal information on customers - names, addresses, credit card data etc. and selling that information can cause a LOT of potential problems.  Seeing how this company operated, I would be very cautious.

You can see pictures of all the items here.

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Mannatech (NADDQGS: MTEX) has made the unfortunate announcement that they will have to eliminate around 15% percent of its U.S. workforce which is around 60 employees. In addition to the layoffs, Mannatech will be making other reductions in expenses to improve the profitability of the company.

Wayne Badovinus, President and CEO of Mannatech, the health and wellness company, released a statement, saying, “Mannatech’s executive management team has made this difficult decision which will reposition the company for improved profitability and enhancement of shareholder value.”

After an extensive internal review of the company, executives have made plans to streamline projects and re-prioritize their business to improve the quality of the business as well as build and generate more revenue. Mannatech hopes that the re-organization process will create stronger leadership and help to improve domestic sales.

There are currently 449 employees at the company’s Coppell, Texas Headquarters and 613 employees worldwide.

It seems that the company is having some problems within the United States. With the layoffs coming so close to when 2nd quarter results are being announced, it will be interesting to see how well or how poorly the company did during the 2nd quarter.

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Michael J. Ellis, former chief executive of Metabolife International was sentenced to six month in federal prison for lying to the FDA regarding an ephedra based weight loss product.

Ellis pleaded guilty last November to one count of making false statement to the FDA back in 1999 about Metabolife products. Ellis must also pay a $20,000 dollars fine in addition to the prison time.

Prosecutors claim that Ellis, along with Metabolife sent letters to the FDA claiming they had never receive a notice from consumers about adverse effects of Metabolife 356, the product in question. However, internal documents showed that in fact they had received numerous letters from consumers complaining of seizures, heart attacks, strokes, and other serious complications.

Metabolife at the time, was one of the largest sellers of dietary products, largely based on sales of the Metabolife 356 product. Metabolife made clams that they were a “claims-free” company. In 2002, the company was forced to turn in over 14,000 reports of ephedra related complaints that they had not previously turned over to the FDA. Ephedra was finally banned in 2004 and Ellis and Metabolife were indicted on several counts of making false statements.

Because of the huge number of civil suits, and the legal costs of the federal lawsuit, Metabolife was forced to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in July of 05.

Metabolife has gone through a re-organization over the last few years and have closed all civil suits. The bankruptcy suit is no longer pending and the company, and Ellis are moving on. Ellis is no longer with Metabolife and there is no word yet on Ellis’ next career move, however his lawyer says that he is no longer involved in any way with the dietary industry.

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