NSP Yearly Price increase - April 1st

It's the last month to take advantage of 2004 pricing. Nature's Sunshine as always is splurging on specials prior to the increase. Check out St. Patricks Day Specials - March 17 & 18 & Extra Specials March 17th-31st blog pages to enjoy these special prices.

While most of our top-100 -selling products will not see a price increase, other products will see a modest price increase. Save money by stocking your shelves now.

Recently a member from one of my yahoogrooups wrote an email to our Home office to question the reasoning behind the increase every April 1st. The following is a letter from Greg Halliday, NSP Vice President, Sales & Marketing.

Dear NSP Members:

I can understand your concerns with the pricing of our products. Our commitment to contamination testing and verification of strength of the herbs (potency)-those two things-long ago determined for us that we would be higher priced. It is very expensive to make sure a product is not contaminated in any way. Our worldwide society seems to create new ways to contaminate, and new pollutants and strains of microbial critters at an ever-increasing rate.

We constantly have to develop new tests and purchase new equipment to insure pure products. In addition, we regularly send back to the supplier products that are safe, but are lacking in the active ingredients.

We have found that many other companies lack in either the purity or the potency, and some, in both. The smaller companies can sell a cheaper product that is a good potency, but, in the case of at least two we considered buying at our Distributors request, we found high bacteria counts in their products. In other words, the products worked, but they were not always clean. They would not have passed our stricter quality standard.

Each year, we only raise our prices where costs truly increase. This past year, 2004, for instance, over 120 products' prices remained unchanged. Of those prices raised, most went up .25 to .50 cents. Those products that increased $1.00 or more were products we would have discontinued in the past, because very few of them are being purchased. In some cases, we have had to throw the products away because the potency expires before they are sold. Rather than discontinue low selling products (since some people depend on them for their health) we have raised the price to offset the much higher cost of building and keeping (and sometimes throwing away) products that aren't widely used. Managers have told us they would rather pay more for these specialty products than see them discontinued.

I included for you a chart that shows at what percent prices have increased in the overall US economy in the past 5 years. I also included how much healthcare prices have gone up and then I compared them to NSP's price increases. As you can see we have raised our prices much less than the rest of the USA companies, with an even greater difference from the healthcare industry.

Year NSP All HealthCare

2000 0.0% 2.7% 3.6%
2001 0.3% 3.7% 4.5%
2002 0.5% 1.1% 4.7%
2003 1.9% 2.6% 4.6%
2004 2.1% 1.9% 3.8%

Average 1% 2% 4%

"All" and "Healthcare" based upon the Consumer Price Index.

We have worked hard to lower our production costs-we have even decreased our number of employees to keep costs as low as possible. This has helped us to keep our price increases down. We are committed to providing our products at the best value possible to you, our Managers and to our Distributors and customers. But, we cannot sacrifice quality, purity and potency. Our herbs will only change people's lives if they work, and if they are safe. This commitment costs money, but it is worth it.

At Convention in Orlando, we announced lowering the price on Paw Paw Cell Reg and ParaCleanse with Paw Paw by $5.00 and $2.00, respectively. We did this because of cost savings in our extraction process. We were very happy to be able to announce this. We are always looking for opportunities to manufacture and process ingredients ourselves (which is the case with most of our products) so that new products can come to market at a lower cost, often, than our competitors. For example, both Nature's Noni and Thai-go (liquid products) were launched at NSP at a savings versus the chief competitor.

There is another aspect of how NSP spends our resources that I want to share with you. We believe people have a better chance of healing when they are helped one on one, or in a small group setting. We have always believed that part of the price your clients pay is for your expertise. It makes all the difference when they can talk to someone who can personalize what is out there. That is why we spend money on educational courses (no one even compares to NSP here) and trips and Conventions where we can get together and learn from one another and from experts.

There is always new understanding to be gained, and new herbs and supplements being discovered. This is the cause we are part of and which we have committed to lead. We still have much to learn and to become to fulfill what we believe is our mission at NSP, to bring our products and our opportunity to all the world-and that includes the many cities, towns and homes in the USA where we are currently unknown.

Sincerely,

Greg Halliday
NSP Vice President
Sales and Marketing