Van Andel and DeVos first became friends in high school in Grand Rapids, Michigan. After both returned from service overseas in World War II, their early entrepreneurial ventures included a flight school and one of the first drive-in restaurants in Michigan.
In 1946 Van Andel started a business called Wolverine Air Service, when he and another partner bought a small Piper Cub airplane as college students.
They sold both interests in 1948 to buy a sailboat in Connecticut with intentions to sail to the Caribbean — even though neither had any sailing experience. Their old wooden schooner, “Elizabeth,” sank off the coast of Cuba.
Early 1959, with the help of their wives and a handful of employees, Amway began operations from offices in their basements. Van Andel created sales literature and supervised new product development; DeVos motivated and trained new distributors.
Amway, the multi-level marketing company of beauty, health and home care products which is another example of successful network marketing model that has been around 60 years with an annual revenue of $8,6 billion.
In 1959, Amway their first product Liquid Organic Cleaner (L.O.C.™), one of the first concentrated, biodegradable and environmentally friendly cleaning products. Since then, Amway has become a global leader in the categories of nutrition, beauty and home.
History of Amway
