Case Studies
Promoting Women's Economic Empowerment:
The Learning Journey of Belcorp
Company: Belcorp
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Global Impact
 Recognizing the integral role of women in its business model has paid off for Belcorp. Since its establishment, Belcorp has expanded into a multi-brand company with 650,000 beauty consultants in fifteen countries in North and Latin America and an impressive annual growth of 10% to 15%. Through the Belcorp Foundation, it has directly helped thousands of women in the region since its start in 2003. As a whole, more than 8,000 women have benefited from the foundation's programs in ten countries in Latin America.
This success has helped transform the lives of its female consultants, allowing them to bring about positive change in their families and communities. Carmen Vargas, Manager of the Pachacútec sales zone in Ventanilla explains, "I feel very happy and proud to work in this company, because it has allowed me to grow and develop professionally, despite the fact that I did not have any prior experience in sales. I am a nurse by training. I started as a sales consultant 7 years ago. Then I became an executive in my zone and now I am a Zone Manager. I am really happy with what I have been able to accomplish in such a short time [….] The company greatly facilitates our work, giving us tools that allow us to reach our objectives."
 Eduardo Belmont believes that, given its products and client base, Belcorp is fundamentally a women's business, and, as such, should have a management that reflects that. Women today comprise 80% of Belcorp's workforce and 77% of its senior staff. Given women's continued lack of representation in higher management around the world, these figures are impressive.
As a member of the Global Private Sector Leaders Forum, Belcorp announced in October 2009 at the Annual IMF/World Bank Annual meetings its commitment to provide financial and entrepreneurial skills to another 50,000 underserved women in Latin America. Fulfilling this commitment is likely to result in substantive positive change in the lives of thousands of women across the region, as well as provide a laudable standard of conduct for other companies to emulate. Belcorp has been gaining increasing recognition for its empowerment of women in Latin America and was recently even featured in the Harvard Business Review. Corporate social responsibility is slowly gaining traction in Latin America and Belcorp is at the forefront of companies that have a positive impact on women's lives.
A Beauty Consultant in Action: Aurora Salas, Belcorp Peru
After only seven months of working as a beauty consultant for Belcorp, Aurora Salas was chosen by her manager to shadow her through a couple of campaigns for potential manager training. The manager identified, among 200 women for whom she was responsible, Aurora's potential for business and leadership. It quickly became clear that this had been a wise decision. In the end of her first year as a manager, Aurora was awarded a prize for exceeding sales expectations: her first trip abroad.
Working with Belcorp has helped transform Aurora's life, as well as that of her family. "I love this company. It has given me the opportunity to accomplish so much. Through Belcorp I have been able to fulfill my role as a woman and as a mother," she explains. She has worked with Belcorp for over 25 years and credits the company for showing her that dreams are attainable. She comes from a humble background, but through her income and Belcorp's support she was able to ensure that all of her four children had what they needed. "I was able to send them to the best schools," she says proudly. "Today three of them are engineers and one is a lawyer." |
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