The Miami Herald Newsmakers Column.

The Miami Herald Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News

Jan. 6--Marta Vildostegui has always relied on Avon products. In the 1970s, she used them to make lifelong friends at her son's school when she sold the cosmetics to the other mothers as they waited to pick up their children after school. In the 1990s, she helped create the company's Breast Cancer crusade and today depends on a cancer drug discovery funded by research money from Avon Products. She's also very willing to share with you that Avon skin care has kept her appearance much younger than her 62 years.

"I am so grateful that through Avon I have the opportunity to touch so many different people," Vildostegui says. "I truly love my job."

Vildostegui's commitment to Avon appears to be contagious. She manages an east Miami territory that runs from Miami Beach up to North Miami and over to Little Haiti. In 2001, her sales force sold $2 million worth of products_ making it the highest-ranking group of Avon representatives in the country. Her sales force of 580 has grown by 181 people since 2001. Compare that to the rest of the country, where the number of independent Avon representatives grew by just 2 percent, according to Linda Bolton Weiser, vice president of research at Fahnestock & Co. in New York, and …