Avon bets Hispanics, smaller selection, price hikes can fix U.S. sales

By Phil Wahba and Lisa Baertlein NEW YORK/BOCA RATON, Fla (Reuters) – Avon Products Inc hopes higher prices, a growing Hispanic market and smaller selection of beauty products will help it reverse years of declines in U.S. sales, top executives said on Thursday. The company's North American sales have fallen by half since 2007, and last year, the size of its army of Avon Ladies sales representatives, shrank 15 percent. "That's our No. 1 priority," Avon Chief Executive Sheri McCoy told analysts at the Consumer Analyst Group of New York meeting in Boca Raton, Florida, where her team laid out in the most detail yet how Avon plans to return to growth in its home market, despite short-term risk to sales. Avon's senior vice president for North America, Pablo Munoz, put the growing U.S. Hispanic population at the center of the company's plan, saying Hispanic sales representatives are "incredibly committed" to the Avon brand.