International Connections, LLC owned by Bea Behnke (kansas)
Connections By Bea Behnke
I was doing some “deep thinking” the past few days - some was remembering about our early days. One specific thing that stands out to me and then I thought about many of our friends - many of who were not in our group - but friends met in the business at functions our upline provided.
That one thing is about geography - One commonality was that people who had really started their business well, developed a business locally to start. Maybe something like within 50-70 miles of where they lived. We lived in central Kansas - small town of 400 people - I grew up in Nebraska in a small town about the same size - 400 people. We knew everybody in the local area - it was a very busy time on the farm so we couldn’t take off a day during the week and drive 150 - 200 miles.
So, we showed lots and sponsored some…. which we were excited about each one whether they took off with their own business or didn’t. But as I thought, starting strong locally, allowed us to develop our own leadership style - and allowed us to help all the local people get started, too. Most everybody knew each other, and it was fun to see the camaraderie develop among everyone. We started right away having one morning a week where the ladies came for coffee and learn about the products (about 40 of them……). I didn’t know anything about the products so I was learning also - We started with a small group of products for our start-up inventory - and usually got wiped out on those days with the products we talked about. And we had to order more products.
When we had about 6 or 8 sponsored - some for the ones personally sponsored had sponsored one or two - then we had (at our house) a regular time to let people bring their prospects - everybody learned about how to show the plan - we all learned together. We were looking forward to when we had enough IBOs who would come to a Seminar to have one of our own but we went to Dallas where our upline was - when they had one. Our sponsor came back for a weekend and we had Friday night and all day Saturday meetings - Our sponsors’ sponsor came as our PV grew and did the same. Dale and Marlene Beneke signed up the same night we did and started with us - we had so much fun building together.
Little by little, we expanded to neighboring towns - then to the BIG city - Dodge City, and eventually Kansas City and repeated as much as possible in those areas - developing leaders who were anxious to do much the same as we did.
Of course, there’s much more to the story - successes and disappointments, people quit occasionally. We really thought we had arrived when we did our first week-end seminar for 1500 PV IBOs - a winter seminar in Topeka, where we all got snowed in for a extra day or two with the blizzard that shut down the highways. Summer seminar - in Cuchara, Colorado - for 4000 PV IBOs. A 4th of July picnic at our farm in the pasture and bag swing across the creek - by then, they came from all over and brought their kids - had all kinds of old fashioned races, with trophies.who duplicated the ideas. Ski trips were another area we did - Colorado, with the Directs (Platinums) - families -Dick DeVos spent one of those trips with us.
We felt good about our group-that they wanted to be involved in everything we did, functions that we had, visits that we had. Lots of great leaders came from developing that camaraderie - so many good friends - and eventually, became a world-wide business.
I tell you all of this which is only small parts - but I have thought so much of us - starting locally and building that first - (course, I know that sometimes, the business goes distances early, so we worked with that, too.)
The BIG advantages as I see it now - and looking at many of our friends who have strong businesses, also built great local groups before intentionally building out-of-town, state businesses.
1. Building locally is not expensive.
2. The camaraderie is so beneficial and talents are shared and easier to build leadership.
3. Easier to develop meeting supports - even to start with just 3 — 4 IBOs.
4. Easy to help each other - especially when expanding to another area
and share meetings with others who may be sponsoring in the same area.
5. It’s fun with more people. Momentum gets shared.
Getting people started right away is so very important- One of the most critical things to do. Once you get your group started you will see how the momentum will be contagious. One success is motivation for everyone around at the get-togethers. Success begets success.
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I haven’t added any message about Melvin’s death, although it’s been a little over three months now - but he was the decision maker in starting our business and every day, I’m grateful for that. He had to do so many things that were uncomfortable and very much, out of his comfort zone but he did it anyway.
And just a few weeks prior to Melvin’s home-going, his sister, Marilyn Wilkens, also passed away. We miss her tremendously and have such wonderful memories and experiences building with Glenn and Marilyn.
Melvin J. Behnke - May 17, 1936 - February 22, 2022.
When I asked Melvin after our brother-in-law showed us the Plan, why do you want to do this? His reply - “Because I think if we do it, and we do it right, we will make income the last month that we live.”
