Timothy Allen has been in the natural health industry for over 25 years. In that time, he learned which areas see the most demand in order for his business to thrive. Allen did what not many are willing to do: he approached a whole new business model in order to cater to that demand.
Allen spent nearly 12 years at Jamieson Laboratories as its director of sales. From there, he moved to Sisu Vitamins where he became its vice president of sales for nearly four years. Most recently, he spent almost 11 years as the vice president of sales and general manager of Inno-Vite Health.
In that role, he held the responsibility of leading the sales team and running the business. He left the company in January 2013, instead choosing to work independently at the Glen Williams Group as its managing director. In this role, Allen offers consulting services such as sales and team management, trade marketing, business development and strategic planning to small businesses.
“I set out to work independently because there is so much work available with small businesses trying to be noticed and manage the sales process. They are getting caught dealing with an ever-demanding competitive environment,” says Allen. “Based on my background in the natural health products industry of over 25 years and based on my exposure to growing and shrinking businesses, my involvement with executive management teams has allowed me to adapt to the challenges of the current environment.”
Allen says he is adapting well to the new economy in his newest role since he is his own business. “The natural health products industry is dependent upon small, entrepreneurial businesses to innovate and create excitement. However, most of these small businesses are driven by passion and not structure,” he says. “I offer the ability to create a relative level of structure to assist the businesses in growing in a more orderly fashion.”
Allen deals with competition in the industry by staying ahead of competitors and offering different services. His advice to anyone who deals with this is to continually challenge yourself and your team to come up with new ideas that are different from what is out there. He uses his network to reach out to people who need help, rather than going about traditional marketing strategies, and it is a method that is working for him.
“At the end of the day, every business needs help whether they want to admit it or not, but most businesses are caught in the whirlwind,” says Allen. “If they can stop chasing their tail and start to lay out solid plans, they can get on with the execution of the strategy. It’s all about having a careful and consistent execution, otherwise the strategy means nothing.”
