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Operator
Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Q1 2021 New Skin Enterprises Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 on your telephone. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. If you require any further assistance, please press star 0. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today. Kyle Pond, please go ahead.
Kyle Pond
Thanks, Peter, and good afternoon, everyone. Today on the call with me are Rich Wood, Chief Executive Officer, Ryan Napierski, President and CEO-elect, and Mark Lawrence, Chief Financial Officer. On today's call, comments will be made that include some forward-looking statements. These statements involve risks and uncertainties, and actual results may differ materially from those discussed or anticipated. Please refer to today's earnings release and our SEC filings for a complete discussion of these risks. Also, during the call, certain financial numbers may be discussed that differ from comparable numbers obtained in our financial statements. We believe these non-GAAP financial numbers assist in comparing period-to-period results in a more consistent manner. Please refer to our investor page at ir.newskin.com for any required reconciliation of non-GAAP numbers. And with that, I'll turn the time over to Rich.
Peter
Thank you, Scott, and good afternoon, everyone. We really appreciate that you join us today. I'm so pleased with our progress in becoming a customer-obsessed, socially-enabled business that has generated record results in this first quarter. Our strategy has positioned us well for success amid powerful macro trends and associated shifts in consumer behaviors. I want to recognize our amazing and talented sales leaders and dedicated and loyal employees who are responsible for the great results we are reporting today. We made critical enhancements to our business as we implemented our strategy over the past few years. For example, we refined the cadence of our product launches. We increased our focus on attracting and retaining customers. We aligned our sales compensation structure to enable social commerce. And we invested in manufacturing companies to secure our supply chain. These and other strategic enhancements helped us drive 31% revenue growth and 153% earnings per share growth in the first quarter. As a result, we're reporting the best first quarter in Nu Skin's history for both revenue and earnings per share, and we are raising our guidance for the year. As Ryan and I continue to work closely together on developing and leading the execution of this strategy, the transition of leadership responsibilities is progressing well. I am so confident that the business is in great hands. This is the right team to build on the existing foundation and drive continued growth and success in the future. I would like to highlight progress on a few of our key initiatives. First, we continue to build upon our 37-year history of developing world-class beauty and wellness products that help people look and feel their best. For example, as people look for ways to enjoy a spa-like experience at home, our beauty devices, including Ageloc Luma Spa and Boost, continue to grow in popularity. In fact, Euromonitor recently named Nu Skin the world's number one beauty device systems brand for the fourth consecutive year. As consumers become increasingly mindful of what goes into the products they use, we extended our product philosophy with NutriEssentials BioAdaptives that feature clean formulas and sustainable packaging. And I'm really excited about the potential of our robust product pipeline, which we will share more details about later in this call. Next, even as the world moves towards a new normal, our social commerce strategy is here to stay. We recognize the trend of consumers moving to digital platforms long before COVID-19, which accelerated this transition. Our triple-digit growth in the West is a result of our brand affiliates embracing our social commerce model. We're reaching a larger and younger demographic, and the business continues to gain momentum with 34% customer growth and 22% sales leader growth in the first quarter. I'm encouraged also by our improving geographic balance, which Ryan will speak to in more detail in a moment. I would like to highlight the growth in our manufacturing segment, which achieved record results and reported 69% revenue growth. We continue to lean into our sustainability efforts with ongoing initiatives to reduce the environmental impact of our business operations, provide more eco-friendly packaging, and strengthen our commitment to responsible sourcing, including our investments in controlled environment agriculture. Given our first quarter performance, increasing sales leader interest in our planned new product introductions, and strong customer and sales leader growth, we are raising our 2021 guidance. The midpoint of our adjusted guidance points to growth of about 10% for revenue and 15% for earnings per share. We are confident in our strategy and we're optimistic about our future. And with that introduction, I'll turn the call over to Ryan.
Scott
Thanks, Rich. Good afternoon, everybody. I've loved partnering with Rich over the past few years as we've refined our vision to become the world's leading innovative beauty and wellness company powered by our dynamic affiliate opportunity platform. This vision builds on our foundational product philosophy and the strength of our person-to-person business model, infusing digital, social, and mobile capabilities that are shaping us into a leading social commerce company. Our ultimate aspiration is to become the world's leading beauty and wellness platform. We're witnessing seismic global shifts in consumer behaviors, from digital, social, and mobile connections to the expansion of the gig economy. Our world is changing rapidly. Traditional advertising, retail, and e-commerce are being disrupted by influencer marketing and social commerce like never before, a trend that has accelerated significantly over the last year. These trends, combined with our strategic investments over the past years to build greater digital capabilities, have positioned us well to realize today's opportunities and accelerate our own pace of change. This strategy has resulted in strong customer and sales leader growth and record first quarter results in both revenue and EPS. Before I go into more detail about the quarter, I want to run through the three key components of our strategy to grow. Our innovative products, our unique affiliate channel, and our powerful platform. First, regarding innovative products, we've refined our cadence of bringing innovative beauty and wellness products to market. We play in the fastest growing product categories in beauty and wellness, including beauty devices. This category is nearly $7 billion and is projected to grow more than 20% annually between now and 2030. As Rich mentioned, this is the fourth consecutive year Euromonitor has ranked Nu Skin as the world's number one beauty device systems brand. This further validates our scientific rigor as a unique strength and competitive advantage in the beauty industry. Our next step to expand our dominant position will be to add connectivity to our devices as part of our Empower Me personalization strategy that we introduced to all of you at Investor Day. The way people engage with beauty and wellness has changed as shopping behaviors and personalized product experiences have become increasingly digital. For us, this shift has resulted in more than 90% of our revenue coming from online transactions with approximately half our revenue coming from recurring customer subscription and loyalty programs. I'm excited about the recent product launches of Ageloc Boost and Nutri-Central's bio-adaptives, which generated more than $35 million for the quarter in a limited number of markets. We'll continue to strengthen our industry-leading position with our robust product pipeline in 2021 and beyond. Later this year, we'll introduce two new products through our proven global launch process, leveraging our robust R&D capabilities in both beauty and wellness. First, we'll introduce a unique beauty from within product line, beginning with Beauty Focus Collagen Plus, with our proprietary formula aimed at disrupting the burgeoning $50 billion beauty supplement market. This product is clinically proven to help improve skin health, and complement other Nu Skin products, including our LumaSpa Beauty System. Second, we'll introduce our next major Pharmanex innovation, Ageloc Meta, a metabolic health supplement. A recent study of U.S. adults indicated that 88% are metabolically unhealthy, and this product helps us address this acute wellness dilemma. Additionally, we plan to begin introducing connected devices in early 2022 and beyond. Connected devices will further personalize and enhance the customer experience while providing additional insight into consumers' needs. These powerful beauty device systems and innovative products combined with our global subscription and loyalty programs create a unique opportunity for us to increase customer acquisition and lifetime value as we continue to meet the needs of beauty and wellness customers. Next, our flexible power Our flexible and powerful affiliate channel is evolving to support our social commerce business. In essence, we're taking the best of our face-to-face, person-to-person model, including a passionate sales force, personal touch, trusted product recommendations, and a connected community, and we're evolving it into a digital-first affiliate marketing engine that's powered by our socially-enabled global sales force. In many ways, our historically unique style of influencer and affiliate marketing is now the approach that many companies and brands around the world are trying to replicate. This approach has always been at the core of our business and is now being amplified by our social commerce strategy. Our first quarter results throughout the West and parts of the East are further evidence that social commerce is an emerging model that will transform the beauty and wellness industry. Third, our powerful affiliate opportunity platform connects consumers with people who are seeking innovative beauty and wellness products with brand affiliates who help them navigate their personal journey. And it all happens within a digital ecosystem that enables our affiliates to attract, connect, transact, and service consumers in nearly 50 markets. In our opportunity platform, affiliates and leaders can effectively serve their customers' personal needs by accessing hundreds of beauty and wellness products. We continue to introduce new digital and social tools to make running a powerful and personalized social commerce business more simple and effective. These tools include Vera, our personal product recommendation tool that is currently being rolled out around the globe, MySite, our personal product storefronts available in most of our markets, WeShop, China's personal storefront model to be introduced in the second half of this year, and digital training tools to expand the reach and capability of our brand affiliates. So when combined, our flexible velocity sales compensation program, our global footprint of nearly 50 markets, our best-in-class manufacturing capabilities, and our significant digital transformation all come together with an unmatched products to empower our affiliates to build their own socially enabled beauty and wellness businesses. Across Nu Skin, we're focused on driving consumer growth and loyalty and creating entrepreneurial opportunities for brand affiliates as we expand social commerce around the globe. To further enable this growth, I'm really excited to welcome Connie Tang as Executive Vice President and Chief Global Growth and Customer Experience Officer. I've known Connie for years as an industry colleague. She's an amazing business leader with a long track record of successfully guiding global organizations. She'll lead our global markets and customer experience office as we further expand social commerce. I look forward to introducing you to Connie in future calls. Turning now to our global markets, we continue to take steps to improve our geographic revenue balance. This will create more sustainable growth moving forward and make us less susceptible to individual market fluctuations and geopolitical issues. Beginning with the Americas Pacific, our accelerated performance continues to be driven by the expanding adoption of social commerce. This region posted first quarter constant currency revenue growth of 97% with growth in every market. This region is now roughly the size of our mainland China business and on pace to become our largest business unit. Customers and sales leaders both grew significantly, demonstrating sustainable growth across all key metrics, as they prepare to launch Beauty Focus Collagen Plus and AgeLock Boost in the second half. Europe, Middle East, and Africa also posted significant constant currency revenue growth of 98% year-over-year as leaders embrace social commerce throughout the region. The UK, Germany, France, and Poland led the way as we partnered with sales leaders for the launch of Nutri-Central's bio-adaptives and on effective product promotions. EMEA achieved the highest growth in customers and sales leaders of any region, providing momentum as we move into Q2 and beyond. Mainland China grew 1% in local currency this quarter, with customers up 16%. We continue to invest in new social commerce technologies in this market, including our own WeShop initiative in partnership with Tencent, which begins to roll out in the second half of this year. This will further reduce our dependency on in-person meetings, which we believe will better enable our sales leaders to adopt social commerce within China's own robust digital ecosystem. Hong Kong and Taiwan reported a 3% constant currency decline, with Taiwan's growth being offset by continued macro challenges in Hong Kong. South Korea remained even with the prior year's quarter, with sales led by our TR90 weight management system and the introduction of Ageloc Boost. Customers declined 12% due to promotional activities last year, while sales leaders grew by 7% in the quarter. South Korea is focused now upon adopting social commerce throughout the market. Southeast Asia's constant currency revenue declined 5%, impacted by lingering effects of COVID in certain markets. But we anticipate increased social commerce adoption across the region, which will generate renewed growth in time. I'd also like to highlight Japan's 11% growth in local currency during the quarter. Our business there is starting to catch a gear as new and younger consumers discover our beauty and wellness products, including our recent Ageloc Boost and Nutri-Essentials bio-adaptive launches. We've raised guidance for the year based upon the optimism we're seeing in our aggregate global business. So let me wrap up by saying that our future looks brighter today than it ever has. We are fully leaning into our mission to empower people to improve lives and our vision to become the world's leading innovative beauty and wellness company that's powered by our dynamic affiliate opportunity platform. Our strategy, investments, and commitment to operational excellence are aligned to this goal and will drive even greater value for our customers, affiliates, employees, and shareholders throughout the remainder of 2021 and beyond. And with that, I'll turn the time over to Mark to go over financial results for the quarter and update guidance. Mark?
Rich
Thanks, Ryan, and thanks to all of you for joining our call today. I'll provide some additional color regarding our financial results, give Q2 guidance, and update our full year 2021 outlook. Details can also be found in our earnings release and the supplemental information on our investor relations website. First quarter revenue and earnings per share came in above the top end of our prior guidance. Q1 revenue increased 31% to $677 million, with a positive foreign currency impact of 5.7%. Earnings per share for the quarter increased 153% to 91 cents. Growth margin for the quarter improved sequentially 80 basis points, to 74.8% due to product mix and easing of air freight charges versus the past few quarters. Gross margin was 75.7% in the prior year quarter. Nu Skin Q1 gross margins were 77.8% against 78.1% in the prior year. Our gross margin continues to be impacted by growth in our west markets and our manufacturing segment. However, This growth benefits us by lowering our overall tax rate. Speaking of our manufacturing segment, a primary purpose of those acquisitions was to secure our supply chain. One of the most significant challenges of COVID-19 has been widespread supply chain disruptions. The agility and flexibility of our supply chain has allowed us to maintain our product launch schedule and, for the most part, keep our key products in stock. Selling expense as a percent of revenue was 40.4% compared to 39.8% in the prior year. For the Nu Skin business, it was 43.4% compared to 42%. As a reminder, selling expenses fluctuate quarter to quarter and often increase during strong revenue growth as more of our sales leaders qualify for incentives. General and administrative expense as a percent of revenue was 25.1% compared to 28.9% year over year. We continue to leverage our infrastructure to support revenue growth and improve operating margin, accelerating earnings growth. I am very pleased with our operating margin for the quarter, which improved to 9.3% compared to 7.1% in the prior year quarter. This is another strong step towards our stated goal of 13% operating margin. The other income expense line reflects a $1.6 million gain compared to a $6.2 million expense in the prior year. The improvement was driven by foreign currency, reduced interest expense, and investment income. Consistent with expectations and first quarter historical trends, cash from operations, was an outflow of $18.9 million. We paid $19.3 million in dividends and continued our focus on generating shareholder value by repurchasing $50.4 million of our stock, with $275.4 million remaining in authorization. Over the past five quarters, we have repurchased more than 6 million shares. Our tax rate for the quarter was 26.5%, benefited by increased profits in the West, as I mentioned earlier. Due to our strong first quarter results, strengthening trends, and robust 2021 planned product introductions, we are increasing the top end of our annual revenue guidance by approximately $60 million and our earnings per share by 20 cents. Our 2021 annual revenue guidance is now $2.8 billion to $2.87 billion with earnings per share of $4.05 to $4.30. This guidance assumes a positive foreign currency impact of 3% to 4% and a tax rate of 26% to 32%. Our second quarter revenue guidance is $680 to $705 million, assuming a positive foreign currency impact of approximately 5%. Q2 earnings per share guidance is $0.97 to $1.07 and assumes a tax rate of 27% to 30%. With that, we will now open up the call for your questions.
Operator
As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star 1 on your telephone Again, that is star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. And your first question comes from the line of Faiza Aoui from Deutsche Bank. Your line is open.
Faiza Aoui
Yes, hi. Good afternoon, everyone. Hi, Faiza. Hi. So I guess my first question is just, you know, if you could shed some more light around sort of what led to the revenue beat versus your outlook. I'm curious if it was, you know, the Western markets or if you did better in some of the Eastern markets or if that was, you know, a product that did better than anticipated. So just more perspective around that would be helpful.
Peter
Yeah, I think I'd comment first, Faizan. Thanks for that question. that our overall business performed very, very well. We love the balance we're seeing around the world in our overall revenue profile, but the Western markets are leading the growth today above the Eastern markets. So yeah, real good balance, but I would say the Western markets outperformed for sure.
Faiza Aoui
Okay, okay. So as we look out to the year, sort of has... Has anything changed with respect to your outlook by markets, specifically China and the eastern markets? And I know, Ryan, you mentioned digital initiatives that are coming into play later this year. Could you give more perspective on that? Have you started in any particular markets? Where are you in that process? And again, if that, you know, if you're changing your outlook with respect to those eastern markets at all.
Scott
Yeah, no, I think, and only adding to Rich's comment around the west, we also just continue to see really good traction with our beauty device systems in social commerce, which is really exciting, you know, to see those devices moving as well through social commerce. On the outlook side, yeah, we continue to see really, really strong growth in the West. And the East continues to recover for different reasons out of COVID and in different states. But overall, you know, seeing a positive trend and, you know, returning to growth in those areas as well.
Faiza Aoui
Okay, understood. And you mentioned beauty devices. I'm curious, sort of, it was helpful to hear you say that beauty devices are expected to grow sort of 20% per year. Um, can you give us some, you know, there's a view that one of the reasons why devices have, have done so well throughout COVID is because of reduced consumer mobility and more sort of at home treatments. And I'm curious sort of what your view is on that, um, as mobility increases, um, Do you expect sort of a step back in these device sales and then sort of grow off of a new level? Or do you think consumers have enjoyed the at-home devices and we should expect sort of that pattern to continue?
Peter
It's a great question, Faiza, particularly because devices make up nearly 30% of our revenue and are really a key growth driver. As we've come into this year, we continue to see a lot of strength in those devices, not necessarily impacted by the sort of new normal that we're starting to see around the world with devices. And fortunately, we have a real strong pipeline. We just launched Boost. We'll be connecting these devices and making them more interactive, I think, with customers going forward. So we see that trend continuing to play very, very strong. Ryan, maybe you'd add to that.
Scott
Yeah, just adding to that. I think your question around at-home treatments, definitely there's a continued momentum towards at-home treatments, but we don't see that going away. In fact, we really see consumers moving more and more towards device treatments that are more flexible and efficient. consumer-friendly. And so that's, for us, we see this, you know, really just an ongoing trend. I think for us, the real big benefit, again, goes back to social commerce and device systems, I should say, the device plus the consumables moving through social commerce, which is really a great place to explain the benefits of these at-home device systems. And so that's maybe something just to add to it.
Faiza Aoui
Great. Thank you so much. Really appreciate it.
Scott
Thank you, Faiza.
Operator
And your next question comes from the line of Doug Lane with Lane Research. Your line is open.
Doug Lane
Oh, hi. Good afternoon, everybody. Ryan, I think you mentioned that the new products did 35 million in the quarter. Can you help me understand which markets they're available in now and when you expect to have them fully available globally?
Scott
Sure, Doug. Yeah, so the $35 million was really spread throughout many different markets in different cadences. So maybe I'll kind of point to outliers more than the ones that aren't there. So with the exception of Boost in mainland China and the U.S., most markets now have Boost available. Nutri Essentials, again, in most markets is now available as well. So it's kind of those two big markets and that product that we're looking at.
Doug Lane
Well, those are big markets and Boost is a big part of the new products. Is that a second half event or do you think it moves into 2022?
Scott
Q2, partly in Q2 for China, and then second half for the U.S., yeah. So you're right. Those are pretty big markets for that product.
Doug Lane
And then you'll also be with the new supplement products that you talked about. Are they going to start being widely available in the second half of this year, or are you going to do them sort of like you did, boost and nutraceuticals?
Scott
Yeah, good question. Exactly, Doug. So those two products will be part, the Meta and the Beauty Focus Collagen Plus will both be part of our global preview model that we use for Boost and Nutri-Essentials. So it will be second half previews, predominantly Q4 and then rolling out or launching throughout early 2022.
Doug Lane
Got it, got it. Now I'm also starting to hear folks talking about returning to live events. Have you moved to scheduling live events later on this year?
Scott
No, we continue to see the reach of our digital or online events is literally multiples higher than the on-site events. So we're predominantly through 2021 still digital first and would anticipate in 2022 some level of local events, but not at the global level.
Doug Lane
Okay. All right. Thanks, Ryan.
Scott
Thank you.
Operator
Again, if you would like to ask a question, that is star one on your telephone keypad. And your next question comes from the line of Steph Wiesink with Jefferies. Your line is open.
Steph Wiesink
Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. Ryan, this is a question for you on the beauty from within or the collagen supplement business. If you can talk a little bit about how you're going to leverage your social selling platform, somewhat of a less demonstrable product. I'm just curious what tools and techniques you're going to provide for your affiliate community to really talk about highlight, emphasize, and drive discovery of that product.
Scott
Yeah, this is a really interesting product step for us. As you know, I mean, we're really a balanced company in terms of inside out, and being able to apply our nutraceutical-based approach to a beauty product is really an opportunity for us, what we believe, to disrupt this $50 billion beauty supplement market. We're very interested in it. We think it's going to be a great initial product line. We actually are receiving very good feedback from our field around the social interest on collagen-related products. While you're right, it's not as demonstrable. I think people can take pictures of themselves drinking it. The topic is very relevant to millennial and Gen Z consumers, this beauty supplement market. From a social listening perspective, there's a lot of traffic on that or social voice on that. We're really interested, and we think this will be a great social product. I think, by the way, in the format that we're doing, we're doing both ready-to-drinks and powders products. depending on the markets and price points. But it'll be priced in a really good place for the target market as well.
Steph Wiesink
That's great. That's actually really helpful. And you started to tug on a second question I had for you, which is around your analytics, social listening, you mentioned. But your product pipeline and innovation seems to be not only more robust, but more on-trend. So can you talk a little bit about what you're learning from a more digitally directed business, social listening strategies, and then leveraging your own manufacturing, how you can come to market with products that are hitting the zeitgeist of consumer interest versus maybe in the past, it would have been more of a multi-year two, three year plus, uh, you know, planned pipeline.
Scott
Yeah. I mean that, and that's a great question. Our, our global product team with Steve Hatchett and, and, uh, Dr. Joe Chang, have really revamped the way we've come to market with or discovered new innovations in the market. And you're exactly right. Leveraging the strength of our manufacturers together with social listening data that we're getting out of our digital ecosystem, our digital platforms, and some of our social listening tools, we're able to more real-time gather voice the customer and even voice a social market to identify trends really, as they're starting to surface. And I think going back to Rich's foresight of acquiring these manufacturers, being able to pivot quickly and go to market much faster with innovations that come through that social listening pipeline, I think is a real competitive advantage to our business footprint now with manufacturing as well.
Steph Wiesink
That's great. Last one for me is just a real quick question on attach rates. I know it's very early with Boost. But that product has a really compelling consumables element as well. So I'm wondering if you can talk about what you're seeing in early days in terms of consumables attached relative to maybe some of your previous devices.
Peter
Yeah, thank you. Steph, you know that one of the key differentiators for us, this competitive advantage, is being able to sell sort of a razor, razor blade model where We get someone who loves our device, and they will continue to purchase the consumables going forward. Boost is still real early. We've just recently launched, as you know, so now we're seeing follow-on purchases. Very good. We have great margins in those consumable products. They're very sticky, and we're seeing really great results. Ryan, would you like to add anything to that?
Scott
Only that what's interesting about these beauty device systems is we found that they do take time from an adoption. I mean, LumaSpa is really in full stride right now, two years after the launch, or three years after, I guess. But we really expect Boost will continue to grow. And we are looking, to Rich's point, the system side of this. We're really finding value. I mentioned the Collagen+. the associated, you know, real benefits related to our devices as well. It's kind of an interesting pairing strategy where we can really deepen that lifetime value relationship with consumers by expanding those systems even beyond just the direct consumables of each device.
Steph Wiesink
Makes sense. Thank you very much. Very helpful.
Scott
Thanks, Deb.
Operator
And your next question comes from the line of Mark Atrichon with Stifel. Your line is open.
Mark Atrichon
Thanks, and afternoon, everyone. I guess I wanted to ask about how to think about the sustainability of this exceptionally strong growth in Americas and EMEA. And, you know, maybe, you know, if you could just take a step back and kind of talk about the key things that you think are really driving it beyond, you products and kind of the repeat purchase rates and whatnot. And maybe, you know, if you're willing to give some sort of guidance about the sales progression, obviously partly because the comparisons get a bit more difficult as well as we go through the year.
Peter
That's a great question, Mark. I appreciate that. You know, I would first comment by that's one of the things we as well were very cautious of as we came into the beginning of this year. You know, could we lap those high rates in the West? And we were very, very encouraged with our first quarter numbers. You can see that the sales leaders, the customer numbers continue to be very, very strong. We have strong product launches coming throughout the rest of the year. So we feel like we're very well set up to continue to see strong growth in these markets that have really enormous potential. I mean, the US being the largest direct selling market, one that we haven't fully tapped our potential. and EMEA likewise, a lot of potential. So very encouraging results coming here into the first quarter. The key will be continuing to see that customer base expand. We like the way social commerce continues to gain more and more traction, and our sales leaders become more and more effective at that. But we see very strong and promising trends going forward.
Scott
Yeah, and just building on that, Mark, I would start at the real macro level of social commerce as a macro trend. Really, as we continue to forecast out, China is by far the largest social commerce business from an industry perspective when you're merging e-commerce and influencer marketing together. And so to Rich's point, the runway of social commerce disrupting e-commerce and retail is very, very long. I think we're just at the very beginning of that trend. And then if we go at the micro level within our own business, we've really only tapped into portions of that in the Americas and the West, still a portion of those markets. And so the further adoption within the markets that are already leading out is great. And then we kind of see this continued evolution and fortune with a global sales force, people see what's going on in America. Argentina or in the UK, and all of a sudden it pops up in Australia or in the Philippines. And that's kind of the pattern that we're seeing as we migrate the social commerce model. So I would almost look at social commerce as a business model. The way we're looking at it is a business model that within Nu Skin will continue to migrate around the globe, but at the macro level will continue to be more and more the norm of the way commerce moves away from just a static paid advertising e-commerce model that fueled the last 20 years of global growth. It's really going to move more towards social commerce. And we think we're just appropriately positioned to play there.
Rich
I'll just add one comment. One of the things that gives me confidence in Americas and EMEA is what they're buying. So they are transacting socially, which is fantastic, and that's driving a lot of the growth. But what they're really buying is devices and devices and consumables. So the top four selling products in the Americas are all devices. Three of the top four selling products in EMEA are devices. These are products that tend to be a little bit more sticky and encourage follow-on purchases with the consumables. And so that gives me confidence in the momentum that we're seeing there. Got it. That's helpful.
Mark Atrichon
That's a dog apparently. That's very helpful. He likes it. The dog likes it. Apparently. So, yeah, working from home, right, is wonderful. So, Mark, I guess, you know, as we think about trying to to lap the growth, would it be your expectation that you can continue to grow off of the base in the back half of the year? And then just another follow up on just China. I'm surprised. I mean, it's grown now a couple of quarters in a row. Boost, I think, was for sale in the market. I think you said in the second quarter, I guess. I'm surprised maybe it hasn't accelerated more. Is that partly a reflection of just the changing dynamics in the market and less group meetings, or I suppose no group meetings? And how do you think about the ability for that to get back to kind of the growth you've seen historically there?
Scott
Yeah, I think on the two sides, your question, one, was the lapsing growth in the West. I mean, there's no question that the comps are tough, you know, as in most businesses. But I think the underlying KPIs and our upcoming product launches with this adoption of social commerce, we're feeling optimistic per the guidance and the raise. On the China side, yeah, it is interesting because there's no question that there's enormous potential in China with the population, as I said, with social commerce being such a large model there and the digital ecosystem that's there, the WE ecosystem. So we see a strategic fit For us, it's really about how do we continue to evolve our traditional direct sales model that was unique in China into this more social commerce and a local China version of that because it is a different business. And that's what's taking more time. But as we continue to apply the strategy and the direction we're heading and the investments that we're applying with Tencent,
Operator
and others were we're optimistic that that market will you know continue to move in the right direction got it all right thank you thank you again if you would still like to ask a question that is tar one on your telephone keypad and your next question comes from the line of dog lane little lane research yeah thank you for taking the uh follow-up question um
Doug Lane
I was just thinking, Ryan, about your answer to the in-person events and I understand the move to social commerce, but in-person events have been so important for recognition, motivation, training, and I think that what would be helpful is you could give me some sort of color on how the role of the sales leader has changed and what is the sales leader's role in this new social commerce model.
Scott
Yeah, you know, it's funny, Doug. We were having a discussion around this yesterday at the company, and you're right. The The role of the traditional sales leader is evolving, and while some of those jobs to be done, so to speak, of a sales leader in terms of training and motivating a sales force remain the same, it's kind of the how-to that changes, and doing that more on a digital, Zoom-based, digital-first type of approach works. But I think the bigger evolution that we're seeing is the reach, the role that sales leaders increasingly play in building awareness and then driving kind of the awareness, you know, through the funnel to the company where the company's really facilitating the transactions. As we said, over 90% of revenue now flows directly, you know, through company, you know, or digital-based transactions to the company. And so that change, and technically that's why we changed the name from distributors to to affiliates because their job is more focused on really attracting consumers and potential entrepreneurs and less upon distributing the products physically where the company now does that transactionally. So that's the main shift. But there's no question in our minds that the person-to-person aspect of our business is still a strength. We're really just amplifying that through the reach and the the capability of social to expand and drive awareness at a much greater level.
Doug Lane
Yeah, it is a big change. And I know that you've been doing this purposefully over the last several years. So if I look at your customer number, 1.5 million, would you say that that represents 90% plus of your total sales in the quarter?
Peter
Yeah, well, our sales, Doug, it's a good question. Our sales all flow through customers, some of whom are doing the business as only purchasing for a customer, some who are sharing products with others, some who are continuing to motivate a downline. But every product runs through a customer who's using that product of some sort. And the base of customers has grown dramatically. We really shifted our focus, say, four or five years ago, to go after customers and our customer base is about 400, 450,000 active higher than it was four years ago. And we see that continuing to grow. I mean, our focus is to continue to drive that number substantially higher with not just active customers that are buying once in a quarter, but that are buying twice, three times that are following up. So we think we have that opportunity with social commerce because the reach is so much larger And we have an opportunity to touch a lot more customers with products that they really, really love. So we see this continuing to grow as we go forward. I think the foundation is set to really expand from where we're at right now.
Doug Lane
No, and again, you've done it purposefully and probably are ahead of most of your peers in pursuing it. I'm just trying to get a feel for how far down the road are we because You know, the customer numbers you mentioned do not include consumers who purchase products directly from members of your sales force, which is the old model, right? The distributor, and that's how they used to operate in the old days. Is that down to a tiny fraction of your business or, I mean, just roughly how much of your business operates under sort of the legacy model from many years ago and how much is operating under this new social commerce model?
Peter
I'd say we're still in the early innings of that transition. There's still a lot of transactions that happen between a sales leader and their own customers. Not coming through the company, that continues to shift slowly, but we're in the early goings of this shift in trying to make, I would say, commerce for our sales leaders more and more simple, more quick, more responsive, better customer experience. And as we do that, with our digital tools and experiences, we'll see that shift continue to move. All right. Thanks. That's good color.
Doug Lane
Appreciate it.
Peter
Thank you, Doug. And thanks to every one of you for your attention, for your questions. Appreciate. And we're really happy to follow up if anybody has further questions. We're, as you can tell, really, really bullish and optimistic on our story right now, on the trends we're seeing, on the way the business is rolling out. And we think we really have a good year in 2021. So thank you again for joining us, and we'll talk to you soon.
Operator
This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.
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