Meet the 94-Year-Old Avon Lady Still Selling Strong

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ABC News(COLUMBUS, Neb.) — Avon, the direct-selling company for beauty products, first started employing women as sales representatives 130 years ago, in 1886 — that’s 34 years before women earned the right to vote.

Opal Greene’s history with the company goes far back as well. She received her first brochure from Avon in July of 1962. Today, more than 50 years later, she is 94 years old and still going strong.

She now has a friend helping her out but she still goes door to door to her customers every two weeks in Columbus, Nebraska, and passes out about 40 catalogs each time.

Her customers are no longer just customers — they’re dear friends.

“I love them and they love me too,” she told ABC News.

This interaction, according to her grandson, Ben Greene, is what keeps her going.

“I just can’t say enough about her determination. She’s built so many great relationships with people and it’s not just about selling lipsticks anymore,” he said. “To be honest, I don’t know if there’s one person in Columbus that doesn’t know my grandmother.”

Greene is a tough cookie. She’s endured a plane crash, a brain aneurysm, colon cancer, and a year and a half ago, a car accident.

“I walked around selling Avon two days before,” she said of the time she was diagnosed with a brain aneurysm.

Will she ever stop selling products for the beauty company? “When my day is up, I imagine,” she said.

Copyright © 2016, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.

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