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Job title: General manager, Esteem Jewellery

Doug Todd, 39, needed a change after 19 years with greeting card giant Hallmark Cards in sales, marketing and management, some of it in Europe and Asia.

He has swapped the post of managing director of Hallmark and its corporate structure for the direct marketing of quality costume jewellery with private company Esteem Jewellery, set up in New Zealand in 1996 and also operating in Australia for the past three years.

"The business was so different to what I'd been running before, and I could see the opportunities were just huge," says Todd.

As with Tupperware parties, a team of self-employed women sell the jewellery via private gatherings in people's homes; there are 75 sellers in New Zealand at present and 250 in Australia. Todd's job in New Zealand is to double sales with the help of his sales force, his 12 full-time staff in New Zealand and four in Australia.

"I've always had a belief in the power of being able to communicate directly with the consumer," he says. Esteem "can get directly to the consumer and get feedback instantly".

He's also excited by the career opportunities his sellers report. A lot of them, he says, are empty-nesters or have small kids at home, limiting their earning power. The party plan run by Esteem, he says, "allows them a degree of financial independence. Women have told me amazing stories about how this has turned around their lives".

Todd was born in Scotland, but has been in New Zealand since the early 1970s. He completed a marketing diploma through Auckland University's school of business in the 1990s.

Recruiter Beverley Coldham, of OCG, says she received 103 applications for the post, all of whom were "really good-quality people".