doTerra (styled dōTERRA) is a

multi-level marketing Multi-level marketing (MLM), also called network marketing or pyramid selling, is a controversial marketing strategy for the sale of products or services in which the revenue of the MLM company is derived from a non-salaried workforce selling th ...

company based in

Pleasant Grove, Utah Pleasant Grove, originally named Battle Creek, is a city in Utah County, Utah, United States known as "Utah's City of Trees". It is part of the Provo–Orem Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 37,726 at the 2020 Census. Histor ...

that sells

essential oil An essential oil is a concentrated hydrophobic liquid containing volatile (easily evaporated at normal temperatures) chemical compounds from plants. Essential oils are also known as volatile oils, ethereal oils, aetheroleum, or simply as the o ...

s and other related products. doTerra was founded in 2008 by former executives of

Young Living Young Living is a multi-level marketing company based in Lehi, Utah. Founded by Donald Gary Young in 1993, it sells essential oils and other related products. History 1993–2014: Formation of Young Living Young Living was founded in 1993 in ...

and others. The company's products are sold through independent distributors called Wellness Advocates, using a multi-level marketing model to sell its products. Individuals receive commissions based on their own sales and the sales of others in their organization. The company and its representatives have repeatedly come under fire for misleading claims that their products could help prevent or cure diseases such as

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

autism The autism spectrum, often referred to as just autism or in the context of a professional diagnosis autism spectrum disorder (ASD) or autism spectrum condition (ASC), is a neurodevelopmental condition (or conditions) characterized by difficulti ...

Ebola Ebola, also known as Ebola virus disease (EVD) and Ebola hemorrhagic fever (EHF), is a viral hemorrhagic fever in humans and other primates, caused by ebolaviruses. Symptoms typically start anywhere between two days and three weeks after becom ...

and more recently,

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

, even being the target of a warning from the

Food and Drug Administration The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA or US FDA) is a List of United States federal agencies, federal agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Health and Human Services. The FDA is respon ...

and the

Federal Trade Commission The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is an independent agency of the United States government whose principal mission is the enforcement of civil (non-criminal) antitrust law and the promotion of consumer protection. The FTC shares jurisdiction ov ...

. The assertion that

aromatherapy Aromatherapy is based on the usage of aromatic materials including essential oils and other aroma compounds, with claims for improving psychological and physical well-being. It is offered as a complementary therapy or as a form of alternative m ...

can have curative properties beyond relaxation is not supported by the company.

History

The company was established in April 2008 by David Stirling, Emily Wright, David Hill, Corey B. Lindley, Gregory P. Cook, Robert J. Young, and Mark A. Wolfert. Stirling, Wright, and Hill were former executives of

, a company that also sells essential oils via multi-level marketing. Its name is inspired by the Latin phrase for "gift of the Earth." The company initially launched with 25 single oils and ten oil blends. In August 2013, Young Living filed suit against doTerra for theft of

trade secret Trade secrets are a type of intellectual property that includes formulas, practices, processes, designs, instruments, patterns, or compilations of information that have inherent economic value because they are not generally known or readily asc ...

s, alleging that the company had re-created their production process illegally. During the lawsuit between the two companies, Young Living produced an analysis of doTerra products that suggested the company was using synthetic chemicals in their "organic" products. Testimony was given that the oils, which were tested by the

Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique The French National Centre for Scientific Research (french: link=no, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, CNRS) is the French state research organisation and is the largest fundamental science Basic research, also called pure research o ...

, did not match any oils sold by doTerra. As of 2013, doTerra reported having about 450 corporate employees, 350 at the Utah headquarters, and 100 at offices in Taiwan, Japan, Europe, and Australia. Later, the company announced that it would build a new headquarters in Pleasant Grove, Utah. In 2014, the company was selling over 150 products such as supplements, personal care items, and essential oils. In October 2014, the Fourth District Court dismissed the claims made against doTerra; the companies also settled lawsuits regarding faked lab tests, false advertising, and theft of trade secrets and withdrew their negative claims in relation to the purity of each other's products. DoTerra Hand Lotion

In 2015, the number of "Wellness Advocates" joining the company grew by more than 120 percent. By year-end 2015, the company claimed that it had generated more than $1 billion in sales. In April 2016, doTerra sent letters to distributors advising them that a breach in a system where personal information was stored had occurred in March 2016. Personal information potentially acquired in the breach included: names, dates of birth, social security numbers, addresses, telephone numbers, email addresses, debit and credit card numbers, usernames, and passwords. The company explained that a third-party vendor was at fault. To compensate, the company offered 24 months of credit monitoring through AllClear, a credit monitoring company. As of 2017, doTerra reported having approximately 1,650 corporate employees and over 3 million Wellness Advocates across 100 countries. In July 2018, the court ruled that Young Living acted in

bad faith Bad faith (Latin: ''mala fides'') is a sustained form of deception which consists of entertaining or pretending to entertain one set of feelings while acting as if influenced by another."of two hearts ... a sustained form of deception whic ...

and had misled the court, thus the judge ordered Young Living to cover doTerra's attorney costs. In 2021, doTerra recalled 1.3 million bottles of its oils due to the lack of child resistant packaging. In April 2022, doTerra entered into a $5 million agreement with the

University of Mississippi The University of Mississippi (byname Ole Miss) is a public research university that is located adjacent to Oxford, Mississippi, and has a medical center in Jackson. It is Mississippi's oldest public university and its largest by enrollment. ...

to research essential oils. As of May 2022, doTerra had 4,461 employees according to a spokesperson.

Distributor claims

On September 22, 2014, the

U.S. Food and Drug Administration The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA or US FDA) is a federal agency of the Department of Health and Human Services. The FDA is responsible for protecting and promoting public health through the control and supervision of food s ...

issued an

FDA Warning Letter An FDA warning letter is an official message from the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to a manufacturer or other organization that has violated some rule in a federally regulated activity. The FDA defines an FDA warning letter as: ...

to doTerra for its distributors marketing products as possible treatments or cures for

, cancer,

, and other conditions in violation of the

Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act The United States Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (abbreviated as FFDCA, FDCA, or FD&C) is a set of laws passed by the United States Congress in 1938 giving authority to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to oversee the safety of f ...

. Federal agents conducted an investigation of doTerra's files. Some distributors have promoted the company's products for air purification and protecting against the health effects of smoke from the fires. It was alleged in 2018 that some distributors had offered personal stories to customers claiming that their child had benefited from essential oils. In 2020, some doTerra distributors attempted to benefit from public concern regarding

by claiming that the company's products have immune boosting properties, despite no scientific evidence to support such claims. The

warned the company it must stop making such unfounded health claims and exaggerated earnings by its distributors.

Projects

doTerra Healing Hands Foundation

The doTerra Healing Hands Foundation is a

501(c)(3) A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of the 29 types of 50 ...

non-profit organization established by doTerra in 2012. In 2016, the foundation partnered with the non-profit organization Choice Humanitarian to send staff and distributors to Nepal and Guatemala to install vented brick stoves for families. In 2017, the doTerra Healing Hands organization began collecting donations from its distributors in the wake of

Hurricane Harvey Hurricane Harvey was a devastating Category 4 hurricane that made landfall on Texas and Louisiana in August 2017, causing catastrophic flooding and more than 100 deaths. It is tied with 2005's Hurricane Katrina as the costliest t ...

to cover the costs of providing relief packs containing samples of the company's products to evacuees in Dallas. In October 2017, ''

Pacific Standard ''Pacific Standard'' was an American online magazine that reported on issues of social and environmental justice. Founded in 2008, the magazine was published in print and online for its first ten years until production of the print edition cease ...

'' reported that after collecting donations, doTerra did not deliver the shipments, allegedly due to weather conditions, and described the incident as "a modern example of malfeasance masquerading as altruism—a type of scam often found in multi-level marketing organizations." In an update to their report in March 2018, ''Pacific Standard'' noted that doTerra did eventually send shipments of doTerra hygiene packs to residents in Houston.

Kealakekua Mountain Reserve

In 2018, the company purchased $7.3 million of land in the Kealakekua Mountain Reserve to source its

sandalwood Sandalwood is a class of woods from trees in the genus ''Santalum''. The woods are heavy, yellow, and fine-grained, and, unlike many other aromatic woods, they retain their fragrance for decades. Sandalwood oil is extracted from the woods for us ...

on Hawaii's Big Island. doTerra announced a 10-year plan to use dead sandalwood for its essential oil production while keeping 75 percent of the land forested. It built a nursery on the reserve to grow

sapling In botany, a tree is a perennial plant with an elongated stem, or trunk, usually supporting branches and leaves. In some usages, the definition of a tree may be narrower, including only woody plants with secondary growth, plants that are ...

s and protect from tree-killing species. doTerra has planted 300,000 native trees and claims it will plant more than 1 million by 2030.

References

External links

* {{Multi-level marketing Multi-level marketing companies based in Utah Companies based in Utah County, Utah Direct sales companies established in 2008 2008 establishments in Utah Personal selling Autism pseudoscience American companies established in 2008