WARREN - When she first started selling beauty products, Ruth Borden, then 25, walked door to door with an Avon satchel in one hand and a brochure describing the company's merchandise in the other.

Today, Mrs. Borden, 78, stays on top of the growing Avon product list, which now includes anti-aging solutions, silicon-based hand creams, facial wash, toys and jewelry, and sells them from her home. After 53 years as an Avon representative, she still provides personalized service to customers.

In fact, just last week she took three orders for beauty products in one night from her residence at The Willows Assisted Living on Barker Avenue — an apartment that resembles an Avon retail shop.

Her bathroom cabinet is lined with tubes of Avon hand cream, a product Mrs. Borden, a Fall River native and longtime Tiverton resident, has been using since the age of 12, as well as a staggering number and variety of shampoos, conditioners, hairsprays, bath soaps, facial creams and more.

Ruth Borden of Barker Avenue shows off one of her "Mrs. Albee" figurines, awarded to top-selling Avon representatives at the year's end. Ms. Borden, 78, has been selling Avon products for 53 years. PHOTO BY RICHARD W. DIONNE JR.

A glass-enclosed display case in her sitting room holds well over 30 "Mrs. Albee" porcelain replicas of elegantly dressed Avon women, awarded to the company's top sellers at year's end.

"I'm very proud of them," Mrs. Borden said.

As she looked over her collection, her face radiated with a warm smile. She was lucky, she said, to have made so many wonderful friends as an Avon Lady.

When she was in her twenties and a newlywed, she was very shy. She would blush if a stranger even spoke to her. So when she told her husband she was going to work as an Avon representative selling products door-to-door, he almost didn't believe her.

"In that day and age, husbands took care of their wives, and my husband was very much that type of person. But I told him it sounds like it would be fun to do," she said.

Ringing doorbells and toting a large black Avon satchel around her neighborhood, she gradually overcame her shyness.

She recalled very clearly the first morning she ventured a block off her familiar Irving Street route in her hometown. She remembered waking up that morning and telling herself, "I'm going to Bogall Street today."

As she nervously walked the new territory, she saw two ladies sitting on the porch in their front yard. When they saw Mrs. Borden walk by, Avon tote on her arm, they called to her and said, "Are you our new Avon Lady?"

From then on, those women, and many more, were added to her roster of clients, a list that continues to grow.

"Back then, you had one brochure. And I sat and visited with the people and made an order every six weeks. Now, you have a brochure for every customer. There are many, many more products, and it's quite different," she said.

Still selling a half century later

Mrs. Borden now places 10 to 15 orders every two weeks, depending on the amount of business.

A resident of Barker Avenue for the past two years, she now numbers her Avon customers among inhabitants of the Willows Assisted Living Center, across the street at the Grace Barker Nursing Center, and from Tiverton, where she and her husband, the late Walter Borden, lived for more than 41 years.

Mr. Borden owned Walter Borden Building Company and built many of the houses on Tiverton's North Court Street, including the couple's own.

Engaged when she was 17, she married a year later in 1944 after Mr. Borden, who served during World War II, was discharged from the Navy. The couple never had children.

Mrs. Borden said she never considered herself a career woman, but the job has given her a sense of independence.

"I never thought of it so much as a business, as it was fun," she said.

She said she was probably attracted to Avon because she was a customer herself since age 12. Because her thumbs became dry and cracked in winter, her mother ordered some hand cream from an Avon salesperson.

Mrs. Borden, who has been using Avon hand cream ever since, said she wouldn't be without it.

"So, it's part of my life," she said.

In a way, the job has been a lifesaver.

When she moved to Warren a year after her husband died, Mrs. Borden said she felt somewhat isolated from her past life. She didn't know the area that well and she didn't know many people, but she knew she had to start doing something to stay active.

The staff suggested she start selling Avon products from The Willows. To her, it was a perfect solution.

"I love people and I enjoy everyone. I would miss not to be able to talk to people," she said.

"And you should see when the Avon order comes in," she said, laughing. Boxes stack up in her room. She opens them, one by one, examines and sorts the products.

Because her eyesight is failing a bit, she sometimes enlists the aid of the nurses and her friends at The Willows to help de-code the labels on the bottles. She has to take her time filling orders, but that doesn't take away her enjoyment of the task.

"It has given me a good life of enjoyment and pleasure, and very good friends," she said.

The Avon juggernaut

* Women have been selling Avon since 1886 — 34 years before they won the right to vote.

* Mrs. P.F.E. Albee of Winchester, N.H., pioneered the company's now-famous direct-selling method in 1886. Her name is still honored today in the company.

* Avon sales representatives, both men and women, now number more than four million.

* Avon products are sold in more than 100 countries around the world.

By Michele K. Corcoran

mcorcoran@eastbaynewspapers.com