Business Notes Deals

Mary Kay Cosmetics has become famous for rewarding its top sales women with pink Cadillacs, diamond-studded bumblebee pins and expense-paid trips to Hawaii. Such glitzy incentives are not the norm among publicly traded companies, but Mary Kay (1984 sales: $278 million) does not have to worry. It will no longer be listed on any exchange. The company's directors last week agreed to sell the firm for $300 million to a group headed by Chairman Mary Kay Ash and her son Richard Rogers, the president.

Ash, who founded the cosmetics distributor in 1963, became a multimillionaire after selling stock to the public in 1968. In recent years, though, she has wanted to return the firm to family ownership. "When a company is publicly held, you live in a fishbowl," said Monty Barber, a Mary Kay spokesman.

The purchase comes at a time when company sales of skin creams, bath lotions and makeup have been slowing. Once known as a high-growth firm, Mary Kay saw its profits fall from $36.7 million for 1983 to $33.8 million last year. Its stock has taken a sharper plunge. After reaching a high of nearly $45 two years ago, it closed last week at $13.38.