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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Forever Living stall at school fair

75 replies

NotOutingSelf · 27/06/2015 22:26

Today I went dutifully to the summer fair of the school where I was a governor, and was somewhat startled to see a Forever Living stall there. AIBU to think the school really shouldn't be promoting something that is basically a pyramid selling scam? I know only too well from personal experience how much hard work goes into organising a school fair, and really don't want to attack the committee members in any way, but WIBU to raise the issue in a low-key way with the head?

OP posts:
DisappointedOne · 27/06/2015 23:13

Someone on our PTA has sold a stall for the summer fayre to forever living as well. The current PTA will do anything for a fiver and a raffle prize.

Runningupthathill82 · 27/06/2015 23:14

Honeyroar - I have a friend who reckons she lost 4st and three dress sizes on the clean 9.

Hmm
backwardpossom · 27/06/2015 23:16

People do lose A LOT of weight and inches on the C9. But then, if I didn't eat anything for 9 days, I'd lose a fuck load too.

Runningupthathill82 · 27/06/2015 23:25

Yeah, but not 4st! That's around 5lb a day or something. Not possible.

And its hardly the aloe that does it, it's the lack of food...

backwardpossom · 27/06/2015 23:27

And its hardly the aloe that does it, it's the lack of food...

Yeah, that was my point Wink

Fatmomma99 · 27/06/2015 23:37

Changing tack slightly. OP. As others have said, they probably paid for the stall, and the summer fair is about making money.

Having in previous years been the main person organizing the summer fete, it was a BLOODY lot of work. I was in tears several times. I felt isolated and alone (cos I'd send out a group email saying (for example) "xxx has happened/needs to happen and I don't know anything about it, can anyone advise?") and no one could, so I got no replies to an email sent to 15 people, and had to deal with whatever the issue was on my own, and having to guess and make judgement calls. It was awful. I started preparing in April and the event happened in July. I was spending hours in the evenings on top of working. True, I was chair the year after a lot of very experienced people moved on from the school, so it's not that bad for everyone, but I would say that I find that the burden of organizing these things lands on the heads of a very small number of people.

So I really wouldn't have been impressed if someone who'd done (presumably, as you were surprised to see the stall) very little towards contributing to making the event happen, rocking up to complain about an element of it that didn't fit with their personal ethics. I would have been polite, but I would have been thinking "well join the bloody committee and help us, then!".
And, btw, I was also a gvnr when I was chair of the committee.

Not meaning to be heated or aggressive, just to give you another perspective.

CrystalHaze · 27/06/2015 23:47

It feels a bit like a cult to me, people who have become involved seem a little brainwashed.

It is a cult. A cult for particularly thick people.

fastdaytears · 28/06/2015 00:20

FatmommaFlowers and good point. Anyone who's managed to organise a school fete is a hero and also likely to be quite frazzled/likely to taking things personally, so if something has to be said then it needs to be later on and phrased very carefully. Honestly sometimes I think violence against the person who comes up with "why is/isn't xxx here" or even "why isn't this event on more often" might be justified.

But with FL it's not just flogging some aloe vera (incidentally, juice available in Poundland this week), it's selling this weird and IMO unachievable lifestyle to people who don't necessarily have money to waste, or gullible friends to rope in to be the bottom level of the pyramid. So I'm not sure I'd be happy with that at a school fete myself.

fastdaytears · 28/06/2015 00:22

Oh and AFAIK Avon is different because they are just flogging the slap not recruiting other salespeople.

Pampered Chef I don't know about but I can barely use the microwave so it's probably not for me

GraceGildee · 28/06/2015 00:58

I'm also organising our school summer fair and trying to get enough stalls to fill the hall. Although we'd love to have a room full of (affordable) crafty stuff and cakes, unfortunately we get many requests from people flogging FL and Utility Warehouse.

I've had seven FL people ask for a stall and have allowed one in. We are trying to make a profit and raise money for the school and also not have a half empty hall so it's difficult to turn someone away who will take two tables.

As Fatmomma says, it's a difficult and often thankless task organising this sort of event. If someone came up to me and complained about one of the stalls when they hadn't helped organise it, they'd probably get my lemon drizzle in their face.

Blueandwhitelover · 28/06/2015 07:53

I've just organised ours last week, we had FL and Pampered Chef. They paid their money for a stall which has gone to school funds as did all the other stalls' fees. I don't think they sold much but that is the risk they took. Parents were free to buy from them, talk to them or walk on by.
It's a school fair making money for the school, the stalls aren't directly at the front of the assembly hall talking to a whole school captive audience (as in the Ned show or whatever the name is of the yoyo selling group).
I feel it is the same as shops in a town centre, people can choose to go in and partake or not.

Blueandwhitelover · 28/06/2015 07:54

(and yes, to the poster who had seven FL requests- I had loads and lost count of the Usborne book stall requests)

tobysmum77 · 28/06/2015 08:37

I know nothing about FL but pampered chef is a cult. I know some really outwardly sane people who literally have everything.

UnspecialSnowflake · 28/06/2015 08:48

There was a FL stall at our Christmas fair. I was running my own bric a brac stall (had recently had to do my grandparents house clearance and had lots of nice vintage kitchen bits and bobs to sell) and the FL stall was right opposite mine. In the whole three hours of the fair I don't think the FL women sold a single thing, I actually ended feeling sorry for her as everyone walked straight past her overpriced aloe Vera stuff without giving it a second glance.

I'd be really surprised if any FL bot makes the cost of their stall back at a school fair.

NobodyLivesHere · 28/06/2015 08:53

I am on my schools pta and we don't allow any of these companies for the same reason. Yanbu

Sizzlesthedog · 28/06/2015 09:01

I didn't know that Pheniox cards were pyramid selling?

I really like the cards and buy them when I see them at fetes etc.

I avoid FL I've lost friends to the cult, but I thought the cards were ok.

Grittzio · 28/06/2015 09:07

YANBU, I would be upset if FL had a stall at our school fare, because I would know which FL rep would be running it, one who approached me whilst I was shopping with my kids, I naively gave her my mobile no as didn't know about FL then, she then harassed me for many weeks even after I sent a polite text saying I wasn't interested, eventually I added her no in my contacts list under the name of 'bunny boiler' and ignored calls. Few months later she turned up at our school gate thrusting leaflets to all the mums. So in my mind FL would be there not only to sell their products but to entice more mums into their cult.

Sizzlesthedog · 28/06/2015 09:10

I went to a school fair yesterday and there was a FL stall with a big banner saying "recruiting now"

Penfold007 · 28/06/2015 09:11

At my DDs school fair it was chair of governors who had the Forever Living stall. She's always trying to flog her wares to parents and staff.

throwingpebbles · 28/06/2015 09:14

Yanbu

Can someone link to the other forever thread on here? Think it is in money matters now? (I can't coz on phone)

It is truly alarming when you dig into how they operate

One FL bot claimed drinking aloe would cure my MIL and SILs severe and chronic arthritis and flogged a lot of stuff to them, they aren't rich and I am so cross about it! She also claimed drinking aloe would cure my auto immune disease (similar to lupus) and gave me loads of their literature which made awful pseudo scientific claims

DocHollywood · 28/06/2015 09:16

Years ago when I was on the PTA we had rules for sellers who were selling under a company name. All the products they wanted to sell had to be on display with set prices. Only sales or orders of those products were allowed. No recruiting and no signing up for regular orders and no promoting. Cards were to be left discreetly on the table so customers could contact later if they wanted to.
The companies were slightly different then, Virgin Vie, Likisma aromatherapy etc but you still felt you could get sucked in if you lingered too long Shock

Original poster
NotOutingSelf · 28/06/2015 09:17

Fatmomma, did you RTFOP? I have spent a number of years organising or helping to organise school fairs. I couldn't have helped organise this one because my children all left the school some time ago. But, as I said, because of my personal experience and awareness of precisely the problems you refer to I was reluctant to pile in on the current committee members: if I raise it at all, it will be on the basis that maybe the school think about whether they want to object if the issue comes up again.

OP posts:
tobysmum77 · 28/06/2015 09:19

Sizzles I agree, £100 for a pan I could buy in John Lewis for £50 is a no. Curing all the world's problems with a bottle of aloe vera is a no. A pack of cards I can handle.

Re the chair of governors raise it still with the PTA, at least get your disapproval minuted.

tobysmum77 · 28/06/2015 09:20

Fatmomma yabvu btw.

Original poster
NotOutingSelf · 28/06/2015 09:25

There are threads on FL here, here, and here.

OP posts: