To be pissed off a "friend" tried to persuade me to take a job by outright LYING about the hours involved?

[throwingpebbles]

So someone I thought was a friend has spent ages trying to persuade me to work for her; selling products as part of her team. She really pushed me to see how I could get a better work/life balance by working for her and made out I could make good money working part time hours around my family

Now I have learnt that in fact to earn any kind of money working in this business you have to essentially "get rid of your kids"!!

Feel really really misled

[Hesalovernotabiter]

Someone on my Facebook has just announced her 'business' has expanded to New Zealand! Yep, Forever Living

[Fintan]

Pixie, yes watch out for Tropic too. Not as bad as FL - yet - but definitely works in a similar way.

OP, I lost my closest friend (of 25 years) to this stuff. She's become unrecognisable from the woman I knew two years ago. I feel sorry for her, although I was angry with her for a while. I'm still very sad that I've lost her as a friend.

When I tried to talk to her about this on a business level, asking about net profit (NOT turnover!) and asking her exactly how many hours a week she was working so we could calculate her hourly rate for perspective, she dismissed me with "you're just jealous of my life".
There's a lovely, fun, intelligent, rational woman still in there somewhere but goodness knows if she'll ever resurface!

If your friend is on your social media, prepare to have it blown up with hun this and hun that, and stupid hashtags eg #bossbabe #sacktheboss and my personal favourite #roadtrip which they post whenever they've had to get up at 5am to go to a training event that may only be an hour down the motorway!

[GoEasyPudding]

Some one I like and respected and worked with tried very very hard to get me and DH into Amway.

It was very disturbing as we were actually kidnapped to Stevenage and had to get up and walk out of a sales rally and find the train station to escape.

We laughed and laughed all the way home and when the film "Go" came out shortly after we were so relieved it wasn't just us!

[LottieDoubtie]

Kidnapped to stevenage

too far!

[ThatsNotMyRabbit]

My bot went global a while back 🙄

[throwingpebbles]

What does that mean thatsnotmy ??

All these stories are shocking! And I have been telling people at work about it today and hearing more of the same...

[Fintan]

#Global.
"International Business Coach"
"Global Business Mentor"

[cozietoesie]

I doubt she's consciously lying to you, throwing. Just seeing you as an object to be manipulated and not as a person.

Either way, the friendship is dead I think?

[Greyponcho]

It's a shame when good people fall for this nonsense with the promises of luxury holidays, bonuses and the life of Riley just by making the same promises to those you recruit.
They justify the shape of the organisation, saying its not different to any other company, with a CEO at the top and minions at the bottom (casually ignoring that my company does my taxes, pays me annual leave and sick pay and does things above board).
My friend "wanted to practice" their spiel on me once, then finished with "do you want to sign up?". I said no. They continued to pressure me, but I remained firm. What they forget is that I know their house is already free of mortgage because their parents paid for it. Their car was bought from redundancy money, not from MLM selling but the MLM company is happy to promote them as an example of what they've achieved through MLM.
Trouble is, my friend is so hell-bent on being 'rich' fast, that this friend has fallen for the scheme scam hook, line & sinker. This friend genuinely believes that this is their pension, once they've got enough rungs below them, they can reap the benefits cream off a slice of the sellers profits ad infinitum.
Oh, and friend believes they are doing people a favour selling aloe to them...

[Fintan]

"Oh, and friend believes they are doing people a favour selling aloe to them."

This is my friend's belief too. I told her I'd buy an aloe plant of my own for £2 if I wanted to use the stuff!

[ChampaleSocialist]

Its not a job. you do know that, right? She did not offer you a job.
If she called it a job you should hit her with a rolled up newspaper.

[scarednoob]

Omg I have an old friend I hadn't heard from in years who keeps trying to get me into this. I was naive, thinking she wanted to be back in touch, but every email is actually a really hard sell. I don't mind buying a few bits, which I have done - but fecked if I am doing it myself. You are right to be angry that she lied. I think they get given a textbook of manipulation.

I remember the first time I got taken to one of these presentations by someone I thought was a really good mate. His ghastly MIL had gotten in early and so had made some money, and had roped him and his wife into it. I thought we were going for a nice lunch out. It was a v v creepy all day presentation. I thought I might sign up just to get out of there, but they wanted £2,500 - and this was in 2000, so would be more now. I felt really awful and uncomfortable saying no, after we had been there all day, and also really angry with my friend for putting me through it.

Then the MIL arrived and started giving me a hard sell about how her daughter and my friend were a young couple with a baby and really needed the money..... Toxic.

The people who start these things off should be ashamed.

[throwingpebbles]

Been talking to other mutual friends now and it turns out she has been targeting loads of us

Kind of feel sad for her too though

[cozietoesie]

It is sad to see people in the throes of a cult-like obsession. Their reason and personality seem to desert them so that they become like puppets. You just have to try to .not be influenced by pity, however strong it may be. Giving in would only delay the inevitable for them by a very little while and might screw up you and your life as well.

I would be guessing, scared, that she's running out of 'friends' in her primary circle and is casting around for anyone with whom she might arguably have a connection. It's pretty well par for the course.

[Siwi]

They have to contact every SINGLE person who they know or ever knew.

The top bots give examples on their YouTube videos of prospecting their midwife, baristas in Costa, sales assistants in Mothercare, B and Q, supermarkets, all night garages and double glazing salesmen.

If they don't contact 5 people a day the are 'not working hard enough'.

[cozietoesie]

Does nobody doing this have a logical brain? Unless several of those involved have friends who are indulgent billionaires - who are eg prepared to buy the stuff and throw it away/pay people to sign up - then there just aren't enough people in the world to keep it going.

I know it's called MLM and therefore not actually illegal but the reality surely is that these are pyramid schemes after a fashion?

[throwingpebbles]

Oh well at least I can rest assured that she didn't see me as a particularly gullible person then siwi

How terrible to spend your life trying to sell to everyone you come across.

[cozietoesie]

No - I doubt she would see you as gullible as such. You would, however, probably just be a name in her file. Another box ticked.

[Fintan]

pebbles she didn't see you that way! But she did see you as a means to make her "wealthy".
They're given a tick sheet to fill out names and contact details of everyone they know. They are supposed to contact everyone, and make notes next to their name. They're given this very early in the process of being involved with FL.

[scarednoob]

Yep, I get that now!

It's insane. How can you not know that the first few people in the scheme will make a lot of money, and everyone else will lose it? It's basic common knowledge/sense. And who feels comfortable stiffing their friends like that??

[MimsyPimsy]

"The top bots give examples on their YouTube videos of prospecting ...... double glazing salesmen."
That must be a sure-fire way of getting rid of these unwanted salesmen!!! Or would it lead to a bizarre stand-off...

[IPityThePontipines]

That Timeless Vie website is brilliant

Several years ago, I went to a talk by an anti-cult organisation. They said they were two types of cults: religious cults and therapy cults. These MLMs seem to be a weird offshoot of the latter.

[ThatsHowYouGetAnts]

Pfft, forget Forever Living. Sign up to . Look how well you could do!

[GoEasyPudding]

The Amway sales rally I was kidnapped to in 1998 was huge! There were probably over a thousand people there and they all started singing "You're Simply the Best" by Tina Turner when the UK "leaders" came on stage.

I turned to DH, then my D fiance and said "Lets go...NOW!!"

When I broke out we had to force our way past the people in the sales group who were kind of blocking us from leaving from our row.

Back at work I totally lost respect for the idiot who took us there. He was a supplier that I had to see 3 times a week. Poor man, I think he saw MLM it as a way out of his financial difficulties.

[CheeseMeisterGeneral]

Does Kleeneze fall into the pyramid selling category ? Have lost a good friend to it, completely changed not by trying to sell to me or encourage me to sign up myself, just totally obsessed with I quote 'wealth creation business' and being a 'network marketing professional'.