To wonder how much MLM reps *really* make?

[GunpowderGelatine]

Firstly I absolutely 100% DO NOT want to be a rep for any MLM. Even if they made a squillion pounds a year I don't think it would be worth it for having to create a Facebook group and post cringey quotes all day.

Anyway, I do use some Tropic stuff and I'm also part of a Body Shop group as now and again the rep does good discounts on stuff I'd buy from the store anyway. The latter often posts redacted wage slips from her 'boss' with £3,000 a month - HOW?! From what I see most people buy a shampoo now and again for about £4 a bottle! I certainly never spend more than about £6 with her. She's trying to tout £5 make-up bags today and has been challenged to sell 5 apparently.

The Tropic stuff is a bit dearer and the 'ambassador' (🤪) talks about holidays to South Africa and getting fancy cars (again with mentions of the elusive boss) but again most people spend the odd £25 and if they only make 25% then they can't be getting more than a couple of hundred quid a month. Even if they sold 5 times that much, it's £1,000 a month, and her boss allegedly does that as a full time job!

How much do they actually earn?

Fuck all. Most don’t break even or make back their initial investment.

Is that because they have to always buy stock to do personal demos for their Facebook page so they're always down??

A girl who I work with does tropic and has been away with them for the last two years. Not sure on actual cash earnings but she does make out she earns well off it but note sure if that’s the whole facade of trying to get your to buy into the lifestyle.

I too cannot cope with the cheesy repetitive posts claiming to be free and your own boss etc etc. Bore off!

Yes. They have to buy new stock and some MLMs you have to put in a certain amount of orders every month to keep what ever status you are. So if no one buying stuff from you, you have to cough up yourself.

As a scam, they are brilliant.

I remember reading the end of year stats published by LuLuRoe (I think) that stated that something like 90% of its reps made less than 1 dollar that year.

It's safe to say that anyone who is still posting on Facebook is losing money. And money they do make, gets spent back buying more 'stock'.

The few that make the big money, the founders and directors etc, probably have never used, sold or even seen one of their products in real life. The reps are the customers. That's who the MLM sells to. Not the rest of the population.

Ugh I know. I knew these people in a previous life and they are smart women, I just look at their pages and think "why are you posting silly things?" They sound like total wankers. And no I don't want to spend £2 to enter a raffle for a sodding advent calendar

From what I can gather, I think you can earn good money if you put in a lot of time and effort but there is a lot of admin involved with promoting the stuff, making the orders, getting the orders to the people, etc. Even if you have lots of people you know who are willing to buy, it probably ends up at about minimum wage equivalent. And there is usually a minimum amount you have to sell to earn any commission so you could work your arse off and earn nothing!

The money isn't in the product it's on recruiting others to also sell the product.

It's the most excellent con. They don't even have to do any marketing - their drones all do it for them! They charge you for the privilege of selling their products and make you recruit new buyers into the bargain!

My Tropic rep says they don't have minimum targets to meet and don't have to buy their own stock. But she also says that she NEVER uses ANYTHING except Tropic products. The shampoo is £16 per bottle, she's either loaded or telling porkie pies

I joined Tropic and Avon, failed miserably at both and barely made £60 a month. And that was delivering brochures and working my arse off. It only works if you have people working under you and so on and so forth. It's an absolute shower of shit.
Tropic stuff is nice but really expensive.

Nobody makes money off it.

Wanna join my team and sack the boss hun?

babyshark what and be my own boss hun? 🤩🤩🤩

Whatever happened to Avon ladies? I don't want to buy shit on FB but if a catalogue popped through my letterbox I'd be at it like a rat up a drainpipe. Love Avon stuff but always forget it's an option.

Avon ladies reading + stop faffing with FB and go delivering!

Yep I promise you you will make £18000 MINIMUM hun in the first month.
Fancy a white Mercedes and FREE all expenses paid trips abroad?
Is it okay if I tell you a bit about what I do?
insert shitspirational quote here

As others have said the money is in recruiting not necessarily in selling yourself.

The more you buy for you and your recruited sellers (they buy through you and you buy through the person who recruited you) the more discount you get. You then sell on to your recruited sellers at a higher price (they get less discount) as they are buying less each and then your profit is the difference between what you paid and what they had to pay.

If youre good at recruiting you will also be getting your stock at a lower price so will make more profit on your sales as well.

There is money to be made but not by everyone.

I dont understand how you are your "own boss" with these. Seems like there are whole layers of bosses above you, and many franchise rules to follow.

As a PP said the money is made by getting other suckers to sign up to be reps. It’s just a modern pyramid scheme.

They post about how much money they’re supposedly earning because a key part of the whole scheme is recruiting people under them for their ‘team’, whose sales they themselves get a cut of. They will insist over and over and it’s not a pyramid scheme, but if it walks like a pyramid scheme and quacks like a pyramid scheme...

If you haven’t read ellebeaublog yet then you must! It’s quite frightening how they manage to suck people in. A key part of the whole thing is this rhetoric that if you question any part of it, you’re just being a negative influence who’s jealous and doesn’t want them to succeed.

As you say, you only have to do some very basic maths to realise that there’s no way they can be making anything like £3k a month from selling a few beauty products to friends. Plus people who actually make 3k a month don’t usually feel the need to post their payslips on Facebook. And if it were really that easy to make so much money from home then would you really advertise it all over Facebook and encourage your friends to sign up? Why would you want to dilute your customer base?!

She might be earning £3k a month.

She'll also be SPENDING £3k a month - or probably more - on the products herself. So actually, making nothing.

The reality is there is a (very small) minority of people who do well with it, but you have to remember their money comes from aggressively pushing products (snake oil) on their friends and family, and recruiting (conning) people into joining their down line and then making money off of them. It’s a dirty, grubby business and they’ve probably left a fair few people in financial trouble in their wake.

Most people won’t make much. They might make an initial surge when they first set up, and supportive friends and family buy a few bits, but it’s not sustainable and they won’t do much better the next month, or the next. Some might break even and get out before they get too caught up, and others won’t even make their money back once they’ve bought their starter pack.

I would like to see it more regulated. They use social media to recruit, posting ‘boss bitch!’ memes and soft, Instagram friendly shots of laptops in coffee shops. They purposefully target women - often women with small children at home. They are sold this idea that they can work from home, around their kids, and make decent cash to buy their DC everything they want and need.

Often the targeted women might be home alone all day with baby, feeling a bit isolated. The MM will offer a supportive community, instant ‘friends’ (‘you’re doing great hun! Xx’) and a seemingly easy way to make cash. And it’s almost glam, selling lovely make up and beauty products! Vulnerable women can get caught up in it too. It’s really gross.

I've known a few people in RL who have done MLM, various different schemes. Avon, Younique, FM Cosmetics, that aloe vera stuff, etc... they all dropped it within 18 months, with comments ahout how they "still loved the brand but had to focus on other projects", or that they simply didn't have the time to promote their business on FB etc so often as it interfered with their real, paying, job. And presumably, social life. I'm sure if it was making them fat wads of cash - or any cash at all - they'd have stuck with it...

MrsBeans you’ve misunderstood on a very fundamental level. They’re not their own bosses, they’re “boss babes” vom.

Can’t help but feel smug at the end of the month when I get my salary and DH2’s boss babe sister in law is asking for another loan. Lot to be said for wage slavery.

I'm with @HairyAntoinette!! Love getting a good old fashioned catalogue through the door and peruse at leisure!

Seen my dp's sister get caught up in MLMs. Not good. She was far too nice for a start to even get a vague profit.

One of my Facebook friends who does forever has just bought a brand new top of the range land rover. She goes on a few holiday a year paid for by the company, gets big fat cheques all the time. She has loads of 'girlies' and 'huns' and is so proud of them all, they're going to do amazing things apparently.
She doesn't mention her fiancé is very well off.