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Original poster

Friend trying to recruit me into her MLM scheme

270 replies

reasonwith · 23/04/2020 21:16

posting for traffic

I have recently been made furloughed by the company I work in as the job role I work in is struggling to pick up work for employees. DH is working but has taken a 30% pay cut so finances aren't strong at the moment. I have a friend who has devoted her life to home working in the last year but quit her job in January to work as an MLM 'team member' whatever that is.

I am fairly active on social media, and so is she, on several local Facebook groups. I run one group where it is rather a safe space for members to post - excluding MLM schemes and any other schemes that exploit people. My friend is a part of the group and usually is a compliant poster. However recently she has been messaging me, asking me if I'd like to join her MLM team. She is a recruiter so makes money from recruiting other people and when they pay in, she gets a percentage. I have refused, and she has kept on insisting. Today I logged onto Facebook and saw that she has now tried to recruit my group members and I immediately deleted the post and got rid of her.

She sent a grovelling message saying it was 'totally unfair and rude as MLM offer good working incentives in this current situation'. I retorted back and told her that she is exploiting a lot of furloughed people and unemployed people to pay an absurd money so she gets money!! After that she stopped replying. However, another friend of mine sent me screenshots of my 'friend' ranting on multiple groups about me, and calling for people to troll me and send me death threats.

She's even sent me a bloody invoice of the monthly payments you have to pay in for the MLMs. I have now blocked her and anyone who is associated with her so she can't use them to get into my head. I am livid. Please share any stories you have of MLM recruitment, so I can feel better.

Surely she was BU about this as she is trying to force me to sign up?

OP posts:
Whitney101 · 23/04/2020 22:38

Avon is

isthisanmlm.com/mlm/Avon

edenhills · 23/04/2020 22:41

I think the pandemic is bringing them out! Have had 3 separate 'friends' trying to flog me tropic skincare this week. One of them told me it's not a mlm because its vegan!

cheeseandpickledonions · 23/04/2020 22:45

I have a friend that has got sucked into the doterra essential oils one. She's always banging on about these oils. One of them will help you not get Covid apparently

Igotthemheavyboobs · 23/04/2020 22:50

I believe the structure of Avon has changed more over to MLM over the past 10 years or so. People are now encouraged to build their downline and recruit and will usually make more money from that than sales of the product.

OP, depending on which MLM it is, see if you can find an income disclosure statement from the company, they are often quite interesting.

MrsChanningTatum · 23/04/2020 22:51

Agree with @edenhills, 2 of my Facebook friends have started advertising products and messaging me in the last 2 week.

Gingerkittykat · 23/04/2020 22:58

What MLM product was she trying to flog?

BemidjiMinnesota · 23/04/2020 23:01

cheeseandpickledonions

I have a friend that has got sucked into the doterra essential oils one. She's always banging on about these oils. One of them will help you not get Covid apparently

I got followed home by a pushy Doterrorist once after asking an innocent question about essential oils during a yoga class. Confused

OP If you report her to the police I think they can insist that she leaves you alone, so you won't have to worry about her creating a new account and harassing you more.

Original poster
reasonwith · 23/04/2020 23:07

@Gingerkittykat it was that TS Life thing? I think so anyway. It seems like a fairly new MLM, I'm not familiar with it compared to Younique and Juice Plus. I think they sell health products but looking at certain member's posts, a lot of them focus on the recruitment and seem to forget the selling part of it (which makes sense as its very recruitment driven so the lower end of the team pay the higher end)

Gosh some of you have really experienced some terrible MLM pushy people! I understand that WFH is something that not everyone can access, however now I feel like it will be more common hopefully, but these MLMs are very exploitative and I get so frustrated whenever someone really believes in them and doesn't realise the damage they are causing.

OP posts:
Jozen · 23/04/2020 23:10

I have a friend that has got sucked into the doterra essential oils one. She's always banging on about these oils. One of them will help you not get Covid apparently

That'll be the OnGuard oil. I appear to live in a Doterra hun hotspot and they are diffusing it in tanker-loads round here if the Facebook posts are anything to go by. You can only get it from the States now local supplies exhausted.
See, even I know this now. Why? Why?

Bouncingbelle · 23/04/2020 23:16

Eeeek I think I might have been sucked in without realising. I've joined Doterra purely for the discount as I use a lot of essential oils but never ever tried to recruit anyone or even tell people! I do tell people if they ask how I treat my sons constipation but never in a "buy stuff" type way. Never even considered that this makes me a 'rep'!

cheeseandpickledonions · 23/04/2020 23:25

Yes Jozen that's the one OnGuard. I actually quite like the smell but it's a bit too Christmassy for me (cloves orange etc)

cheeseandpickledonions · 23/04/2020 23:27

Bouncing belle just please be aware of how much kore expensive they can be. For example the clove oil - $20 doterra, £2.50 Tesco.

Original poster
reasonwith · 23/04/2020 23:27

@Bouncingbelle it might be the case like Avon where it isn't necessarily a scam with its products, its just very hard to actually earn a steady figure. I've looked at the Doterra website, it isn't an obvious MLM, I am guessing that it focuses on the MLM part if people sign up to sell its products rather than it being its core drive. Do the products work?

OP posts:
acatcalledjohn · 23/04/2020 23:27

was that TS Life thing? I think so anyway. It seems like a fairly new MLM,

Oh Christ, she doesn't adore the Messiah who runs that one, does she?

Anti vaxx conspiracy nutcase con artists. It's basically Actilabs product repackaged. It's all white label mass produced crap.

Have a look on the MN Money Matters board for the Bot Watch threads. Lots of people with good knowledge there.

SpillTheTea · 23/04/2020 23:33

It makes me cringe when I see people posting MLM bollocks. She's batshit and grabby.

Gingerkittykat · 23/04/2020 23:37

I just googled TS life and you can't even view their products without having a customer log in. It looks like slimming teas, coffee and hot chocolate.

JaniceBattersby · 23/04/2020 23:39

Avon is absolutely an MLM masquerading under its innocent ‘we give mums a little bit of extra pocket money’ persona.

Doterra is one of the worst MLMs. The products are stupidly expensive, the reps are some of the most cutthroat recruiters and the False medical claims run right up the line, and often over the line, of what’s legal. I wouldn’t be sporting a company like that by buying the products.

RedPanda2 · 23/04/2020 23:44

ellebeaublog.com/

Original poster
reasonwith · 23/04/2020 23:44

@acatcalledjohn yeah she does, it's extremely cringe and the only people endorsing the product seem to be people with a huge social network - leashing over the ones who are quiet and paying their incomes in!

Regarding TS Life, I have only ever seen it on FB and its very differently portrayed on its site as it looks like it sells products but on FB, it is marketed as a true investment for people who want to be entrepreneurs, it almost forgets that it is built upon selling products. All MLMs show their true colours eventually, the recruiters forget to endorse products and only recruit as their main goal is to build a huge cult.

400,000 people in the UK are signed up to MLMs, I think that number is extremely high and really thought it would be lower here.

OP posts:
Samtsirch · 23/04/2020 23:59

@reasonwith
Did you start a similar thread recently ?
If not, someone else has suffered similarly and you should read the replies to their thread, it may be helpful.

Original poster
reasonwith · 24/04/2020 00:06

@Samtsirch

I have not, could you send me a link if possible to see the OP's situation?

OP posts:
GlummyMcGlummerson · 24/04/2020 01:32

A woman whose DD is in dance class with my DD tried to recruit me to Tropic - not even sure if it's a MLM but I did buy a few products after being tricked into going to a party and TBF I liked most of the stuff - my son has severe eczema and the shower gel is one of the few products in the world that doesn't irritate his skin, so I don't mind spending £10 on that. So much is tremendously overpriced though

She harassed me to join, even after I repeatedly said no, to the point where I had to tell her to back off. She didn't have my phone number but we were Facebook friends and she'd leave me voice messages over Facebook messenger. She also would bombard people when she had a "product launch" at her house - she actually wanted people to go along to her house, which was in the arse end of nowhere, at 8pm on a Friday to spend £38 on sun cream.

She would go to the annual Tropic event too and watching the videos was like watching those American healers and their believers - fawning over the owner of Tropic (who was on the apprentice at some point) and crying over face serum Hmm she creeps me out. And since I told her to back off it's awkward AF at DD's dance class now.

I have a colleague who also sells Tropic who is never ever pushy and hasn't tried to recruit a soul in the workplace AFAIK.

I also have a friend of a friend who's joined Pruvit - overpriced meal replacement shakes - and claims that joining has completely cured the manic depression she's had for 20 years. It's fucking scary, and these people are soooo boring to listen to.

SharonasCorona · 24/04/2020 02:42

I've just seen the post where a Doterra seller is recommending essentials oil to a poster who had run out of her asthma inhaler at night and was desperately seeking advice. Despicable.

CrazyKitkatLady · 24/04/2020 06:08

If anyone is interested “The Dream” season 1 is a podcast about MLMs (it looks into a lot of the problems with them), it’s American but they work the same. It was an interesting listen!

I found it on Spotify.

Notajogger · 24/04/2020 06:18

She sent a grovelling message saying it was 'totally unfair and rude as MLM offer good working incentives in this current situation'.
Doesn't sound very grovelling!

Agree with pps about reporting the death threat incitement. That's madness. Fortunately I don't know anyone involved with MLMs!

Oh the irony of Avon adverts at the top of the page...