To ask for MLM success stories?

[TheLoudGobbyOne]

This is not a TAAT so please don’t report this for that. But its inspired by the ongoing MLM thread where a friend of the OP who is/was a teacher has/is giving it up to work for an MLM scheme.

And I was just wondering: does anyone know anyone who has had success from this? There are countless horror stories and warnings to make it obvious MLMs are more scams than successes but surely they are benefitting some people out there otherwise they would not exist?

I am not asking this because I am questioning joining one or remotely tempted or intrigued by it before anyone asks! Just purely wondered if there is anyone who knows someone who has been successful in these and how much work they put into it

@DontDribbleOnTheCarpet

With MLM's, you are either being exploited or you are doing the exploiting. Neither of those screams "success" to me.

This

I’m sure I saw a documentary about an Avon lady that became a millionaire a few years ago. I’ve used forever living products (a relative gave them) and they were actually good. When I was a teenager, a friend had a body shop party. She told us to bring our mothers. It was basically a lady trying to sell products. Guess what, all our mothers bought stuff .

I keep seeing a brand called nuskin on insta. Everyone seems to be going on lavish holidays and making lots of money. Who knows what’s true or not

My friend sells a mlm product. But she has a full time job. And the product she sells is more of a extra cash side hustle.

She made a fb group so only sells to ppl who want to be in the group or ask for orders.

I have a friend who does very well in the Utility Warehouse. He's a genuinely nice man who takes a lot of trouble with his customers. About 6 years ago when I was helping him out with admin he was regularly earning around £3k a month from his on-going commissions. He takes it very seriously and puts in the hours, treats it as a full time business.

No. Unless unless you are an incredible salesperson. Most people arent.

@Thehop

There’s a girl on my Facebook who’s 22 and sells FM. She posts pictures of her account showing £5/6k a month going in from FM and drives a brand new Mercedes that they pay the monthly bill for.

Oh yeah?

Why would anybody do that if it were really true? Surely you wouldn't want to be either:

A - telling all your customers that the product they are buying from you is so over-priced that it gives you such a huge profit,

or B - telling undesirables that your house would be a great place to burgle.

I know 1. She has been doing it for over 20 years, got in when the company was brand new and stayed. She's now really high up in the company.

I have done a lot of research on this and spoken to various ex huns.

The vast majority of people make absolutely no money (in fact they end up losing money). Not only do they lose money but they are sold a dream which they also then have to give up on. Which can be heartbreaking when you have to admit to everyone that it hasn’t worked out (that is if any friends and family haven’t run a mile once you start shoving your products down their throat at every opportunity).

If you are one of the very lucky few who make money, you got in early, have a lot of downlines / victims who you put pressure on to succeed at any cost and are basically preying on vulnerable people who are desperate to improve their lives.

It’s a cruel business and I tell everyone who will listen to avoid like the plague.

@BeaMends have you never posted a photo of your bank details with your salary showing for everyone to see?! Totally normal, professional behaviour.

I know somebody who went into MLM 20 years (yes, 20y!) ago with her husband. Neither of them worked in 'normal' jobs all this time, but have 3 children, always newest cars, nice house. They did not inherit (I know them very well) or had money from anywhere else. But they are always on the go, recruiting new people and, to be honest, getting on everybody's nerves with their sermons about products they are flogging. The company they work with doesn't ask them to invest any money upfront, but they get ££ from every person under them- like pyramid schemes always do. They, of course, are somewhere at the top of pyramid.
These are the only people I know.

A handful of the founders of a certain huge American organisation in the Uk in the 80s did very well. They made their money off the minions they recruited, mostly by charging them a small fortune for tapes and books and conferences, and by fiddling the VAT. The founders set up all sorts of businesses on the side and made money from those whilst pretending it came from "The Business".
Eventually the bubble burst, the downline workers were left high and dry, but a dozen or so of the people at the top moved on to set up new companies.
There were several court cases and scandals and quite a few divorces.
Some have disappeared without trace, some are doing very well, having reinvented themselves.
A couple of the American founders managed to get into very influential positions.
I am deliberately not naming names.

It’s hard to know as so many of them lie about it. I know two women who claim to have ‘given up their day jobs’ to do mlm but I’m sure at least one doesn’t make anything like a normal salary. I also knew a woman who pretended that her expensive Range Rover was ‘paid for by the company’ when in actual fact it was on finance. I’m sure in the bbc documentary (which is well worth a watch) it said that only about 2% of people make ANY money from them, at all. So the numbers that make a decent amount must be vanishingly rare.

There will be successes otherwise nobody would ever be sucked in.

But it depends on many factors:

A, your definition of success. I.e. do you just want enough to have a small bit of extra or do you want to have enough to quit your day job and have millions in the bank?

B, the product you’re selling. It goes without saying that some products will sell better than others and that many e.g. juice plus/foreverliving/Herbalife/FM world Start out with a questionable reputation so you have to work a lot harder to convince people that it is actually a legitimate product.

A friend of mine did pampered chef for six years until they pulled out of the UK. It enabled her to stay home with her kids while they were in primary, and she made not only a bit of cash at it but had perks e.g. various conventions which were essentially holidays etc. But once they pulled out of the UK she had no desire to go to any of the others, and many of them did approach her because of her PC success. She says that she liked what she did, but it worked for her at the time.

And tbh that kind of thing will have a shelf life. It’s just not possible to stay that upbeat about a product for years and years and years, it’s a bit like a cult where the initial excitement is real and you want to tell everyone, but as time goes on you just go through it, and that’s when many people either give it up, grateful for being out, or move to something different because they still want the high.

FWIW anyone saying they know someone making six figures doing FM world is either lying or ripping people off to a huge extent. The way FM world works is they sell you their fake fragrances at cost price And then you have to sell it at a price you agree. And the rewards are reset every month so you can’t actually make decent money doing it.

I have known numerous others who have tried juice plus/foreverliving etc and the problem with those that they are incapable of thinking for themselves. Every bit of marketing is written for them, and they’re essentially just doing cut and paste jobs.

Although I consider it an achievement that I’ve managed to get myself blocked on facebook by all of them.

"... but surely they are benefitting some people out there otherwise they would not exist?"

The only people benefitting are the founders, and maybe the first two rows of the pyramid under them. But remember, they benefit by parasitically sucking up the lifeblood of everyone in all the rows below them.

I'm guessing you think that the fact the MLM/pyramid continues to exist is some sort of proof that more than the founders of the scheme are 'benefitting' - otherwise, if no-one was making a living/some income from it, it would just be abandoned and collapse? That would be rational, right?

If so, you're forgetting that these schemes are very good at attracting people who aren't making rational decisions. They're naive, maybe a bit gullible. Or they're restricted in the jobs that can go for and the MLM looks viable. Or they're just so fucking desperate .

I know one woman who makes a fair few quid from Avon but she tells me it's all tactical. She has some customers on one book, some on another and then takes advantage of all the special offers/BOGOFs etc. For example, if you order a Skin So Soft from one book and it's on offer in another book, you'll pay the higher price but she'll order if from the book with the offer. She'll also order more than she needs of certain popular items if they're on a BOGOF then fulfil future orders using them.

[quote Chapterx]@BeaMends have you never posted a photo of your bank details with your salary showing for everyone to see?! Totally normal, professional behaviour.[/quote]
No I haven't. Should I be? I went self-employed years ago. Perhaps I should be telling all my customers how rich they are making me (I wish)?

Or should I just get quietly on running minding my own business?

MLMs are big on the "fake it til you make it" and "law of attraction" school of thought so even the people doing badly are encouraged to lie on mumsnet social media about how well they're doing to attract down lines.

Using empty boxes to fake big deliveries, taking selfies on car showroom forecourts of their 'new' car and even pretending to stay in luxury hotels by nipping into reception for a selfie.

It's an industry built on deception.

ChesnutSquash is talking about Amway in the UK with International Business Systems. No need to be secretive about it, it's a matter of public record. Those in higher positions misled their "downline" about their incomes. Those at the top profited from sales of "continuing education" to the downlines. IBS were found guilty of illegal practices. Amway dumped them swiftly. www.casemine.com/judgement/uk/5a8ff7d960d03e7f57eb2782

Betsy DeVos, the soon to be sacked US secretary of education (who has no relevant experience in the role but is mates with Trump) is up to her neck in Scamway. Trump had his own pyramid scheme at one point.

@LunaLoveFood

I know 1. She has been doing it for over 20 years, got in when the company was brand new and stayed. She's now really high up in the company.

she isn't in the company though? She is a self employed business woman- isn't that the line? No pension, sick pay etc etc

but surely they are benefitting some people out there otherwise they would not exist?

Yes, those at the top of the pyramid who benefit from those below them losing money.

I've had friends selling variously Scentsy, skinny coffee, body shop, avon, ann summers products. The only one who is still going is the avon rep, and she does it in addition to her fulltime job.

A family member did the fake perfume thing for a while and it was awful. This person started using corporation speak and their personality changed completely. Their relationships became all about if they could sell stuff to others or if they could be recruited. I stopped going there and so did lots of people. It was like thay had had a personality transplant. Thankfully once they realised they were a good £1800 out of pocket and had half a house full of crap no-one wanted they woke up.
The stuff smelled OK but you had to reapply it every hour to keep the smell so you were no worse off buying the real thing as it lasted all day. Thankfully that short but miserable interlude was over relatively quickly.

I know someone who ended up doing very well with usborne books. I think the main differences were that a) they got into it quite early so could build a large team as the business increased in size and b) they treated it as a full time job and worked a lot of hours, rather than expecting to earn a full time wage doing a few hours on the weekends and c) usborne books are actually a decent product and can be sold at schools and fairs, whereas most of the MLMs seem to be beauty products with a more limited market and more competition.

I know this person ended up earning a salary of up to 30k per year. But it did take a lot of hard work and time put in. It's not an easy option.

And yes, as per PP, so many of them lie about how much they are making which encourages others to join. That's why they are still so prevalent. If the people recruiting were honest about the likelihood of you actually making anything, no one would joint.