To be confused about friend’s Maldives holiday

[Jacobijake]

A friend of mine had a ‘proper’ job but also sells FM cosmetics on the side. I know this is an MLM and so I’ve muted all her posts and she doesn’t try to sell to me so it doesn’t bother me and I don’t think about it.

However she’s recently (last week) been to the Maldives on a work trip which looked amazing, she said she didn’t have to pay for it it came through her ‘side hustle’ I guess I’m just wondering if that’s true? I always thought MLMs were a complete con and no one made money etc but I’ve seen the holiday pics and it’s a 5* resort! Also pictured are loads of other sellers of her particular thing (FM cosmetics).

To be clear I have no intention of buying products/joining/ and I genuinely think all MLMs prey on the vulnerable.

[quote Hopeisallineed]@ElephantOfRisk don’t they essentially work the same way though?[/quote]
2 cheeks of the same arse.

@NotPersephone

Urgh there’s an awful school mum who keeps trying to flog Tropic on the class WhatsApp group. She’s a total ass pain anyway - the kind of woman who posts on FB every time her DD gets praised at school and she’s also #blessed and #bossbabe. It’s so disingenuous.

I've seen a few mates go into Tropic. And insist there's no Downlines etc it's not an MLM but I'm not convinced. The way they worship the owner, some woman who went on the Apprentice, is so unbelievably cult-like that I'm amazed these formerly intelligent women can't see how embarrassingly cringey they're being. Even down to "Isn't Susie just SO pretty doesn't she look young!"

[quote Squeezita]@steff13 the point is Shannann Watts was under huge pressure to maintain a happy family image due to her job, and she couldn't afford to pay the mortgage on her home on her MLM 'salary', part of the reason she didn't leave her husband.

If she had a normal job, she may have been able to leave Chris Watts.[/quote]
Exactly why the Watts family are relevant in relation to what life is like with MLMs

This is taken from Tropic's last audited accounts which is publicly available on Companies House -
"The principal activity of the Company is manufacturing and selling of skincare and cosmetic products primarily to Ambassadors, with a small portion of sales to end consumers.'

This is what ALL MLM/NWM companies are based on - the 'business owner' is actually the customer, and the money just gets funnelled up to the top bots. The lower you are in the pyramid the less chance you get of any return, and you mainly just end up in thousands of pounds worth of debt.

The whole MLM industry is illusory and constructed on broken dreams, lies and betrayals

And there we have it in a nutshell ...

My friend does scentsy, she doesnt push it tbh as she has a page that does really well. She's had some amazing holidays and when her Florida holiday was cancelled due to covid they gave her the cash equivalent. For her it's a real job and the only one she can do due to her disability.

Ive another friend who makes pin money from it she saves for Christmas, maybe £100 a month tops. Most won't make megabucks and holidays from this sort of selling. It's a popularity competition really. But they can work so long as people go in with realistic expectations.

I am part of a company where trips are available to go on, current one to Dubai. However there is a lot of pressure to get there - sales for a month and sponsoring new people.

I don't bother with the trips as I like the products and have a small customer base. I also don't push it to everyone enough to make them mute me or be fed up with me.

I worked on the executive side of "direct sales", a sub-company linked to a large multi-national food brand. As a part of this role I had to join every MLM I could get my hands on, take apart and analyse their on-boarding kits and processes, etc. Fascinating stuff.

As MLMs went, the one I worked for wasn't the worst. There were no sales minimums to remain an active seller, the company provided the individual's website and payment processing for free, and all products were drop shipped so no inventory was required beyond what the seller wanted to have on hand for in-home demonstrations. The most successful sellers never even did that, they leveraged Facebook.

There were five to seven sellers out of a few thousand at any given time that were making six figures. The majority made £100 PCM or less.

As far as the incentive trip goes that was absolutely funded entirely by the company, including airfare and accomodation. Sellers earned a certain number of "points" towards the trip for every £ of product they sold, with anything sold by a downline being worth 2x to encourage recruitment. Some sellers earned enough for two people to go.

In the end it was probably 75 or so people who earned that trip.

Great series on Netflix called 'On becoming a God in central Florida'. About MLM

[quote NotPersephone]**@dickiedavisthunderthighs* and @YourFinestPantaloons* yes, that's exactly why it pisses me off that she is wanging on in our WhatsApp group. It just feels like she thinks there are gullible women there to be taken advantage of. It's a very supportive group with missing clothing, sharing things that are outgrown etc and it's clear that most of the mums are good eggs. I really don't want to have to trawl through her shitty self-promotional BS to find out what the homework task was. I am tempted to post some of the links from this thread!

And she actually uses picture of her 4 year old daughter using the Tropics kids' range and saying "wow! [Kiddo] has been using this since she was 6 months' old" etc. Just, no.[/quote]
Oh yes my friend had her 8yo 'sampling' the Tropic make up.

Funnily enough before I found out the full extent of Tropic, I did agree to a make up trial. I looked so orange with dark brown eyebrows (from the harsh eyebrow pencil) I laughed out loud at myself. And it was all more expensive than my usual Clinique range

From Tropic's last audited accounts which is publicly available on Companies House -
"The principal activity of the Company is manufacturing and selling of skincare and cosmetic products primarily to Ambassadors, with a small portion of sales to end consumers"

Ouch
I expect most of us realise this perfectly well, but it's not often you see it so baldly put - and on Companies House at that

As for "targeting young women who can least afford to lose" ... well yes, but there's not exactly a lack of publicity about what usually happens
People can only be protected against themselves up to a point, and if they're determined they know better and ignore all the warnings they've surely got to take some responsibility for what follows

Sorry, I meant to put a sarcastic emoji after my earlier post. Yes, essentially the same but amazing how many Google hits were saying, quite indignantly that it wasn't a pyramid scheme it was an mlm. As if that was somehow a completely different and better thing. 🤷‍♀️

When I'm in charge, these MLM schemes will be banned

Anyone follow Danni Armstrong from Towie? She’s a MLM with Herbalife. Seems to have made a bloody fortune - she’s something like President Level now. All from being a #bossbabe.

@YellowandGreenToBeSeen

Anyone follow Danni Armstrong from Towie? She’s a MLM with Herbalife. Seems to have made a bloody fortune - she’s something like President Level now. All from being a #bossbabe.

Yes, I follow her. She's even got a Bentley which I think is her 'company car'. Ferne McCann also is in the same company as her.

The Bentley was revealed as being leased for a day - for photos. Can’t buy class!

I know someone who made a good living doing Venture and Virgin Vie. She was a natural sales person though and worked round the clock.

@Janaih

I know someone who made a good living doing Venture and Virgin Vie. She was a natural sales person though and worked round the clock.

It's incredibly likely that her money is from downlines and her skill was selling 'the dream' to other women, not shifting products to consumers.

An MLM's best customers is its own 'sellers' racking up inventory that won't leave their home.

Haven't read the whole thread, so I'm not sure if this has been mentioned, but watch LulaRich on Amazon if you can.

It details how these MLM companies work and joust how much pressure they put on their employees to spend their own money for things. It's like a cult.

LulaRow was only in America as far as I know, but they made a fortune after starting a MLM Company that sold utterly tacky leggings that had a cult following

https://watch.amazon.co.uk/detail?gti=amzn1.dv.gti.6a82ce29-83b3-4a81-89f2-8794d0bb85d6&territory=GB&ref=shareeiosepisode&r=web

It's incredibly likely that her money is from downlines and her skill was selling 'the dream' to other women, not shifting products to consumers.

This.

You've got to be some kind of hard person to recruit any singe person, whoever they are, whatever their circumstances, knowing you are making money from them, and they don't have the skills / thick skin / awareness that you do.

I think a lot of people struggle with the idea that a friend or relative who has "done well" with a MLM might have been lying through their teeth about the whole thing.

@KingsleyShacklebolt

I think a lot of people struggle with the idea that a friend or relative who has "done well" with a MLM might have been lying through their teeth about the whole thing.

No, I think a lot of people have just seen the income disclosures and know how incredibly unlikely it is they have made any money at all.

Currently MLM's aren't required by law to publish income disclosure statements but lots do and they can be easily found online. There's currently a petition on the gov.uk website to make it a legal requirement for MLM's to publish them if anyone would like to sign.

@KingsleyShacklebolt argh sorry I read your post wrong and thought you were sticking up for people in MLM's

I will never ever stick up for MLMs!!

I don't think most people are interested enough to look up income disclosures to be honest, I think most people will just believe what their friends and relatives are telling them. If your mate from school has always been honest with you, and tells you she has this new fabulous job and a white Mercedes, you'd believe her, wouldn't you? And potentially get sucked into it yourself, which is exactly why they do it...