MLM-Bot Watch SIX - Juice+, Forever Living, Younique, Arbonne, newbie ARIIX, and our own Parslai-powered Timeless Vie

[stopfaffing]

Here it is!

Thread 5

I was only an Arbonne bot for about 5 months... I kind of saw from the first day what it was all about when they refused to cancel my joining up... The products I was expected to buy a month were far too expensive no I couldn't be doing with the hassling of friends. Luckily I didn't ever post a lot on Facebook!

"So of total sales of around £100m,"

bloody hell this is big business! I am astounded how no one is making more of this - where is Martin Lewis? Where is Watchdog?

The more I read this thread the more I see how insidious and dangerous it is. Someone tried to recruit me once and I went to a meeting with them. This was about 6 years ago so a bit before it was all over social media. I didn't take it any further (despite being on maternity leave and looking for some "part time" income) because I just couldn't get anyone to tell me about the products - what is in them, how they've been tested etc. - and I wouldn't use/try and sell them without that info. I also thought it was weird how they were focusing on one fairly random plant that has been known to have mildly soothing properties on the skin, amongst many others, and that you can buy in Boots and Superdrug. I also thought it was bizarre, as someone with scientific training, that they were eating it! Surely if you had a real beauty/healthcare business you would offer other products based on other natural products eg lavender, honey etc as well, I thought to myself. This thread and TV has made me realise that that is because the products themselves are entirely irrelevant.

Spidey senses were also massively tingling at the event, in a hotel, as people were coming up and saying how much money they were making and the sums just didn't seem to stack up. Crummy 3 star hotel, downtrodden looking people in scruffy clothes - claiming they were making £100,000 in a couple of months. Exactly 6 months later the girl called me again to see if I had changed my mind. I hadn't. Ever since then I have had a hatred of all these kinds of "mum jobs" as I call them as I see so many women who are struggling to get back into the workplace, or through redundancy are doing FL, Pampered Chef, Jamie at Home, Stella and Dot, JP etc etc and its all just varying degrees of bollocks! They'd all be so much better off getting a normal job as far as I can see as they never actually seem to make any money and it annoys me how they are preyed on as soon as they have children. I know one that boasts on FB about annual trips to Disney World in Florida thanks to her business when her partner tells everyone it's paid for out of his normal job bonus every year.

Not sure I realised how insidious and creepy it all was until these threads and TV so thank you - and to eye et al for the fascinating history and insights.

Is there no 'compensatory' factor eg a bonus for recruits? There surely must be at least the possibility of something else to keep them all dashing around tweaking those spinning plates.

I know when I worked for * (famous fashion brand) in the 90's we put our factory agent and some of our top sales agents on a sliding scale of commission, but that was only because our top two sales agents were each earning over £1 million a year in commission (several million in the case of our factory agent).
Yes there is money in sales and a whole lot of travel, too, but it's certainly not in mlm!

Sorry - that post was to darcey.

I will second that motion!! Itching to find out what happened in MK!

we all are!

So am I Dadandmum!

Yes, it says you do get an extra bonus if you 'sell' another £15kish a month and also recruit 30 new people. But as far as I can tell if you sold the exact same amount the month after promotion you would get paid less. Also, if you don't meet the volume requirement one month you drop out of status. So they wouldn't include your income in the income disclosures (because obviously that would make them look worse) but you get to keep your title for another year. So all the little bots think 'wow she's making so much money and she has the White Mercedes' when in reality you could even be making even less than they are.

EC posted in that video interview from her first time at head office, that she worked 7 days a week and has never taken a day off. Either her or CS were in Paris/shopping at Eurodisney put the trip was planned around meetings/present times etc.

I cannot imagine working every evening and weekend constantly for 2 years. Burn out ahoy.

And yes please re MK!

This is an interesting thread - pretty much backs up what we are all saying here

forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=5186822

Plus the usual Bot response to the haterz:

"It's only natural that human beings are suspicious of what they do not know. I am a Forever Living Distributor and I was too. But if you do your research, you'll find that Forever is a legitimate company and Network Marketing or Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) has been around a long time.

There are skills to be learnt in order to be successful, so it's not a get rich quick scheme. The rewards are directly proportionate to the effort one puts into the business. A pyramid scheme is one in which there are no products and money is paid to the person that sponsors you. A proper MLM has money paid to the company and there are products given in exchange for money.

As for the short comings of some distributors, well, people are flawed. Some do as they are trained whilst others don't. That is typical of any business or work place and not unique to Forever. All ingredients of all products are in the public domain. Compared to normal high street prices, the products cost more but they are good value for money. As for the claims of cure, Forever are emphatic to say, their products ARE NOT A CURE. But when taken, many people report changes in their conditions and find their symptoms very much reduced. Obviously, speak to your doctor and use common sense before taking the products. "

So scripted

Her 'sales pitch' seems to be that she's doing it in a concentrated way now so that she can have a great and extended 'me-time'.

As someone pointed out upthread though, you never seem to see any resultant and wealthy retirees on the scene do you?

PM me too re MK, am dying to know! 😀

I'm imagining a conversation occurring about now in the darkest depths of Milton Keynes ......something like....

A - 'you don't think they're on about when THAT thing do you'?
B - 'no don't be silly'
B - '......I mean it can't be........and even if it was they wouldn't tell people ......would they'?
A - ' .........fuck.............oh fuckity fuck fuck'

Re. taking your tablet so you can 'work' whilst shopping - this is yet more smokescreening.
MLM is all about appearances, and putting on a good show for your downlines. ALL of it is a pretence - why wouldn't 'working whilst shopping' also be a pretence?

I too want to know the MK scandal!

Whilst we are waiting for thetruthisere to spill about her MK product centre stories have a look at the photos and check ins on their FB page to see just how thrilling it looks there! LINK

I always had my own thoughts about that 'passion planning'.

New LINK not sure why that first one doesn't work.

Why is that, Cubic? (Only if you can say of course.)

C'mon Truth beginning to wonder....