Multi-level marketing (also known as network marketing) is a controversial direct-sales business strategy where individuals sell products to others in their network. It follows a pyramid structure where people that make the most are at the top, and those who find themselves at the bottom usually don’t make any money at all.
Pyramid schemes are considered illegal because they’re paying distributors to recruit other participants. MLMs claim that they're different since you don't have to recruit but sell their products. However, without your network, you wouldn't be able to sell anything at all. People often get involved without even knowing that it’s a total scam and lose a lot of money along the way. Fortunately, some of them do escape.
One user asked the r/AskReddit community to share what red flags made them quit this industry and how did they do it. More than 3.7K brave former MLM members told their stories and Bored Panda collected some of the most terrifying comments from this post. Make sure to check them out below and if you have a bad MLM experience yourself, don’t be afraid to open up about it below.
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My mom was caught up in the Market America scheme. They manipulated an already vulnerable, mentally unstable woman to sink $20k into her “business”. She took her own life less than a year later. If the company has washed up celebrities as spokespeople and asks you to spend more money than you typically make in your “business”, you may want to reconsider your investment.
Bored Panda reached out to Robert FitzPatrick, president of Pyramid Scheme Alert and author of Ponzinomics: The Untold Story of Multi-Level Marketing. He is an expert in multi-level marketing schemes and pyramid sales fraud who said that millions of people get lured into MLM because they don’t know its history, origins, or financial consequences.
Trying to unmask what MLM actually is and how it differs from a pyramid scheme, we found out that the latter is, technically, illegal. "However, there is no national law that bans them. There is no national law that even uses the term, 'pyramid scheme.' Some states do have anti-pyramid scheme laws but they are seldom enforced and some have been written to exclude MLM," FitzPatrick explained.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has prosecuted about 30 MLMs out of nearly a thousand over the last 25 years or so: "It was never explained why those 30 were picked or how they differed from the hundreds of others. Just selling a product does not mean that an MLM enterprise is not a pyramid scheme. All of those that have been prosecuted as pyramids sold products. Some operated for many years before finally being closed down."
My recruiter told me she made $400 at the party I was at. I later learned she made 25% of that.
I was told if I could get 2 people under me, I would make $400-$500 per month.
Then I was told I needed 4 people instead of 2.
Then I was $2,000 in debt with nothing to show for it.
Deleted them all and changed my phone number.
Edit:
I am an owner of 2 businesses, so I thought adding a small side hustle would be an easy transition, but it turned out that as a legitimate business owner, I couldn’t bring myself to use the toxic business practices that were expected of me (cold messaging, hounding people for orders, constantly reminding people about deals, etc.).
When I left, I helped the two girls who were under me get out as well, and apologized for roping them into something I thought was a good deal.
Kudos for stepping out of a scam. They also explain why so many people fall for the scam. It all looks legit and profitable on the surface. Only when you really get involved you find out how much of a scam it is. By that time a lot of people have invested too much money to be able to walk away.
A pyramid scheme is basically a fraudulent system where the vast majority loses. "The loss is determined by the model itself. The basic model is the 'endless chain' and the 'money transfer.' Each investor gains money only if others can be recruited onto the chain," he explained.
"Some of the money from the recruits is transferred to the recruiters. The new recruits are told they can do the same — forever. This is obviously impossible based on expansion. Those at the bottom will lose. The majority are always at the bottom. This is by design."
My mother did Amway years ago. She told me she quit when she realized she approached every new acquaintance with an aim to make a sale instead of making a friend.
By not getting in, I’ve seen a friend and his wife get into Amway, and in 3 years, they sold most of what they had, moved back in with the husbands mother, and both begin selling drugs to support the Amway habit.
They still think they are mere months away from being millionaires. its infuriating.
I live where Amway was started. They have done a lot of philanthropic work with their wealth. Wealth acquired on the backs of suckers. The Devos's and VanAndels are beyond wealthy. One of them has an obnoxiously large mansion on Lake Michigan. It's rarely if ever used. But it's great if your prepping for a colonoscopy because it has 11 bathrooms.
According to the expert, the defining characteristics of all MLMs are the same as those of all pyramid schemes:
- The endless chain recruiting model;
- The requirement to pay to enroll and participate. This can be with cash or the purchase of goods;
- Necessity to recruit in order to make the money that is promised;
- Money is transferred from "last ones in" to the top recruiters.
When my husband died (abusive prick so don’t feel bad for me) he left me with a f**k ton of debt (ok you can feel bad for me now lol). Not long after he died I had gone to a Tupperware party for a friend, and made some positive comment about one of the products, and that put me on the presenter’s radar. This presenter happened to be one of those top tier ladies that ignored their family to make it big. She was/is the regional person. Whatever the title is.
I was BROKE. Paying off so much stuff while waiting for the life insurance to come through, you’d be surprised at the amount of companies that don’t give a s**t that you’ve lost a spouse, they just want their money. So Tupperware was spun as a way to earn extra money. She even gave me the starter kit without having to pay up front.
Problem was, I worked full time, and it was near impossible to book parties. I did my first presentation at my house and booked no parties. I reached out to all my friends and family and booked no parties.
The pressure from this woman was IMMENSE. She’d call me while I was at my day job. She try to convince me to quit my day job to focus on Tupperware. She knew I was broke, but she was adamant that if I quit my job I’d make it big, and before I know it I’d have a Tupperware car just like her.
She never listened to me. Even when I said to her “How do you expect me to pay my bills if I quit my job and start up Tupperware?” She had a response for everything. Nothing was based in logic and every time she called me, which was weekly, I was filled with dread.
I started to ghost her. It took months for me to work up the courage to tell her I didn’t want to do it anymore. It took weeks for her to accept me “don’t want to do it anymore”. She dragged it on, and on, and on. Finally she sent me a curt “Leave your kit at the front door” message which I did.
She tried a couple of years down the track to recruit me again. I ignored her calls.
All I wanted to extra income to help me. I also wanted to add to my friend group. All I got was stress, anxiety, and frustration.
Woman I know who sells Younique and recruits HARD, pivots between bragging about her boss babe lifestyle, and selling random used household stuff on eBay and Facebook marketplace for £1.50.
Multi-level marketing companies claim to be using a direct-selling strategy but very few people actually sell goods to the general public. "Money is made by recruiting others, who must buy some product in order to participate," Robert FitzPatrick explained. "MLMs claim to be an income opportunity, but, by design, most are at the bottom of the chain and therefore always lose. In fact, only 1% a year in MLM make a real profit and that comes from the losses of the others."
Joined a jewelry-based MLM thinking it would be cute to sell jewelry as a side hustle in July after I relocated across the country. I got roped in to the “be your own boss” and “make money while you sleep” mentality, and for a while, it boosted my confidence because I truly thought I was doing a great job running my own business.
On paper, I brought in good money (about $100 per live show, which was one hour a week), but I had to ship out the jewelry to them, which ate about 20% of the profit, then the money earned went back into ordering more jewelry.
By September, once the glitz and excitement of it all wore off and I realized nothing was coming back to me, my boyfriend told me the only way to earn money in the business was to add new “business partners.” I told him I wasn’t interested in doing that, but that was part of the scheme. I was so hurt by the people who had roped me in to the business. So I quit that same day. Luckily, I made it out with only like $30 lost, but I still have a ton of jewelry and packing materials taking up space in my house.
I worked at the head office of a large MLM, and one of the OG’s. Mary Kay.
You have to live, breathe, and s**t pink. Honestly, I once got sent home from the office because I had made a cardinal mistake… I had worn a pantsuit to the office. As a woman, we were expected to wear a skirt or dress daily. I was new and didn’t really think they’d get upset over a pantsuit, all things considered. I was wrong.
I know this is a different perspective, but hear me out. I didn’t really know what Mary Kay was initially, all I remember is seeing the old school pink eye shadow cubes in my mom’s makeup drawer. I started to discover that things were all a bit strange and … predatory. We would run campaigns inside of universities and colleges because the older generations all “knew” what was up. The company was marketing toward these younger girls specifically because they didn’t know the shtick, and hinging on the fact that we would somehow be able to convince them of making easy money. I heard a lot of horror stories the longer I worked there. Specifically from people who were angrily demanding answers from directors at the annual “Seminar” held in Toronto for Canadian Mary Kay consultants. People losing thousands of dollars. It all felt so criminal to have been a part of.
I remember being a young adult like maybe 15 years ago meeting someone at my job. She was very nice and we were chatting. Maybe second time she came to my job she invited me over for facials. I was excited to make a friend. Well when I got there it was all about Mary Kay and how I could sell stuff if I didn't want to buy it. I was heartbroken and embarrassed. its already hard making friends and basically I just got scammed. I wish I could tell her how much that hurt me.
MLMs deliberately prey on the vulnerable. When you start staying home with your kids, especially after having a career, there are a lot of things (potentially) going on at once: social isolation, loss of income leading to feelings of inadequacy or not doing your part, ambivalence about the worth of unpaid labor in the home, guilt and insecurity about your parenting decisions... the list goes on. MLMs promise mothers what seems like the perfect solution: being able to earn money and spend time with their children and connect with an instant community of women just like you and feel worthy and important again. Those promises are lies, but sadly, they are very effectively aimed at those who are, because of their vulnerable state, most likely to believe them.
One of the biggest problems with these schemes is that so many people get involved in them. There are a couple of reasons why: "They have been deceived into believing that MLM offers are real income opportunity (not knowing that 99% never make a profit) and that it is based on direct selling (not knowing that almost no one does or could sell MLM goods door to door for a profit.)"
I know a girl who got sucked into Arbonne. She constantly makes videos on FB and instagram acting like she has this perfect life and last I heard, her boyfriend (that she claims in her husband on social media) had to call her from a gas station to see if they had any cash in the house because both their credit cards were declined and he needed gas to go to a friend’s birthday party. Needless to say, he didn’t go. It literally says “boss babe” on her Instagram.
Some dude tried to recruit me into buying/selling energy drinks. It was a known scam throughout school at this point so I decided to go along with it to see where it would go. The guy’s dad was a friend of mine, and my dad has a pretty well known computer shop in town.
Anyway, I go to pick up MLM man from his house to go to a meeting. This guy loads three cases of energy drinks (I think they were called “VEEMA” or something) into my car. I was already sketched out and this was a liability I didn’t want to encumber myself with so I told him I had a family emergency. He got out of the car, told me to keep the -85 energy drinks. The 3 cases were in my car for a few weeks, never touched them. about a month after hearing anything, one morning there were maybe 8-10 cases of the energy drinks stacked right outside the back door of my dad’s shop.
2/10, would not try to join a cult again.
Wait. So you got 3 cases for free and then another 8-10? I think they're the ones being scammed, not you.
Used to sell younique. It was easy to get out. I wasn’t making any money, I couldn’t be fake to sell my product and I learned about quality makeup and younique ain’t it lol.
You can buy colourpop for literally 1/4 of the price and 10x the pigment and blendability.
He continued: "With salaries declining and costs rising, many people look for alternatives to jobs and MLM falsely promises to offer an alternative." But the sad truth is that often they end up losing money and blame themselves for their failure. This is due to the fact that they have been falsely told that this model works for everyone and the only reason anyone would fail is if they quit or did not try enough. "The lie is accepted by most people," FitzPatrick said.
I've been in sales almost all of my adult life. Early on in my real career, Amway looked like an easy touch. I liked the challenge, I always hit target. It seemed simple.
I was naiive. I got hooked on the tapes and books. I was better at my day job, but I couldn't make it work in Amway. Even after a couple of years with the seminars and books and tapes.
I don't know why it took me so long to do the damn simple math. I had an epiphany about how the real money was being made in the tools (books, tapes, seminars). Then I started to critically think about where the money was coming from. And I realized I had been lied to. I drifted away from the group and then got a new job opportunity in a different city. I took that, changed my number, and haven't looked back on it in 15 years.
My red flag was that they would not share with me the company name when they brought me in. At one point the recruiter left the use the restroom and I snooped around and saw a logo of the name. When he came back, I asked him what it stood for and immediately he got defensive. He also told me to do everything I can (sell my TV) to join. Also, the teleconference was weird AF. They started using the term "untouchables" for their higher ups. I noped my way out and they were pissed. They're probably the reason I got so much junk mail in the following months.
I was a Mary Kay girl for a short period of time…They kept claiming that if you sold so much, you get a “free car with no strings attached.” Long story short, I googled it and there WERE INDEED attatched strings.
They WORSHIP Mary Kay Ash (aka the founder of Mary Kay). It’s kind of like how the FLDS worships Warren Jeffs. It was very unsettling, and very cult-like.
For the makeovers, you’d do a before and after photo of the subject. They wouldn’t let you smile in the before photo, but would make you in the after photo. Therefore, you’d automatically look 100x better in the after photo, regardless of how s**tty the makeup was.
My regional director bought a bunch of stuff under my name without telling me (she didn’t use my credit cards or anything, but when I initially got the email receipt for it I freaked out because I thought my numbers were stolen). She never told me that it was her, but I found out by searching the address on the order. I later found out that it had to do with some bonus the upline would get if their downlines bought enough inventory in a certain period of time. This wasn’t a huge deal but it definitely weirded me out.
A lot of the girls who were at my level were from my school. A few of them really didn’t like me growing up. The moment I walked in that door, they all pretended to love me.
And yeahh, that’s all I can think of.
My sil did this to me. I wasn’t charged but she used my name on a receipt that was emailed. I asked her about it and she claimed it was her dad’s secret bday present so she used my info so he wouldn’t find out
However, there are a few ways on how to avoid getting involved in such situations. The multi-level marketing industry is based on deception and once a person is enrolled, they are being told that in order to succeed, they have to blindly believe and not have any doubts.
“The key to escape MLM and to avoid MLM is clear: investigate, ask questions, ask for data, just as one would in a real business — do the due diligence. Think for yourself. Questioning, doubting, critically thinking — these are good habits and everyone’s right to do. MLM tries to seduce, deceive and persuade people not to think for themselves," he advised.
I had a friend who got into Herbalife. Ended up with a bunch of expired products in his garage and everyone except me unfriended him on Facebook for constantly pestering them. Herbalife is a pyramid scheme and a scam.
LuLaroe literally bankrupt my wife I, and damn near ended our marriage. My wife isn't a dumb person, her heart was in the right place but she is easily swayed by "friends" and me being the voice of reason quickly faded out of her mind. The one year she took part is one of the worst years of my life, it ruined us financially, f**ked up our taxes, and probably took years off my life. It's been three years and we're just now finally back in a good place.
I remember going to craft shows and there was a bus parked outside FULL of LuLaroe! The couple had refurbished it and made it super easy for shopping. I knew there was something fishy about the company when I found a pair I wanted but not in the size that would work and was told they are sent everything at random. That seemed so weird - why not try to please the customers?? So many women/families went bankrupt with that one. Hopefully it opened people's eyes.
When my upline, in training, was explaining how you always had to be "on." If anyone asks how you're going, you always say, "Fantastic!". The fakeness made my skin crawl. I got out of there asap.
The voices opposing MLM are growing widely and loudly all over the world. "They are demanding that law enforcement investigate MLMs for deception. They are demanding the media tell the truth about consumer losses and the methods of domination and deception that MLMs are using," the expert said. "The truth is available now. People just need to seek it out."
Just remembered another one. I had this "friend" who told me her work was hiring and that she could try to get me an interview. I was about 16 at the time, she was a year older and drove me to the "interview", it was in an office on the top floor of a strip mall. There were about 20 other people there who were being shown a presentation of the business, very pyramid schemy vibes. They had canvas photos of their top employees on the walls of all these marvelous trips they went on. During the hour presentation I never learned what the business was, they basically just told us how amazing and easy it was to get ahead in this business. The guy who runs the operation and all the employees were also there, I made a comment to my friend about how this felt like a cult and she said, and I kid you not, " guywholeadthepyramidscheme doesn't like when people call it that". I noped the f**k on out of there fuming after this friend and her co-workers tried to push me into whatever the f**k sales job they were trying to con me into.
whoa, had similar experience when i was a teen. Had an "interview" with really well known life insurance "recruiter" that run piramid scheme. was surprised to find out that it still exists after what they were doing came into daylight. Even 1 hour of convincing me that i'd get starter salary "for nothing" and bonuses for "recruiting" did not convince stupid teenage me. Was utterly sad and disappointed that someone that I know could do this to me. After about 2 years my classmate sends hi on fb. I thought he wants to reconnect... you guessed, he was recruiting for the same company scheme. And after telling him that i've been there and not interested, and that he should leave it too, he just pitched pre-typed phrase inviting me to "come over for interview to find out about great opportunity", without even reading my message... . Sad that they got to so many good people. :(
Isagenix. First red flag was when they told us not to say the name isagenix when trying to recruit members or clients to buy into our products.
Oh man, this was like 6-7 years ago (would’ve been a millionaire by now lmfao jk)
It was like $350 starting pack for the 30 day and I only ever made a few sales. I had to call and message my friends who I thought would be interested in losing weight. I only basically messaged people who commenting on my photos saying they wanted more info.
I didn’t make much money from it and I had to keep buying products for myself and post before and after photos. They were super annoying with texting me all the time and pressuring me to go to their events. Just a bunch of fake motivational speech. 2 of the people I remember are still in it but never mention they are working for Isagenix, instead they’re freelance nutrition coaches/ etc.
It’s super sketchy and their products aren’t anything special.
Yeah, answered an ad for Herbalife in college. "Oh, yes, take this, and this and that pill, mix this shake, and be healthy and lose weight!" Naturopathic me noped out, it felt like being a drug pusher! Especially when I asked for ingredients, and what if these pills interacted with medications, etc and got brushed off.
My SIL talked me into selling It Works! I was hesitant, didn’t quite need the money, but figured extra income couldn’t hurt. Was a “seller” for 6 months. They kept telling me to add all of these women I have in common with people I’m already friends with. And to post about it 3 to 4 times a day on Facebook and Instagram. I literally made an Instagram for it. They said to message at least 30 people a day about. And twice a week there was a group video chat they kept insisting I join. I couldn’t join due to me being at my normal job.
All in all. I hated it. I’m awkward and a terrible salesperson. And I made nothing from it. Never made a sale. They kept saying “try and get your mom or aunts to support you”. It was a waste of money and all. But, made out with 1 new friend.
You made no sales because it is a ridiculous business model to expect to make your money from your friends and family. Don't blame yourself, they know perfectly well what they're doing.
The people were horribly mean under the veil of being “good Christians”. They used the f word to describe gay people, made fun of a deaf person at a conference and the whole crowd roared with laughter. Made you feel like an idiot for wanting anything other than “the business”.
I had to completely cut them all out of my life at once, stopped responding completely to all calls/texts/e-mails.
I lost so much money but thankfully I have the most patient friends and family so I didn’t lose any of them.
Do NOT waste your time or energy on MLM’s. If you’re looking for a sense of community, join a co-ed sports league, book club, small church group, volunteer, ANYTHING but a MLM.
they sound like loveable evangelicals. I once had to sit through a meeting with client who insisted on praying before we started. Then he did everything and more that the OP listed above, including wanting a dossier on our sex lives. I didn't hold back. And yes, I most likely caused his heat attack later that day, or so he claimed. Good times.
My first office job out of University was working at the head office of an MLM company. It was shady as all hell. I was in-charge of "licensing and communications". They would charge people between $40-120 per month to maintain their "travel agent license" which was meant to provide discounts and booking benefits to airlines, hotels etc. In reality they had a single actual licensed number and were setting up thousands of people as "agents" using the same accreditation number - which in itself was illegal, and meant most people were laughed at when they actually tried to ask for discounts.
Furthermore people were constantly calling and emailing asking us to stop charging their debit/credit card every month. Most of them were poor, uneducated, or older on a fixed income. The stories were heartbraking. People were evicted, had power shut off etc because we were basically stealing from them monthly. All of them had been duped at some point into signing up by a friend or family member at a big "travel agent event".
A handful of about 30-50 top "network leaders" with massive downlines were cut checks every month...like double digit thousands, out of the hundreds of thousands bilked out of the poor shmucks they signed up through lies and false advertising.
The owner was treating company accounts like a piggy bank and using funds to pay for holidays, private jet travel and his new humvee. They couldn't even keep the books straight enough to make sure us office employees regularly got paid on time. Eventually it got so bad they couldn't even keep paying the leaders regularly, who would constantly call with threats to "move their whole f**king downlines if Ron doesn't get on the f**king phone this god damn second".
It was such a collosal scam, and I only realised after about a year that this was just one of hundreds and hundreds of other MLM companies that operated in largely the same way by preying on rubes and shmucks.
On my last day I emailed about 20,000 contacts in the company records a short few paragraphs describing what a piece of s**t the founder was, the various investigations and lawsuits he was involved in, and pasted extracts from emails of him telling us to "keep charging the idiots" that had requested multiple times to cancel. Apparently I heard through the grapevine he was livid and wanted me dead. They had to change offices and business names.
I was eventually contacted by someone from the state business board, the FBI, and several from competing MLM schemes inviting me to come across and share secrets of the operation.
So long story short - people running MLMs are pure garbage scumbags, and anyone involved at a lower level is a gullible idiot. Not a lot of room there for legitimate entrepreneurs and business people.
As travel agents, only having a main "license number" for the agency that the agents use is common practice. Granted, most agencies don't have thousands of agents nor charge a fee. Not sure how people would be laughed at for using a legit number though, most vendors don't know the individual company's number nor keeps track of how many agents/people use it. If the number is real and legally assigned to the agency, that's all that matters. Source: I used to be a travel agent
I joined WUN in 2013. My upline didn't even help me and just told me to keep paying money and "be persistent". It wasn't until 8 months later I snapped out of it and realized "Hey, I'm shelling out $100 a month for f**king nothing!" I was so brainwashed by the success hype that I couldn't see that I was wasting money while my upline went on to become the top earner in the company. My upline was making $100,000 a month and I was going broke because I bought into the hype.
The company started falling apart in early 2014 because of shady business practices from the founders. By that time I had already quit and my upline was like "Hey dude, are you going to renew your subscription?" I said "F**k no. The only time you hit me up is when it's time to pay? FOH." Years later I still feel so bad about trying to peddle that BS to my friends and others. Every time I see a post I wrote on my feed I delete it out of cringe. When you're a young teenager and want money you're prone to sip some cool-aid because you want the "rich young CEO" lifestyle.
Man I joined a wrap company. I'm sure you can guess which one. This was 5 years ago.The first thing they said was to start making posts. Take pictures at the gas pump or of your grocery receipts and say "look what (insert company name) has paid for!" Even if you haven't made any money yet, it's okay because eventually they will be paying for it. Write sappy stories, or steal them from the big consultants and just change the names to fit your own. Oh and be sure to say you only have 3 spots left" or whatever to make people think their isnt much time to get in. Even though it's not a limited thing. It was all crazy.
I was approached at one of my jobs by someone I used to work with at my first job. This was when I was 19. He said he was a part of a really good “business opportunity” and he had a “mentor” who was teaching him all this [stuff]. I agreed to meet with him and the mentor and luckily for him I had no knowledge of what mlms were at the time. I found out it was Amway and went to a few meetings. At first they were able to be flashy and confusing enough that I thought hey this sounds like it could work. Plus before you actually register and join someone’s downline you don’t see their aggressive recruitment tactics.
Pretty quickly though I realized things were not right. There was a big Amway event not long after i joined so I got a ticket quickly because they tell you that the events are insanely important blah blah blah. The mentor of the guy who recruited me lied about the ticket, saying that it would include the hotel and 2 meals both days. Obviously neither of those things were true. Plus while we were at the event the “mentor” tried to get me and the 3 other guys I split one room with to pay for part of his brother and his brothers girlfriends hotel room. Total scumbag.
After that was when I knew I was out of that s**t. But before that I started noticing how weird the recruitment aspect felt and how much they pushed it. They lie about the products and say you will save money because you get a discount but every single product is like at least 50% more expensive than most name brand stuff and when I saw that I was like how am I supposed to sell any of this?
The funny thing about that is they don’t want you to sell. They want you to buy a certain amount of product for yourself every month to prop up your upline. They say it will save you money but you’ll lose money not only because of the cost of the product but because you’ll have no idea what to do with the amount they expect you to buy. One of the guys there said he just gives the extra product away… and the up lines will encourage that as long as you’re hitting your number.
I realized quickly that the only way to make any money would be to use shady tactics to recruit people under me so I can profit off of their losses. I also did some research and found out that all of their events and weekly meetings are bulls**t as well as their educational app services because they felt like bs. They’re all cashgrabs, once you hit a certain level in Amway you start to earn a cut of the profits from the meetings, events, and app sales and the more people you bring to meetings and events the more you make. Luckily I only spent a few hundred dollars on Scamway and leaving was as easy as saying that I didn’t want to do Amway amymore.
I was a call agent for Tahitian noni for the USA and Germany (now called Morinda). It was horrible fielding calls near when people’s $120 monthly auto payment was due for 4 one liter bottles of juice. I couldn’t cancel their subscription on late notice without a fax with their signature at least a week in advance, unless they claimed “financial hardship.”
Eventually I learned that I would just need to feed them what to say and then gladly cancel for them on the phone. Total scam. Only people who made money were the early people to sign up and the founders, who are multi millionaires.
My wife wanted to do nuskin for about half a year. The thing is, we already have an online sales business with a few thousand regular clients so doing nuskin just added one more product onto our product list which was already pretty extensive. The problem, as I knew it would be, was that you don’t make any real commission money unless you get people ‘below’ you. No biggie, my wife just fake signed up family members and did all her sales in their names so her name could collect the higher commission. But even after going to all that hassle (multiple emails, credit cards, shipping addresses/po boxes, etc) the commission was still only something like 15-17% and our typical profit margin on cosmetic products is more like 40%. Some stuff, like The Body Shop shampoo, we can sell for over 100% markup. She figured that the free vacations and other perks for winning sales competitions would make up for it, and she ended up in position to win a 5 day trip to South Africa. But when we researched what all the trip entailed, it actually seemed like it was going to suck balls, especially when we had a 1 year old at the time, so she just cancelled all her accounts, sold off the remaining product, and that was that.
Bottom line is that if you had the ability to make real money doing online sales for an MLM, you’d most likely make twice as much money for half as much work actually just working for yourself.
I did Lularoe for almost a year. Buy in was insanely high. How I Actually got in when the Halloween leggings were highly sought after with very limited supply and I bought 200 of them. Sold every pair. So that basically paid for my initial investment. I did okay at first, hustled my butt off online. But then I kept being told by my sponsor to buy more to sell more. Later found out sponsors were paid commissions based off what their lackies were buying rather than selling. Another few red flags were no online sales. I did it anyways, so I did well compared to those who followed the rules. I also started receiving leggings and tops from other LLR reps that went out of business and sent their inventory backs… so I was getting leftovers. Another red flag was the holes. The freaking holes. They never reached out to us to just have us toss a batch that were prone to holes. They would just send us a bunch of ugly ass solids that were paper thin so every few weeks I would try on a few pairs I knew would have holes and wore them until minutes later, “pop!” Then and only then could I take photos for corporate and be reimbursed. It was total s**t. I started putting in more and more time for less money. I was starting to lose money, thankfully at the same time LLR was under fire that their business was failing and consultants were losing money so they said anyone can get out and get 100% of their money back from their inventory. I sent it all back. Got my check. A few months later it changed to 75% back so I lucked out. I’ve helped two other consultants get out since. I made $16,000 in profits for hours upon hours. I lost time with my son while I was supposed to be a full time mom. He had my iPad while I would constantly post my inventory everywhere.
As terrible as it was in the end, I really did love it. I learned about fabrics. Now I’m self taught at sewing and sew up some hoodies for friends here and there and clothing for my own family as well. I love it so much more but would’ve never found that joy without lularoe so.
Was on bumble and this hot chick who tbh, I though it was a bot or a Catfish. Anyway, she asked me out for coffee to talk “business”, I was suprised cuz you know women and first moves.
It wasn’t even a date, It was ACN, and they pay almost 600$ to get in! I told her to pay for it, y’know since she was bragging how easy she makes money, told her I could pay with the first money I’d make in the company. She kinda got me hooked and I attended their repetitive speech events twice (their people are fake af)
After many awkward attempts to get in almost every one I knew (ruining relationships in doing so) I spent a month and two without a “sale” I was pissed. After doing some research and realising how impossible the marketing tactics are (no advertising, just tell a friend, relative or anyone) I unfriended everyone, left their group and told them to delete every identification of me.
I kept my 600$ too, just time wasting man, f**k those guys man!
It was a fun summer filled with road trips, parties, and easy sign ups; there was a moment, though, where I felt like a bright and nearly blinding fluorescent lightbulb turn on about a foot away from my face.
I was over at my friend's place with his recruiter from Toronto (drove a nice BMW, hung out with the guys who were renting lambos). At this point I had been in for about 3 months, my friend 6 months, and the other guy over a year. They convinced me to message a highschool friend a 30 minute drive away that I needed to see him. When he asked why, I was told to say it was important, that I needed him to trust me, and that he needed to come right away. This was considered an effective method, and their argument was if I wanted to experience their success, that I needed to be willing to do what they were willing to do. I acquiesced.
Well, being the friend that he is, he made the trip and was ambushed in my friend's basement for 30 minutes. To his credit, he nodded, listened, and thanked us for our time, then promptly left. I felt absolutely filthy throughout the convo and couldn't even make eye contact.
This was about 7 years ago, and we hadn't talked since. I actually messaged him recently out of the blue to apologize, and in a crazy coincidence he had actually been thinking about that moment recently as well. He also apologized, for not working hard enough to get me out of a s**tty situation.
Mind you, he wasn't even a particularly close friend, but both of us had a brush with MLM and I took the bait while he ran. I told myself that I was too smart to fall for some bulls**t, and that I was in this only for $100 or so a month, and that I was a few sign ups away from becoming like those guys.
Of course you find out later that when everything buckles, those "successful" guys are stuck with leases they can't afford, and everyone is just left dazed and confused.
Anyways, it's been many years since, as I mentioned, and it was an important lesson: don't ever consider yourself too smart to get swindled.
Anyway, I had just started college right out of high school. Was going to an art school (i know, bad idea) and was looking for a job to do between classes. Classmate of mine mentioned CutCo, so I naively went in for an interview.
Few points to know. I had no previous job experience at all, the “office” was in the next town over, and I didnt have a driver’s license at the time, let alone a car. My freaking Mom drove me to the interview. Got the job anyway.
So I get the CutCo bag of stuff to show off and was sent on my way to harass my relatives. I thought that I was only doing example shows to them, practicing for the real deal. My Dad and StepMom even bought some knives (no idea what happened to them though, last I saw they used a different set). Once I run out to people to bother, i start running into problems.
Problem 1 was i didnt sell anything other than that one set. Problem 2 was i hadn’t gotten any other people to talk to. The “pyramid” part of my pyramid scheme wasnt working real well. Problem 3 was the straw that broke the camel’s back apparently. I couldn’t get to the weekly meetings because my mom refused to drive me across town every week (she had a long commute).
In the end I got a call from my “manager” telling me he was basically letting me go and I needed to turn in my swag bag. I told him I couldn’t get to him so he had to come to me. Later that day he rolled up, o gave him the bag and that was it. Dont think I ever got my cut from the knives I did sell either.
The real kicker was k didnt even realize it was a MLM until almost a decade later, browsing this very sub.
😂😂😂 I went to a cutco recruitment meeting back when I was 20 or so. It was ridiculous. I'm not selling knives out of my car like a weirdo snake oil salesman, thank you!!
One of the first jobs I took out of college was one, and to this day I cringe thinking about it. Looking back the reg flags were easy. At first the interview process was so fast and the recruiter didn’t even really say much about the company, just about how much everyone could make (as a new college grad I was blinded by the idea of making money fast). I quickly realized this was not a real job when we were tasked with walking territories to sell energy and we had to cover all expenses. the whole goal was to sell energy while also building your “team” who would then sell energy for you while you just collected money. Didn’t sell anything that week? No pay check. There was literally a week where I got a $30 paycheck... if it wasn’t for my GF loaning me money at the time (which I eventually paid back) I would have had to move back home. I grew so sick of the people and the scam I found a new job as fast as I could. When I did, I never even told the other place I was leaving. Only one person reached out asking where I went, told them I found an actual job.
I was at a Starbucks one time before work and a random guy starts chatting me up. I'm a pretty friendly person so I engaged in small talk. Pretty subtly, we start talking about work and then passive income. Soon he starts telling me about how he vaguely generates passive income and that we should keep in touch and meet next week to discuss further but in the meantime I should read this book call "Business of the 21st Century" by Robert Kiosaki.
I kinda was intrigued but also very suspicious so I went with it cautiously. I did read the book and we met up again next week, I figured I was already this invested, I may as well see what it is he's trying to peddle. Upon our second meeting, he tells me a little bit more and invites me to a private meeting with his business associates (at one of those nice conference rooms at a nice apartment complex, could've been a hotel, it was in the evening). Keep in mind, this whole time, he hasn't told me the name of his company or really anything too specific about this venture. He tells me to dress up, once I get there, I see everyone dressed up really nice, looked like a formal party but without the o'dourves. They brought out a few speakers, who honestly were excellent speakers, and finally after all of the feel-good motivational talk, then drop the name of the company and it's Amway LOL and how it's changed their lives for the better. After the presentation, I had to awkwardly tell the guy who tried to recruit me that I wasn't interested and GTFO of there. I like to tell people that I purposely sat through an Amway presentation so you don't have to.
TLDR: Was buying coffee at Starbucks and a random guy tries to recruit me to join Amway.
This will probably be buried but my sister got really deep into Amway a few years ago. She was like 19 and a sophomore in college and her friends from her church got her involved. (Amway is/was apparently very popular with the people practicing her religion in our area and everyone was joining).
They told her it was a job interview, so she shows up at this Starbucks for this “interview” where she basically left with no less than 6 books on leadership and entrepreneurship and a new “business”. And would not stop telling us how rich this guy (her up line) Danny is.
First big red flag was their “meetings”. They would rent out a specific, more upscale restaurant for the night and somehow pay the staff to stay ridiculously late. These would commonly last from 8pm to 3am. They would learn how to be leaders and the up lines would tell them how rich they were and then tell the downlines how rich they would become if they just worked harder.
Within 2 months, Danny had convinced my sister to drop out of college “because college is a waste of time”. He got her a job at a call center, decided what her monthly bust get was, and picked out an apartment and two roommates (who were also his downlines) for her.
She would go to monthly meetings with Danny to “discuss her finances” where he would tell her how much money she needed to put into this scheme for dues and “growth”.
Everybody around her started realizing how sketchy this was except for her and my mom told our entire family not to buy from her in the hopes of stopping it, but instead she just kept putting more and more money into this. She went to several of the big national conferences. They gave her music to listen to and of course more books to read.
We told her that Amway actually meets criteria for a cult and I showed her so many articles online about it and she told me that the people who lost everything and went bankrupt just didn’t work hard enough. She also kept telling us about how Danny was 28 years old going to retire young 30 and “had a house with 6 bedrooms”, but always left out that he shared and rented that house with about 8 other people. It was crazy how deep she got.
Finally she started to butt heads with her roommates and decided to move home. After about 6 months of the family constantly telling her it was a cult and a scheme she finally slowed down in the meetings. She got a better job and a new car and realized she couldn’t pay the dues and other fees and still afford everything she needed so she just stopped it all, but still tried to sell whatever [stuff] she had bought as inventory. But she’s totally done with it all now, I think.
Danny still comments on her social media sometimes and tries to reminisce about her business and Amway meetings. It’s really weird. He also tried to recruit me every time he saw me even though I made it very clear that I was not interested as I was going through chemo and other major health stuff at the time. Also, unsurprisingly Danny never retired from his real job, I think he’s 33ish now and still lives with a massive group of people in a rented home.
A good friend joined World Financial Group also known as WFO. I told her off the bat to avoid it – major MLM scheme that preyed on family and friends. She of course, ignored my advice and went all gung ho. I told her that if she wanted to keep the friendship – please don’t ever ask me to join. And luckily, she didn’t.
She attended a whole bunch of seminars and even went on a trip to the US – a very expensive trip for her and her guy. Paid out of pocket. I think she even had to pay for training and some of the seminars too.
Then one day she just stopped talking about it. I assume she grew tired of it and gave up on it. MLM scams encourage asking friends and family members to participate. I fear not to bring it up again as I’m just glad she stopped going to those meetings.
I ‘work’ for Cutco when they were on my campus like any other job/business. It paid 17/hr.(much higher than anything a work-study would give me). We had a group interview where we were asked to write down everyone we knew. Then we got a lot of we were doing home demos. Hours wasted. I did however got three appointments and were paid for them(minus the four weeks it took to mail me)
I quit after there was an article saying that the student government at the college banned them forever coming back.
TL;DR broke college student dumped by Vector/Cutco. If any job says you can set your hours or require you to call people.....it’s a scam.
In 2017, a new MLM was all the rage in our state. I was approached by at least 5 people and all of them were my friends. One of them asked me what my future plans were and i told him I'd probably get an MBA and the guy demotivated the s**t out of me saying how he knew people who had MBA's and were unemployed or working minimum wage . Thankfully, i didn't get roped into the whole "being financially independent" bulls**t.
Side note: The guy who told me that i shouldn't get an MBA degree, loaned money to many people who wanted to get into this and obviously they couldn't pay him back, which got him into a lot of debt and sadly,last year, he took his own life.
So if you're reading this, if it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is.
My dad used to be in a group of principle enrollers used for these. He did Excel, metabolife, herbalife, primerica, YTB, and zurvita, along with others i can't recall. He and a few others would come in, pump up the numbers early, show off their checks to get more people in, then bolt for the next scam when market reached saturation.
I say this as a huge warning to anyone looking to get in. My dad was one of the top guys in the south at most of these, and he died broke with only his family and one friend at his funeral. He burned every bridge he'd made getting people in these things. These companies leave you out to rot, even their best people. If you're lucky enough to get in on the ground floor (fyi, you're not), you can make a living until they decide to close shop or sell off, which will leave you unemployed. Otherwise, you are a pawn in a scheme designed to fail on its largest supporters.
I didn’t take the plunge, but I researched getting involved with Usborne Books after my mother’s friend’s daughter asked us to one of her online parties. I love books and am an advocate for literacy, so this was right up my alley.
I bought tons of books/activity sets and attended a lot of the online parties. The first red flag was that I stopped getting invited to parties because, despite spending about $100 on books each month for my kids, nieces, and charity, I wasn’t making her enough money and in fact was costing her money by not throwing parties myself or taking her up on being a consultant. I bought about $1500 worth of books in just over a year, yet I cost her money? Okay....
I’m 150% a hermit and know next to zero people to “hey hun...” into their inboxes. So any party would be small and I’d fail hard at “networking marketing.”
They are very closed off on how their system works, so I was still unclear as to the pyramid scheme nature of the company until I researched it on Reddit. It still surprised me as I didn’t think that books could be an MLM product. They seemed so passionate about literacy and quality. The videos all show a family friendly atmosphere. I saw the brand in Schools, libraries, and bookstores. I could buy direct without a consultant or with one if I chose to.
It just seem so legitimized. Yet it showed up on MLM lists and the consultant I worked with seemed so frazzled in trying to get people to also become consultants. She was a new SAHM of a special needs child and this was her way to contribute to her hard working husbands income.
I haven’t seen many horror stories as compared to other MLMs, but the red flags were there. It was just hard to decipher because of how legit it seemed (seen in schools, stores, and libraries).
I almost honk that’s what makes this one so potentially dangerous. It flies under the radar and seems legit enough to be able to get involved.
A friend of mine got into Mary Kay and was always trying to have parties and get us to host parties so she could sell her stuff. She invited a few of us to one of the regional directors' house and it was one of the most bizarre experiences I've ever had. Like many people have mentioned, this woman did nothing but brag about her lifestyle and how much money she's made being a part of Mary Kay. She kept asking all of us if we were going to sign up with her to start selling and was so pushy about it.
I peddled life insurance for about 4 months. I let go from my real job and decided it was ok because I would make big money with the MLM [stuff]. Like I said, 4 Months. That's how long it took to run out of money and realize it wasn't working.
The real redflags ran up a few months later when a few friends from high school passed on. I was sad because they were great people, and I checked my messages with them and the last thing I said to them was the bulls**t lines to get them to come play idiot with me at this stupid MLM. One of my best friends growing up lost his grandfather and fell into a really dark place. I was so blinded all I cared about was whether he would join our kool aid party and move to Guatemala with us. He was basically suicidal and I was a horrible friend.
I joined Primerica, I didn’t see any red flags at first but small ones started popping up.
Like my team leader telling me to basically live outside my means to make people think I was doing really good and then they’d join and then I’d do really good.
Or finding out all the contests ran around recruitment and not sales numbers.
I left as soon as I realized, even put my name and number on the do not contact list.
Blew a lot of money trying to make that work only to realize I wasn’t going to make any money without f**king my friends.
I’m a slacker but oh well.
My ex boss brain washed me into Hempworx. I was very skeptical about cbd working for anxiety. I had tried everything and nothing worked. It actually worked surprisingly. This was before the big hemp boom.
So my dumbass paid the 20 bucks and luckily that’s all. I thought it was rather weird that my manager kept pushing me. Talking about “Running your own business.” My mom had her own business before she died. I knew it wasn’t “my business.”
After trying other cbd products and getting better deals I basically saw they were exploiting people. Charging too much for their product. I was very back and forth most the time. The thing is it helped me and it did work. Just a lot of terms were thrown around that seemed off. So I basically paid 20 bucks and never sold anything.
I attended an "Interview" for a MLM. It was selling pots and pans. I sat in a room full of about 10 people. The "Boss" walked in with a stack of resumes and said "here are all the people who wanted to be here. But you made the cut". One dude was around 75 years old. I remember thinking something was off but I wasn't until later I realized what was happening.
There's a hilarious King of the Hill episode with this same kind of mlm and tries to fake her own death to get out of it.
Sigh. My father has spent the last 30 years going from one MLM scam to another. He's literally tried dozens of them. It never seems to occur to him that the fundamental model is a flawed; he believes it's because he didn't meet the right person or (to my and my siblings absolute fury) his children didn't give him the support and/or help he needed. He literally has cashed in his second wife's pension for some [lousy] car-selling scheme that lasted all of three months. He walked away from an incredibly lucrative career in logistics to lose tens of thousands of dollars over the decades.
There was a company called United Games that I had a short stint with. It was clearly advertised from the beginning as multilevel marketing, but the reason I jumped on is because they did a good job giving it a different feel. I’d gotten in because my friends dad has a number of side gigs that he’s managed to make profitable, had recruited me, so I trusted his judgment. He jumped much later than I did, and counted it as a lesson learned.
The product was a game called FireFan, which was basically real time sports betting against your friends with in game tokens. As an “affiliate,” I had the opportunity to recruit players with an affiliate link, and in turn I would profit off of them playing. Tokens were worth ~$1, and for every token purchased, won, spent etc. by someone who was linked under me, I would receive something like $0.15. Before the game launched, we were also encouraged to sign up other affiliates, and we would get something like $.05 from every token action someone linked below them got.
The game concept itself looked promising, and was set up to capitalize on a real opening in the market, but red flags popped up really quick. First, there was a $50 initial investment for all the usual BS reasons. We weren’t allowed to tell anyone how much we were making, commission rates would get changed suddenly and without any announcement or even a notice.
I noped out fast. The first day the app launched, it was buggy, unoptimized, and the servers crashed because too many people were trying to play. (First game of the official NFL season) some people held on for the next few months, but the app didn’t get better, and benefits (if they really existed) got worse.
The company eventually shut down, I imagine they took the money and ran. It’s hard to believe they invested much into the product itself based on how it turned out.
I'm not a ex mlm member but have had some experience with Anyway, figured this story was worth sharing, this was when I just graduated high school and have very little if not no knowledge at all about these stuff, so im a pretty ripe target for them, better get them before they know better right?
What happened was i went to a mutual friends place to get a haircut and he spent the duration of the haircut chatting with me about amway and invited me to go to their convention kind of thing which just happened to be that night, and i agreed.
The whole thing was weird as f**k, I didn't need to know about pyramid scheme to be proper weirded out, the entire thing started with some "origin story" video about 5 minute long. Then several important people came on stage and addressed each other as brothers & sisters, there was a lot more subtle weird stuff but it's been a long time so I only remember the main few things. After the service we were split into groups and there came a few leaders who went around asking all the newcomers what we have learned that day, what insight we have gained.
After that we went to a nearby café and there came another guy, looking back now basically his job that day is to be the role model, he drove an expensive car and throughout the entire conversation everyone is CONSTANTLY talking about how he has the highest sales, how successful he is, how everyone aspires to be him. I was also given a ton of information about 2 year plans, 5, 10 years plan if I joined them and became part of the family. So yeah that was my experience, I happen to get another job shortly after so I turned down any further invites but I doubt I would have went anyway. The entire thing smells like a cult
I had a guy that I worked with that tried to recruit me into one of these pyramid schemes. He and his handler came to my house and gave me their little spiel and I told them I’d think about it and get back to them. The first red flag was that they both lived in the same city as me but they had a rental, and not a fancy one at that, some economy sedan. The second red flag happened at work. The guy who was trying to recruit me had logged into his bank account to check his balance while I was coming into his work area. His account had $68 in it, which told me that he most certainly couldn’t afford the lifestyle that he pretended to have. Especially, because pay day was only three days prior.
I did Amway for 7 years. It became my full time income during my 4th year. As I climbed the pyramid ladder so-to-speak as a new platinum I was given information that wasn’t available to people in the lower rung.
I quit after that I realized that the people in the upper rungs were truly corrupt.
It was hard quitting especially the income it provided me paid for all of my expenses. I had to go back to a regular job which amway people hated.
But I wouldn’t trade it for anything.
The system is literally full of higher ups who are liars.
Some have good intentions but are just idiots so they just keep following the so-called leaders.
Most use their knowledge and position to manipulate those outlined in the sentence above.
WWDB for those who know.
When I was in university, I was looking for work opportunities to get some income coming in.
I saw in the local newspaper classified for an ad that basically said 'Looking for Casual work, call this number'. I called and then they brought me for an 'interview'.
Turns out it was for a company called CutCo and it was to be for a door to door salesman for Knives. The 'interview' was a group one where the main person spent 2 hours telling us how awesome the products were and that they could cut through a shoe and still sharp enough to cut through a tomato effortlessly.
Then we each went in for a one on one interview (there were about 20 of us there), there I was told congratulations you've got the job and we need you to come in for these three training sessions. I kept thinking to myself 'ok, I've had job interviews before, this seems super weird I'm getting the job now'.
It was then they said that before the training I had to purchase my own set of demonstration knife sets at a cost of $2kAUD. It wasn't so much a red flag but more of, I don't want to go door to door and I don't have $2k to buy these knives, that's why I'm looking for work.
Didn't show up for the training sessions, ignored about 12 phone calls then never heard from them again.
I was 20 and dumb. Working a job who notoriously only offered 13 hour weeks so naturally I was hurting for cash. A former church goer frequented the place and one day offered extra work but they wouldn't specify with who. Me being naive and desperate obliged them one Thursday. We went to a rally almost 2 hours away and it was for ACN. After the pitch these five people, including the churchers, ganged up on me and said I better hurry and front $500 for my new business because (coincidentally) a promotion was to end at the end of the month, which was two days later. I fronted the money but I knew it was hairy when they pitched the exact same rally, verbatim, the next week. Plus, they were offering phone and internet service packages that were absurdly outdated and unfair (packages you'd get in the early 2000s). Even encouraged us to hound our family members for a s**t bundle. I didn't have the heart and kinda stopped going to the rallies. It embarrassed me by having fell for it, and my family for being subjected to it. It fell out of favor and months of MIA they contacted me to offer putting newly signed people under me. I told them no thanks. I also looked at those churchers a different way thereon. Also helped solidify my atheist foundation.
I had a sweet Avon lady in my office and when I changed jobs I missed some of their stuff, so I decided to sign up myself. My "team leader" and the other girl she was leading were so freaking pushy about making me run a full Avon business and quit my job, I immediately felt like I had signed up for a cult. Bounced and blocked their numbers within a month.
F**king BeachBody. Had a friend who’s been doing “great” on it. Recruiting left and right making lots of money and it is so easy to do because “everyone wants to be healthy and lose weight.” It’s fine if you just use it for the workout videos for yourself but having to be the person to reach out to random people and be like, hey you're fat, come pay loads of money for this s**t and oh yeah you can have a huge discount if you become a coach too and recruit other people and scam them also. It’s all bulls**t.
I think BeachBody is the only MLM company that has products that actually WORK, though. And I know that their promo videos are legit, as far as "before and after" because I actually know a guy who was in one of them! He used P90X and got in fantastic shape, then went on to be cast in one or two of the other work out videos. As for the whole "Become a coach and get a discount" thing, I never wanted to do that; I just used the videos!
I never joined an MLM but years ago I went with a friend to a meeting for WorldVentures. His friend had told him he was having a get together with a few friends to talk about a business idea he had.
We walk into this packed apartment and immediately are ushered to the couch where another friend and a neighbor are also sitting, surrounded by a bunch of strangers.
They start playing a video about WV, and a couple of people come up to talk about all the money they're making with it. At various points, the strangers in the place all clap and cheer and I'm looking around at them thinking "What the f**k is going on here?"
It felt surreal and bizarre, rehearsed and fake. We weren't told we were going to be shown and entire presentation, so that was off-putting. I felt tricked being invited.
The presentation ended and all the WV strangers left immediately. The neighbor politely declined joining and left. The other friend asked what made this NOT a pyramid scheme, and the host proceeded to draw out A PYRAMID explaining how the business model worked, the whole time insisting it wasn't a pyramid scheme. The friend also politely declined.
Me, having seen the red flags in 1) being lied to about what we were doing, 2) the fake clapping and ludicrous claims during the presentation, 3) the way you needed to pay up front to join, and 4) the f**king pyramid drawing, also declined.
The idiot friend I went with happily wrote a check to join like the god damn moron he is. He really thought he'd be able to get tons of friends and family to join. In the end no one wanted to, because everyone could see from a mile away it was a scam.
We've since stopped talking so I don't know if he's still in it or not, but I did end up getting to tag along on a trip to Dubai with him because he needed to go on trips to help his sales pitch. Was a fun trip but the WV group activities were just as annoying and cult-like as the meetings.
When I was a freshman in college, I got suckered into joining Quixtar (Old name for Amway, I guess).
Didn't stay in it long. Only ended up out 300 bucks or so. I was put under a lot of pressure to travel out of town for all these "retreats" and s**t. I refused to make time for it and quit taking calls from any of them after a while.
Also all of my friends were smarter than me and refused to sign up as a downline. Quite a few people wanted to buy products, I think it would have been ok if thats all I was expected to do, push product. But thats not how these things work...
I had joined Cutco (selling knives), because I was told it was a standard salesman job. Sounded legit enough, but in the initial training I was told to just sell to family and friends. Problem was, I didn't have many such contacts that lived in the area. But since I was already "hired", I figured I would give it a go. Still, I started looking for another job.
Of course, I ran out of contacts within a week. I don't know if this was their policy or just my recruiter's technique, but cold calls/messages were discouraged. So I had no potential customers, and no idea how to find more.
When I asked my recruiter for help, he just suggested asking my original contacts for more referrals. However, I knew it would just be a nuisance to them and a waste of my time, so I didn't accept his advice. That's when I knew my time with them would be short.
I sold maybe one knife set, and a few random pieces, but nothing more. Fortunately, I didn't have to invest in a demonstration kit, so I actually made a tiny bit of cash. However, it was only $300 or so for about a month's worth of work. Once I found another job, I quit. I had no idea what an MLM was until a few years later.
At the point that I was introduced to the MLM that I got involved in, I was aware of what a pyramid scheme was, but I was an edgy teenaged kid, and figured that I could play the ruthless business-person, and start make some cash, ethics be damned. I had friends who were drug dealers, so this seemed relatively tame in comparison. I'd just bounce around on social media like linkedin and facebook, and find middle-aged housewives to rope in, and f**k it if they ever get their money back, I'll make bank. The thing that got me out (aside from maturing a bit and realizing that mindset was kinda f**ked up), was just the difficulty in maintaining it. Even if you're a malicious actor, MLMs take a while to ramp up and return investment on. Even after I filled up my first 4 recruits, getting those people to do the "work" to recruit more people was nigh impossible. Turns out most people aren't good salespeople, especially when there's no actual product to speak for itself. I made my money back, but just barely, and when I did, I realized that I had dumped a LOT of hours into it, only to make my own $250 back, and screw 4 other people out of theirs. However I thought it was going to work out, I didn't actually do the math, and when I took a moment to realize that getting literally any real job would have paid more and had a better effect on the world, I cut my losses, and got a job at a movie theatre instead.
I was a junior in college and had just transferred to that school. I didn’t know a single soul at that place. One day in my German course this bud invited me for coffee. I told him I just started the semester there and had a hard time meeting people.
He immediately said that he’s a having a get together at his place tomorrow and I should come to meet the gang. I was thrilled. I show up at his place and him and another gentleman are wearing suits. I was a bit puzzled. This other guy showed up and I could tell he was a bit confused too.
So they started their pitch. It was for a brand new company called Quixstar. I immediately was turned off because it had all the components of a pyramid scheme. I didn’t join. They were asking for 100 dollars right there.
I ended up meeting people in my dorm and eventually got a girlfriend. The other guy stopped talking to me when I expressed no interest in Quixstar.
If you land a place at any sort of marketing or sales firm, they second you hear “Smart Circle”, get out. They’re the biggest pyramid scheme I’ve ever come across. They typically target younger college aged men and will have you work 50-70 hours a week selling their products door to door.
My parents bought into an MLM when my dad was out of work. It was a decent amount of money they invested in order to get the product to sell. It was actually pretty good business for us for a few years. It was a home insulation product that actually worked fairly well so we were having success getting customers. But then the parent company violated our non-compete area by allowing another company to buy in and operate in our highest profit region.
The company was also supposed to send out a sales specialist and marketer to help us get the word out about our product. They never sent anyone. Big red flag.
My parents filled suit against the parent company and ultimately the company settled by agreeing to pay off the difference between what my parents paid and how much they had sold (we got to keep the profits from marking up the price as well as our labor charges). My parents won the ability to sell the rest of the product as well. My dad found a full time job again shortly after that and over the next 2 or 3 years we managed to sell and install the rest of the product.
Overall, my parents ended up slightly net positive and it was a good experience for my parents, my brother, and me. I kind of knew it was an MLM right from the beginning, but my parents were excited and the work kept my dad sane so I didn't push the issue. We weren't gouging our customers so no harm as far as I can tell.
Sounds more like a poorly managed business venture than an MLM, honestly.
Some really good friends of mine and my wife's got sucked into the Arbonne cult. We hung out and had fun nearly every weekend. Once Arbonne happened, every time we hung out turned into a sales pitch full of straight-up lies. Me, and my wife are mostly introverted home-bodies, so when they'd give us the "we know you'd do great at this!" nonsense, it was straight-up insulting. Both my wife and I are already decently successful, so I always wondered how they thought preaching the "financial freedom" line would work on us. It's so predatory how they try to recruit people.
A former colleague is in the Arbonne cult and it has overtaken almost every aspect of her social media. I've just unfollowed her but it's alarming how deep she's in this thing, constantly evangelizing and pushing the "financial freedom" nonsense. Granted she's made her way higher up so she's doing better than the people below her, but it's really obnoxious how it overtakes ever aspect of these peoples' lives.
Within the first week everyone but two people had quit. Week after week, everyone was quitting. One chick drank 24oz malted alcohol drinks every morning before we started. We worked 12 hrs a day for 5 days, and 7 on Saturdays.
I literally made 40 to 60 dollars a day at the most, and had to use my own gas to drive all over the metro area to try and sell my product. That meant maybe 30 to 45 dollars to live on a day.
All our stuff was on consignment, so one day when I was doing an alright job at making sales (70 or 80 dollars profit, about 250 in all around sales dollars) and left my wallet on the sidewalk and someone snagged it off the ground. I also had christmas shopping money I had barely managed to save, so someone got away with 400 cash that was mostly not even mine.
I had quite the mental breakdown, never went back to the office that night. I called in for 2 days (with inventory still in my car) and finally went in on day 3, gave back the remaining inventory, and explained the whole situation. The manager was actually pretty great with it, she said she would only require me to return 50% of what I owed back to her MLM. Thankfully my partner at the time helped me with that. I also quit right when I was able to pay her back. she definately expected me to not last as long as I did and was sure I would be quitting.
I've never worked so hard for so little, and never understood how someone could end up being lucrative with a business that no one lasted in...
There was a trend in my city a few years ago where MLMs became ridiculously popular among uni students. One girl in my class got into it, thinking she was going to make a ton of money since she was really popular on campus so everyone would buy from her. What she failed to factor in was the fact that we were all college students, we were broke. No matter how much we liked her she wasn't going to make any significant money off of us simply because we didn't have any significant money.
The awfulness of these scams should be taught in schools, not have everyone learn through a series of painful experiences.
Pyramid schemes are illegal and I don't understand how these companies continue to stay open. I also don't understand how people keep falling for these things. Justice system needs to worry less about people smoking pot and more on companies leaving people in financial ruin.
Is this MLM nonsense just a north american thing? Wondering if it is wide spread?
This thing is a nightmare and hooks so many African citizens because of poverty. You end up with piles of stock that can't be sold, and coworkers hassling you all the time to buy. Literally only the Tupperware is worth anything, everything else is garbage that you can find cheaper better in retail stores. The prohibition on online advertising and sales is a big giveaway, the cost of materials is a scam, the requirement to sign people up is a sure sign of pyramid schemes. These are only legal here if there's a product involved, so guys lie about the product and conceal the facts. A coworker of mine started one of these and got arrested by our equivalent of the FBI. F-him. What a crook.
How are these schemes still existing? They are blatantly obvious to be a scam to any government regulatory organ, and yet they are allowed to exist and to feed off the last scraps of money from desperate people. I understand that they are designed to be flashy and confusing for the ordinary person who wants to make a few extra bucks, but don't they get inspected? Aren't there lawsuits that would shut them down permanently?
Had a guy I knew ask me out. We were friends with Benefits, but never seriously dated. So when I show up, he's pitching Amway to me and telling me how great it is...then tells me that my "promiscuous" lifestyle would be looked down upon. I said "They took you!" The a customer at the counter of the restaurant we were at started arguing with him about what a scam MLM's are. I walked out, left him with the bill and left him with no ride home.
Anybody watch the LulaRoe documentary on Amazon Prime? Some people need violence in their lives.
I don't understand how so many people get scammed with pyramid schemes. I remember learning about them in elementary school in the 80s and thinking "wow, what a ripoff".
My husband and I met this group of friends and literally watched one person completely burn bridges with each person because of their MLM (It Works!) To support them, everyone had bought a product piece, but guess what? It does NOT work, and everyone was a bit peeved since it wasn't cheap. The person felt no one was supporting them and over time quit talking to them at all. Anytime they did talk to anyone, it was about the MLM and nothing else. They eventually moved away after having to foreclose on their house. It was so crazy because they were all best friends, and in such little time, the MLM scheme completely broke them up.
Beachbody. The product is not bad, and is certainly more useful than makeup or jewellery. But the shakes are where the money is made, and that's just overpriced protein. I considered being part of it, because it was promoting health and fitness. But my 'coach', the upline, was posting all about how much money she was making, '6 figures!' but still lived in her parents' house. Then I watched her as she got booted from that scheme and went on an absolute rollercoaster of MLMs and it made me feel super gross watching her beg people to buy from her, and of course the mandatory 600 page novels she'd post on social media about 'keeping it real'. Her entire life was on show, and she used her kids to promote sales, and that's when I unfriended.
I was invited to join a couple of these. The first one, another couple invited us to their house for dinner. We got there and an Amway guy was there. They started to talk about how much money you could make and had anyone gotten a $1000 raise that year. I had just gotten a huge promotion and gotten a huge raise - way more than 1k (I had been grossly underpaid up until that time so I was finally making what I should have been all along - I didn't tell them that). So I said I had and they asked how much and I told them. The guy just stopped and stared at me and didn't know what to say. The sh*tshow kind of stopped right there and we left and never spoke to those "friends" again. The other time was right after I had my first baby. I had a friend with some makeup/skincare company come over and try to sell me some ridiculously expensive eye cream I didn't even want. When I told her I couldn't afford it she said I should work for her company so I could afford it. Nope, nope, nope.
I signed up to be an At Home America (home decor) rep back in 2003 after my son was born. Thought it would be a great way to earn some extra money, and my upline reps swore I could be making just as much as them if I attended the meetings and followed their advice. I now cringe whenever I think about the culty sayings I spewed during my presentations, and can't believe any of my friends still talk to me LOL. Cherry on top was that after 3 months I realized I was spending more than I was earning. Finally noped outta there. Never going near an MLM again.
Luckily I've only ever been on the fringes of MLM's. Been to a Mary Kay party where they kept trying to get me to wash off my actually high quality makeup so they could put crap on my face. Went to a Cookie Lee party (jewelry) with my mom when I was a young teenager, bought one necklace and we left. The people are always so weirdly pushy. I get annoyed any time someone tries to message me about one of these things.
One of my former GF's has made MLM her career. I think she's doing several at the same time right now. She tried to get me to be a Beachbody Coach. Ever had that Shakeology crap they sell?
Wife's coworker tried to get us into a "coffee business" years back. Went to a presentation out of politeness mixed with curiosity. The entire presentation was on recruiting others. No a single word about selling product. We left right after the presentation was complete.
There was a trend in my city a few years ago where MLMs became ridiculously popular among uni students. One girl in my class got into it, thinking she was going to make a ton of money since she was really popular on campus so everyone would buy from her. What she failed to factor in was the fact that we were all college students, we were broke. No matter how much we liked her she wasn't going to make any significant money off of us simply because we didn't have any significant money.
The awfulness of these scams should be taught in schools, not have everyone learn through a series of painful experiences.
Pyramid schemes are illegal and I don't understand how these companies continue to stay open. I also don't understand how people keep falling for these things. Justice system needs to worry less about people smoking pot and more on companies leaving people in financial ruin.
Is this MLM nonsense just a north american thing? Wondering if it is wide spread?
This thing is a nightmare and hooks so many African citizens because of poverty. You end up with piles of stock that can't be sold, and coworkers hassling you all the time to buy. Literally only the Tupperware is worth anything, everything else is garbage that you can find cheaper better in retail stores. The prohibition on online advertising and sales is a big giveaway, the cost of materials is a scam, the requirement to sign people up is a sure sign of pyramid schemes. These are only legal here if there's a product involved, so guys lie about the product and conceal the facts. A coworker of mine started one of these and got arrested by our equivalent of the FBI. F-him. What a crook.
How are these schemes still existing? They are blatantly obvious to be a scam to any government regulatory organ, and yet they are allowed to exist and to feed off the last scraps of money from desperate people. I understand that they are designed to be flashy and confusing for the ordinary person who wants to make a few extra bucks, but don't they get inspected? Aren't there lawsuits that would shut them down permanently?
Had a guy I knew ask me out. We were friends with Benefits, but never seriously dated. So when I show up, he's pitching Amway to me and telling me how great it is...then tells me that my "promiscuous" lifestyle would be looked down upon. I said "They took you!" The a customer at the counter of the restaurant we were at started arguing with him about what a scam MLM's are. I walked out, left him with the bill and left him with no ride home.
Anybody watch the LulaRoe documentary on Amazon Prime? Some people need violence in their lives.
I don't understand how so many people get scammed with pyramid schemes. I remember learning about them in elementary school in the 80s and thinking "wow, what a ripoff".
My husband and I met this group of friends and literally watched one person completely burn bridges with each person because of their MLM (It Works!) To support them, everyone had bought a product piece, but guess what? It does NOT work, and everyone was a bit peeved since it wasn't cheap. The person felt no one was supporting them and over time quit talking to them at all. Anytime they did talk to anyone, it was about the MLM and nothing else. They eventually moved away after having to foreclose on their house. It was so crazy because they were all best friends, and in such little time, the MLM scheme completely broke them up.
Beachbody. The product is not bad, and is certainly more useful than makeup or jewellery. But the shakes are where the money is made, and that's just overpriced protein. I considered being part of it, because it was promoting health and fitness. But my 'coach', the upline, was posting all about how much money she was making, '6 figures!' but still lived in her parents' house. Then I watched her as she got booted from that scheme and went on an absolute rollercoaster of MLMs and it made me feel super gross watching her beg people to buy from her, and of course the mandatory 600 page novels she'd post on social media about 'keeping it real'. Her entire life was on show, and she used her kids to promote sales, and that's when I unfriended.
I was invited to join a couple of these. The first one, another couple invited us to their house for dinner. We got there and an Amway guy was there. They started to talk about how much money you could make and had anyone gotten a $1000 raise that year. I had just gotten a huge promotion and gotten a huge raise - way more than 1k (I had been grossly underpaid up until that time so I was finally making what I should have been all along - I didn't tell them that). So I said I had and they asked how much and I told them. The guy just stopped and stared at me and didn't know what to say. The sh*tshow kind of stopped right there and we left and never spoke to those "friends" again. The other time was right after I had my first baby. I had a friend with some makeup/skincare company come over and try to sell me some ridiculously expensive eye cream I didn't even want. When I told her I couldn't afford it she said I should work for her company so I could afford it. Nope, nope, nope.
I signed up to be an At Home America (home decor) rep back in 2003 after my son was born. Thought it would be a great way to earn some extra money, and my upline reps swore I could be making just as much as them if I attended the meetings and followed their advice. I now cringe whenever I think about the culty sayings I spewed during my presentations, and can't believe any of my friends still talk to me LOL. Cherry on top was that after 3 months I realized I was spending more than I was earning. Finally noped outta there. Never going near an MLM again.
Luckily I've only ever been on the fringes of MLM's. Been to a Mary Kay party where they kept trying to get me to wash off my actually high quality makeup so they could put crap on my face. Went to a Cookie Lee party (jewelry) with my mom when I was a young teenager, bought one necklace and we left. The people are always so weirdly pushy. I get annoyed any time someone tries to message me about one of these things.
One of my former GF's has made MLM her career. I think she's doing several at the same time right now. She tried to get me to be a Beachbody Coach. Ever had that Shakeology crap they sell?
Wife's coworker tried to get us into a "coffee business" years back. Went to a presentation out of politeness mixed with curiosity. The entire presentation was on recruiting others. No a single word about selling product. We left right after the presentation was complete.
