/ot/ - off-topic

My mom was a part of a MLM. The 3 reasons were because 1. she has no other friends (she would literally only leave the house to talk to people on holidays), so the MLM filled the void 2. I got diagnosed with diabetes as a kid and my mom saw MLM's as a way to cure/lesson the burden of my illness, and 3. she always wanted to 'do something great in her life' so a MLM that could cure a bunch of illnesses was the way.

She never sold any of it and the only people who used it was my family and the random people who got her free samples. Point 1 wasn't because she was unlucky, but because she had a toxic personality and would get mad, to the point she refused to visit my dads side of the family, if someone tried to talk about anything besides religion. She was deeply into the MLM to the point she would mention how the MLM would cure my diabetes to my doctor, which embarrassed me. As a child I had a paranoid fear she would one day stop giving me insulin medication, which i would die without, in exchange for MLM pills. the MLM also messed with me as a teen because I developed eczema she refused to take me to a doctor at first, when I went to a doctor they gave me a medicine that fixed it under a week, and instead made me try every one of her MLM lotions, which made it worst.

The worst thing the MLM did to our family was make my mom stop taking her thyroid pills. She always complained about severe drowsiness, she would sleep in till 2 PM wake up and make my brother breakfast then go to sleep again because she was drowsy, and bad PMS, her mood would worsen so bad we had to walk on eggshells, and both of those are symptoms of untreated hypothyroidism. her medical neglect of herself has grown so bad that she got mad at her family for saying she should go to the doctor for a checkup because she hasn't for 30 years.

Most MLM members are often victims of average IQ (not malicious idiots like /r/antiMLM wants you to believe). It's simply the fact most people targeted for MLM's are to niave (college as Op mentioned) or simply don't have the technology to find out (many MLM's say immigrant and poor families are their main audience. MLM's have also been caught deleting bad reviews form the internet.)

Unironically antiMLM doesn't do much to help the victims of MLM's., like they state. They just wanna mock the 'stupid women. Look at my if MLM's continue you'll run out of people at the 18 seller'. The people who need MLM info the most will unirincly be turn off from the site because they reek 'hater' and 'ha ha stupid' instead of a desire to help. MLM victims also don't use reddit.

When I was a teen in high school, I remember getting letters in the mail from a MLM posing as a marketing company trying to recruit students for summer jobs. I don't remember the name, but I remember seeing flyers posted around the city and the occasional recruiter on campus handing out flyers to the seniors before graduation. I was offered 14$-24$ an hour, flexible schedules, competitive pay and the ability to "climb the company ladder" and get better positions the longer I worked, no interview or resume needed. Then there was a phone number to call to reserve a spot for a "meeting" with no location. I tried looking up the company online and all I got was a facebook page with 5 posts from "employees" talking about how amazing the experience was. No details on what kind of work the company did, just these glowing vague reviews. My bullshit radar went off and I ignored the offer. That didn't stop them from sending me letters each year until I turned 18.

Eventually, word had spread about this so called company trying to recruit teen girls. They were branded as a human/sex trafficking scam after one girl and ber mom had gone to the location of the meeting and found themselves 25 minutes outside of the city at some unmarked building at night no less, so they high tailed it out of there and made a warning post on facebook about it (this was in the early 2010s mind you). It made rounds fast, so the next semester the MLM stopped sending letters under their name and switched to a new one. Same bullshit copypasted letters, just under a new name and address.

My friend wasn't so lucky. She and her family fell for the scam and ended up working for the MLM because they were struggling with money and the offer was just too good. Her younger brother tried to hold some kind of presentation in my house, literally begging my parents to do it because he only got paid if he held presentations and got them to sign his papers that confirmed he did it. It fell through, but I had overheard that he was trying to sell them knives. It was the same MLM that was hounding the high schools in my area, trying to get hapless teens to sell snake oil and knives door to door. Her family was also very anti-science/anti-medicine prior to being recruited, so they stopped going to the doctor whenever one of them got sick and instead relied on one of the MLM's many supposed miracle cures to help them feel better. They were perfect targets for schemes like these.

Her brother recruited his own family and then she tried to recruit people in our social circle, but by the time that happened most of us had already gotten real jobs or went off to college. Her family was bleeding money fast, they would only get paid if they either successfully held presentations or recruited new members, but were punished with fees for each period they didn't meet the MLM's goals. I cut contact with her for unrelated reasons and haven't spoken to her in years, but the last I heard was that she and her family got out of the MLM, after moving to a completely different city and going under the radar.

My mom's been in so many MLMs throughout the years. Tupperware parties, PartyLite candles stuffed in drawers since the 90s, Dove chocolate parties, Avon meetups, Herbalife, Trevo, and Melalueca filled kitchen counters, LulaRoe items, diet pills, Touchstone Crystal bags filling up closet space, doTERRA oils, Origami Owl necklaces, most recently Univera drink shit.
So much money gone down the drain and she and my dad used to burden me with financial issues.

My mom is currently involved with doTERRA which sadly has arrived here and since it's new and relatively unknown, almost no one knows it's shady practices. Her hairdresser managed to convince her and a bunch of other people to join. A few weeks ago she got a feet fungus and it turned into an infection. An ''expert'' told her she could pour the undiluted Oregano Essential Oil into the affected area to cure it, so she did exactly that and burned her skin off. She also made me take some ''relaxation pills'' that were filled with essential oils that made me sick for 3 days. I tried many times to make her understand it's a scam but they brainwashed her already.

I have never personally been recruited for any MLM scams but I remember about two/three years ago when Lula Roe was huge. I kept getting invited to Lula Roe events on Facebook and I had a coworker who was constantly trying to get everyone to buy their overpriced clothes. Her main selling point was 'the dresses have pockets!!'. I have no idea how much money she spent but she bought so many leggings for her daughter and it seemed like she had a new Lula Roe dress every week. I bought one dress from her out of pity and it cost me about $50. I wasn't surprised when women started coming out about how much money they'd wasted trying to start their own 'business'.

My sister, who used to sell Avon as a tween, got into a nutritional MLM and has been selling it for a few years. After the period of making a website and traveling to company conventions she’s starting to make far less than what she was expecting. At one point she actually said “I thought I’d be making six figures by now.” Her upperline or whatever they’re called is a divorced fiftysomething woman that still parties like a sorority girl.

It makes me upset because I can’t get through to her that it will eventually (like right now) dry up. Every time I talk to her the conversation is always redirected to discussing the company, or asking if I can watch her kids so she can do more phone call sales. And I got supplements for Christmas.

>>500579
I’ll add this cause I saged on accident. My mom has been to things like pampered chef and at home america parties, but I also found primerica paperwork in the spare room of her house. That ticked me off a lot because it was likely one of her much younger coworkers trying to talk her into it.

>>500521
You’re talking about Vector!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vector_Marketing

My sister got recruitment letters prior to finishing high school and my friend announced his recruitment via Facebook a couple of years ago, he was also shilling out his involvement with some obscure cable network called The Owl or something and thought of himself as some sort of entrepreneur making it big (lol)

I had a friend who was scouted by Amway, she turned down the offer after a few other people and I told her it was a terrible idea but the tactics these people use are pretty scummy. They recruited her when she was working at her shitty fast food job, under the pretense that her customer service was so good that they wanted to give her the opportunity of a lifetime. They took her out for meetings, asked her about her dreams and told her that if she worked for Amway everything she wanted (a house and income to support a family) would be possible. They talked about how they too had started from nothing, but now they owned an enormous house and had the money to go on expensive vacations frequently. They took her to said house and had her meet other members and told her that they were all rich too, and that it was easy to get started. They had her read some novel too. She said she almost fell for it because they made her believe she was special and not anyone could do that sort of job.

A lot of these MLM companies prey on young adults financially struggling or just unsure of their future in general.

>>500596
That's the one. I thought it was just a local thing until I checked that article. I'm still wondering how the fuck they got my contact info when I had never applied to any jobs before nor did I ever give out my personal info online.

>>500638
On their website they state:
>We use a third party company to send out direct mail pieces each year. They get their information from various sources. Anytime you fill out your name and address for things like cap and gown orders, taking standardized tests, summer camp, sports camp, etc, your information is subject to being passed on or sold to affiliates and third parties.

Is Royal Prestige considered MLM? I remember them coming to our house when I was a kid showing off how supposedly awesome their pots and pans were because they were made from stainless steel. And they are pretty good, we’ve had them for years!

Okay I have a story here I am not sure how popular is Oriflame in your country but here its kinda popular, anyways my sister was about to move very far away (basically a diff country) because her husband found a great job opportunity, so I told her we should take some type of class or do a fun activity together before she left and she was in to the idea, so we found this pastry class and we were both excited and yeah we took the class and everything was great but the teacher that gave the class was a total hun she kept shilling Oriflame and their shitty products and I kinda felt bad for her (BIG MISTAKE) so I agreed to sign up (I know Im a dumb bitch) and she tried to reel my sister in but my sister wasn't having any she said that she was moving to another country. So yeah since I am a lazy person and I hate selling things to people I just bought a few things myself and yeah as expected the products were shit (i spent around 100dlls worth of products) and yeah I just left it at that and a year later the same lady emailed me with a copy paste email (for people that stopped selling or stopped being in touch) but bitch put another persons name. anyways nothing bad came out of it but seriously these people are fucking predatory there was times where this lady tried to convince me to leave my job because supposedly this was gonna pay better but I wasn't that stupid so I brushed her off, but its funny how predatory these people are how low they are willing to go in order to reel people in their shady business

>>500499

We already have an MLM thread

>>>/ot/282026

>>500954
I don’t think we’re allowed to necro sites anymore

Fuck yes I'm so here for this thread.

Anyone remember the trapezoid scheme?

>>501057
people necro threads all the time tho

>>501343
yes and they get banned for it

>>501363
you clearly dont know the difference between drama and offtopic boards, newfag. please read the rules

>Primerica

-a girl i met at a party tried convincing me to join this cult

-went over to her house, she played a brainwashing video to me

-in less than a minute of the video, saw right through the operation as as a cult-oriented pyramid scheme.

-wanted to tell her the truth but
she was completely delusional about it. from a small town living in a big city, big dreams. she was devoted to it, legitimately thought Primerica was a path to success.

-it was so cringy, and never hung out with her again. sad. real sad. i wonder what happened to her.

The only person who ever tried recruiting me into one of these groups. I wasn't sure if she was pretending to be stupid, was actually stupid or thought I was stupid. Sad to think we live in a world with enough stupid poor people for scams like MLM to operate.

I have met a few women who try to sell me hand creme. Either a coded message for handjob, the latest MLM scam, or both.

It sounds like your mom is on a sucker list. Scammers share lists of dupable targets.

Thought on Nuskin? Some of their products are sold on Sephora and celebs like the redhead from Riverdale use their stuff. I've never heard of Nuskin until one of my friends told me her BF used to sell for them, he used their stuff and his skin looked great and family and friends noticed the difference. She did warn me of the MLM nature of the company after I showed interest in their products.

>>528331
I've always been afraid to ask, is it a rule of thumb that MLM products are of bad quality (and all good reviews are either paid for, an example of sunken cost fallacy/cope, or completely imagined)?
Whenever I can tell something is a pyramid scheme, it drives me away like whatever they're selling is poison. I guess I get the idea that if they can't sell it the normal way, the product itself (or even its manufacturing process) must also be shady.
Is that an irrational line of logic?

I have two stories with MLMs.

First experience I was going to community college and my parents were pushing me to get a job, I was desperate as this was in 2008-2009 aka the market crash so I was willing to take anything. Around campus they were offering great opportunities for students to work and made sure to tell us to show up in business attire because I was going to be working for Vector marketing. You see where this is going. I was super excited to have the opportunity to work as a receptionist or secretary and I show up and there's 35+ people already there…they were trying to get us to sell Cutco knives and even though I was 19 I could smell the bullshit from a mile away. I even apologized and told them I wouldn't be showing up anymore as everyone shook hands to say goodbye and the presenter completely ignored me. I remember exactly that they wanted us to spend $500 to have "inventory" to sell and even tried telling us to sell it to friends and family these knives at like 60-100 a pop. I was so frustrated that I wasted my gas driving to this stupid thing that got my hopes up but my parents were glad I wasn't dumb enough to fall for it.

Second story was I had a friend when I was in the military who was also military that tricked me into meeting him for an MLM shill meeting. He was there with his wife and I brought my friend along who was looking for a job and it was probably the most awkward meal at panera I've ever had in my life. When my friend mentioned not being able to afford the packages they offered (it was Amway bullshit) they tried to tell her to borrow from friends and family and tried roping me into buying it for her. We both noped the fuck out and had a big laugh about it.

Almost forgot I was invited to a Pure Romance party and actually got some of the best tasting lube I've ever had, and when my friend had a new baby and couldn't do it anymore she gave me a bunch of her leftover inventory for free like a sex swing so that was pretty sweet. Overall though MLMs are the fucking worst and I wish they would disappear already.

>>528345
thats basically 100% the correct train of thought. most MLMs that sell beauty stuff always use a third party to produce it (private label) so they don't have a direct impact on the product manufacturing. they didn't actually make it so they can't tell you exactly what's inside and if shit goes wrong can deflect blame.

my college sorority had "sex toy" parties from Pure Romance once a year. people (me included) genuinely looked forward to them. i honestly didn't think it was a MLM scheme until i read this thread. we did it as a pregame before parties. what more fun can you have in college than drinking while openly talking about sex? i never bought anything but i remember the woman requiring girls purchase cleaning solution if they bought something.

i also was desperate for a job in college and applied to an MLM "company" that sold cable door to door. thankfully the interview was an hour away and i was getting fishy vibes. their social media was all of them at happy hours and weird social outings and their website said they had fortune 500 companies as clients but they never actually said who a client was or any sales numbers or any actual information. after a lot of thinking and anxiety how i needed a job, i trusted my instinct and cancelled the interview the day of saying i was sick. i got a thank you email for coming to the interview and i emailed them to say i didn't go. then i got another automated email thanking me for interviewing…
so glad i didn't waste the drive to get there.

>>528345
I don't think that necessarily every MLM product is bad quality, I've heard people who are anti-mlm say "I love this product but I'm ditching it because X is a pyramid scheme."

A lot of the products are bad quality, make baseless claims, are unregulated and can be harmful, don't disclose ingredients properly, and are sold at super unreasonable prices. So even if it's a good product, you can almost always find something just as good or better for much less.

And plenty of companies do just make terrible products (Younique, Monat) that should be avoided.