Hello
Just to second the 'genie out of the bottle' comment. They have to admit something but try to minimize it as much as possible.
Don't want to get political but Tony Blair did something similar recently when a journalist put it to him that the situation in Iraq was a disaster and he said 'yes?' as if he'd been saying this all along.
Having been out of Amway for seven years now I recently spoke to someone previously crossline to me and asked him about the rumour that most of the money the Diamonds made came from the motivational (tool) business, not product bonuses. He initially expressed astonishment and said it was nonsense but then added 'of course people are paid for their time.' Now this is very interesting because in all the four years I was actively involved we were told over and over that the system was run at cost, for our benefit. Speakers were introduced as having 'taken time from their business to come and speak to us today' implying that they were doing it for free. So when our upline was exhorting us to go to seminars and functions and buy more tapes and books it was purely for our own benefit, not for their profit (or rather the profit of people further upline to them, except for the Emerald and Diamond speakers I heard on stage and on tape when it appears it WAS for their financial
gain.)
Amway knew huge profits were being made from the system in 1983 (Directly Speaking tapes) and tried but failed to rein in their kingpin distributors. Later memos from the company suggested that most distributers should not profit from or even know there was money in the motivational systems.
Maybe by admitting some of it Mr Upline thinks he's taking the sting out of the information or perhaps he thinks this is the truth. Even if your boyfriend is happy with the idea that he'll make tool money once he's a higher pin, he'll have to accept that almost all of the people he introduces to the business will lose money and never get it back .
Definitely see if you can get proof of Mr Upline's income from the business. They've always been pretty sneaky on this too - waving bonus cheques without explaining that, before the automated systems were introduced - downline distributers had to be paid out of the bonus cheque as well as business expenses (petrol, brochures etc), it wasn't pure profit.
The key is still whether the MAJORITY of the money 'successful' people in Amway/Quixtar are making is from the product bonuses or the 'system'. Ruth Carter's book 'Behind the smoke and mirrors' and Eric Scheibeler's book 'Merchants of Deception' clearly show that the money is coming from the systen. Hence all the lawsuits and groups 'breaking away' to ensure they get more of the tool money.
Good luck and Merry Christmas.
Helen
T
narcissedespres <Narcissedespres@
My boyfriend's upline did come for a visit. I didn't get a chance to
speak with him personally, however, my boyfriend did ask him about the
tool/function money, and when IBOs started to see that money.
To my surprise, the question was answered pretty well. He was told
that once you hit Platinum, you begin to see some of the profit from
the tools and they may start to pay you for training people (running
weekly meetings), and more once you hit Emerald and above. Most of
the money you see is from tools, but you get some amount of function
money depending on how many IBOs in your leg? section? go to the
functions. The upline also explained that Diamonds have a food spread
and such at the functions that everyone else does not, so some of the
function money goes toward that, although you don't see those benefits
until you reach diamond. The higher you get, the more money you make,
though the upline wasn't sure of the exact amounts. Even more to my
surprise, he told my boyfriend all questions along this line were
welcome, and that he'd (upline) asked similar ones when he started.
His upline also said that the money he tells people he makes (6
figures) comes *only* from the Quixtar portion of the business, and
the tool money is a separate figure that he does not add in.
So...thoughts? I'm not really sure what to make of it all. Is it the
truth? Is it what the upline *believes* is true? I'm really not sure
what to make of it all.
The rest of this post is quite long, but I have no other place to
share all this. The first portion of this post, about the upline, is
what I thought most people would be interested in. Feel free to read
or skip the rest, but it's there in case anyone has any thoughts, or
has spare time to read my ramblings:)
My boyfriend and I also had an interesting discussion re. the "cult
side" of Quixtar, which *he* initiated. He said he feels that a lot
of the cult claims come from people who "ask their upline about
everything". He says he's noticed this piece of advice on some of his
CDs (though it often seems to be in passing). One time it was even in
relation to dating. My BF stated that he would *never* ask his upline
what to do in a non-business situation (i.e. dating, marriage, kids,
buying a house or car) and he's not sure why some of the CDs say to,
or why some people do so. He said his upline is aware that I'm not
interested in Quixtar (ever), and that he's not sure what some of the
members of his upline would say if my BF directly asked them what they
thought of this. And then my BF stated that he would never find out
what they thought because he would never ask them. "It's none of
their business. If you need to ask opinions about a relationship,
you'd ask close friends and family, and then make your own decision
regardless." And I told him I wouldn't be dating him in the first
place if I thought he was the kind of person who would blindly ask for
and take advice that didn't make sense (i.e. "ask your upline").
I'm hoping the fact that he's noticed these things in the CDs (and
that these things bother him) might help out down the road.
After that, he mentioned that the fact I'm not interested would be
interesting "down the road" because all of the Diamonds on the CDs are
married and work together with their spouse. He's never heard of a
person who is married and building the business alone. (Not that were
married, of course, but perhaps down the road...) He said that often,
one spouse was against the business and then later became interested.
I took this as an opening to stress again that even if the businesses
works exactly as he'd like it to, I still will never be interested.
Moral issues aside, selling anything at all (products or an
idea)...it's not where my talents or interests lie and that most
couples have separate professions and don't work together. Am I
worried that this will all become some bigger issue down the road?
Yes, though I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it won't...or that
he'll get out of Quixtar before it does.
-EA
--- In mlmsurvivorsclub@
<Narcissedespres@
>
> Hey all:) I may have a chance to speak with someone several levels up
> in my boyfriend's upline. I've met him before, and even given all I
> know about Quixtar, this person seemed quite sincere. He heard I
> wasn't at all interested in the buisness, even a little, and I never
> once heard anything from him that even remotely sounded like a
> recruiting pitch directed at me. I also know that he buys the CDs and
> such, and supplies them to his downline for free. (The cost to him
> must be astronomical.
> some of the questions that my boyfriend has been having trouble
> answering (i.e. tool profits, how much the higher levels actually make
> from selling product vs. tool and function money, when you start
> seeing that money, how much do those at the higher levels actually
> make each month once you subtract tools and personal PV, etc.) I'm
> looking for help coming up with direct, clearly-worded, neutral and
> non-actustory sounding questions and I was wondering if any of you had
> some ideas:)
>
> I was also wondering this, and could find no answer on the internet.
> Does anyone know the percentage of people who leave an MLM and then
> later either join again or join another one, vs. the number of people
> who leave the MLM world for good once they get out?
>
> -EA
>
------------
All New Yahoo! Mail – Tired of Vi@gr@! come-ons? Let our SpamGuard protect you.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch format to Traditional
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe
__,_._,___
No comments:
Post a Comment