Market America

An old friend of mine on social media seemed to be living a pretty lavish life.I asked him what he did for work , he said he worked for this company. Immediately, he seemed very eager to help me learn more about the business.

I also met a few people online zooms who were also eager to put me on. Everything sounded good until I bought my flight&convention ticket. Then I felt so pressured. The team or small group I was in was very pushy for me to start this website.

He was forceful but portrayed a mentor and friend behavior. Theyd say things like trust, family, connecting with people then also say I dont do this for money , I want to help people which is I guess nice but why wouldnt you do this for the money? I told them I didnt want to buy nutrition products or start this website until I was down there to see what it was like. Red flag, I was like shunned for not doing that.

Then I kept being asked to trust him and the group. They were trying to push me so hard on this. I kept asking what do you guys do what is your like occupation or something how does the revenue work and commission All the answers I ever got was we love connecting with people, its not about the money . Non-stop zoom meetings everyday for no reason , just talking about basically nothing.

I was merely interested in the nutrition supplements and to get percentages off since I spend tons on supps anyway and I live a fit and healthy lifestyle. I was told I would get a huge care package of stuff and I got only some small samples ..everything made me bloated and nauseous. I asked why the enzymes were making me so sick, then he told me there used to bulk up. So I gained almost 10 pounds in one week off multiple powders alone.

Since Im in the medical and health field I am knowledgeable but the website is a straight lie. It states everything is natural but when I took it I was so sick. It was like mean girls when Regina George gets tricked into eating the African candy bars. Then he had another solution to take something else, these products do not work, its literally candy and sugar in a container.

I said I wanted to go to Florida and meet with the so called doctor/nutritionst who would be there. Come to find out theres none. I got to this beautiful hotel. No one wanted to swim or hangout by the pool.

Everyone was on their computers in the lobby, I was like what are you guys working on? Literally nothing. Its like a soft cult. Everyone talks about motivation and healthy lifestyles but stuffing their faces with pb&js and fried food.

Everyone is super fake and acts like theyre better than everyone else. There was a girl there who had two children and could barely afford the trip because I found out she was forced to buy stuff and pay a huge portion for her room. I also met a girl whose mom did it and she had no clue about it so this was her vacation-she was not having this *** I went to a meeting that night and no one spoke about the company jobs or what the business is, everyone is like hi my name is joe and I love this company, thank you and that was it. One girl was crying because she made new friends Im like sitting there like you guys are idiots.

Then they wanted to play board games . Im like wtf , So that night, I took myself out to a restaurant on the water, and contemplated on my next decision. My best friend and boyfriends family live down here in Florida, I told them about the whole thing, they were like ahhhh weve heard about it, no way get out come here so I was like perfect I will. Then later that night I go back to the hotel, theres this random woman sleeping on my bed with a huge oxygen tank and a bag of prescription pills.

So I made a freaking spot on the floor. I get it, if you need meds to survive but having sodas and food on the nightstand table is outta control when you cant breathe on your own. I felt so bad for her. In the morning I told the girls I was leaving.

They were like are you scared or nervous? . Im like no you guys are being scammed I asked the girl how much money shes made since she's been in and they both responded its not about the money, we love everyone so much . Im like okay that makes no sense.

They were nice about it but I packed my stuff and went to my girls house on the beach. We already had plans to hang anyway so it couldnt of worked out better. Im a firm believer in Jesus. I truly believe everything has a reason and a lesson.

The lesson for me is that Im on the right path to become a doctor. Trust your instincts. It was a silent cult almost and its literally impossible to explain it other than it is a pyramid scheme. My mentor was mad at me because now him and his team wouldnt get credit or bonuses for putting me on.

So I was fortunate enough that I only loss out on the convention ticket. I made this long because it was my experience. At first I was disappointed and distraught because it was such a waste of time OMG but now it kind of comical now.

LMAO. Now Im having a great vacation!

Where do I even begin? I was recruited by an acquaintance whom I really liked.

Somewhere in my gut (listen to your gut people), I knew the business model of this and other MLM's was not legitimate. However, my husband was in the process of losing his business and I felt enormous financial pressure to do something to help him. Working from home sounded great and the line of makeup/skincare Motives/Market America produces is actually above decent. I am an esthetician and makeup artist by trade, so it like a fit.

I felt that I could sell the products and create my own Bridal Makeup (on-location) company. My motivations were to increase profits with the makeup. I was wrong. After over a year of attending numerous paid training sessions, flying out to their big siss-boom-ba rally in North Carolina and even being pressured to shell out more money that I already had on my $3000 makeup kit, I was beginning to understand how this would unfold.

They are masters of luring you in with a promise of financial security. After they used your friends and family to lure you into the business, they used celebrities (albeit washed up ones) to charm you with larger than life speeches at their conventions and PR efforts. I believe Kim Kardashian, Fat Joe and some athletes are "on-board" with their marketing--all of whom have sketchy pasts. I'm embarrassed to admit that I actually cried at one of JR Ridinger's (the owner) speeches.

I realize clearly now how Hitler led the masses away slowly and steadily with charm and a belief and hope for something "better". I guess MLM's appeal to some level of greed within many--but truly, I just wanted a job where I could work from home, doing something I enjoyed. I began my efforts to recruit--but quickly realized their training/recruiting program felt awkward and weird, so revised it to suit what felt honest and natural to me. I even decided I would only find people for my "team" of downlines who could legitimately use and sell the makeup/skincare (i.e.

makeup artists, salons). I aggressively marketed to those people and in all the man-hours I put in, only recruited one girl and one salon. She was fresh out of beauty school and excited about the opportunity, as was I at the time. As things evolved, I thought I would only target salons as I could legitimately sell a lot of product quickly through them and make more money.

The problem was, MLM's are not set up for legitimate business, so in order to make commissions like a sales rep, I needed to recruit a team of people buying hundreds of dollars worth of product, while balancing out both sides of the payment structure (a near impossibility) to earn the commissions from my decent sales at the salon. In other words, I was working for free most of that year for the salon (hosting beauty events, spending 3 days a week in the salon promoting it to their customers). I finally approached the salon owner and took a makeup artist position with them in order to make any money at all. I did receive 2 paychecks from Market America which didn't even cover the start-up costs of getting into the business that year.

Sadly, my salon forgot to make a purchase ($100-$300 required monthly on average) on time from Motives and they refused to send her her $600 commission check. She was furious and guess who ended up looking ridiculous? After running the numbers at the salon, she was break even on profits even though we had sold a TON of products (maybe 10-15K). In order to earn her "commissions" on all that she had sold to her clientele, she had to have a team underneath her--which was a nightmare to deal with if you are running a legitimate business.

Soon afterwards, I realized enough was enough. I pulled out of Market America and recommended to the salon owner that she do the same. Now she only retails the product (since she has thousands of dollars worth of testers invested) and no longer tries to earn commission. She only earns 30% profit on those sales--probably half of what another 'real' vendor would provide for her.

The ONLY upside, is the custom blended makeup where the profits are 300%...and for that, she can go directly to the manufacturer and get rid of these scammers. I feel *** and defrauded, but more importantly angry that I brought anyone else into this mess. I feel good about my decision to cut it off. In the process of all of this happening, I was developing my own on-location Bridal Business--a legitimate company.

It has flourished this year and tripled in profits. At least something good came out of this situation. Don't be fooled into thinking MA is a way to "own your own business". It's not.

Don't be fooled into thinking other people who failed at it must have done something wrong. That's the furthest thing from the truth. The statistical fact is (look at the tiny print on the back of their recruitment booklet), only 1-3% of people make any profit (that doesn't mean good money). Right there should be a sign that this is a scheme.

I thought I could make something legit out of it in my approach, but even that was stifled by their business model. It was impossible to do and every financial gain works in their favor, not yours.

Check out this site--it's been a huge help to me after going through this.

http://pyramidschemealert.org/are-all-mlms-scams/

Products are very good, but over priced. I worked as a distributor full time for over 5 years and made several pay cheques and had many people working under me.

Never made a single penny in profit the whole time. Just put tons of money into it to try to keep it going as I was determined to make it a success. Finally gave up as I just could not keep pouring money into it. I made it all the way up certified to several levels and got certified in sister departments as well, went to endless meetings, recruited endless people and none of it made a profit.

All their stories of making money (profit) are lies.

Sure you make pay cheques, but you will not make profits. Stay away of waste 5 years of your life loosing tons of money.

This company is a total scam and a sham. Do not fall for their “get rich quick” live the dream farce that they sell.

The owners use the profits of the company (preying on people with little Money) to fuel their drug habit and they could care less about any “unfranchise” owners.

They buy yachts and host 1 seminar a year on them so they can write them off as a business investment. They’ll be in jail one day soon for this scam.