Thursday, October 7, 2010

Amway Tools Systems - A Money Pit?

I've been blogging about Amway for a number of years now and I've learned quite a bit about Amway and how the system works. It is my absolute conclusion that the vast majority of IBOs lose money because the system consisting of standing order, book of the month, voicemail and functions are a money pit. The system can never be satisfied. It must constantly drain money out of IBO's pockets in order to sustain itself along with the lavish lifestyles that some diamonds and upline leaders like to portray. Sadly, the system is promoted as the key to IBO success but the reality is that the system is the very reason why so many IBOs suffer net losses. IBOs often do not realize that they are systematically being drained of their money because it is done one standing order or one function at a time. What some uplines do to disguise this is to start teaching that the Amway business is about investing in your business, lifelong friendships, or making an IBO a nicer person, etc.

Let's look at some system components. Voicemail is absolutely unnecessary. With email, text messages, twitter, or even facebook to transmit messages for free, it is ridiculous for IBOs to pay for a technologically outdated means of communication. The functions are also a waste of money. With telecommunications, there is no need for so many meetings and functions. These functions, especially the ones where air travel and accommodations are needed set back many IBOs financially and they never recover. While I agree in general that open meetings are more effective in person, these are generally regional and not cost prohibitive as out of town functions. Standing orders are generally recorded at functions so when that happens, IBOs are paying twice to hear the same information. Book of the month I don’t have too much objection except that some of the books may be basically propaganda promoting the AMOs and the systems. The ones that talk about success principles are generally okay. But overall, I believe the return on investment is poor and in many cases, a group of IBOs will actually spend more on tools than the amount of bonuses generated from Amway.

Uplines avoid the discussion of scam by talking about the opportunity being hard work. Thus IBOs don’t get the idea that it is too good to be true. Meanwhile they are often strongly encouraged to be on the system. Some IBOs are shunned if they don’t purchase tools, which might be against Amway rules. However, the shunned IBO might be better off because the ones who do invest in tools often find that the system is simply a money pit where money goes in and nothing comes out. As far as I know, there is zero unbiased evidence that the system produces any tangible results. If you in the US, you might be hard pressed to find newly emerging diamonds. Sure there are some new platinums, but there is evidence that system platinums make very little or lose money, and many of them are not able to maintain that level of volume. The system is basically sucking money from the IBOs and channeling them to certain uplines, probably the ones who show off their new sports cars and fancy suits. Does this appeal to you?

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Joecool...long time no hear. I used to be active on the QBlog board, and respected your posts there.

I am surprised and disappointed that it is still necessary to have to keep repeating the truth over and over, and that franchise-style rules haven't been applied to this segment of the business opportunity market. But, as I found out first hand recently, changing economic and social conditions will always drive new waves of MLM recruiting.

I have been approached periodically in the near-twenty years since my initial contact with Amway and near-obligatory support "systems", but my children have been "prospected" several times of late and thus I decided to check Web to see what the situation was. I see that not much has changed...

Anyway, keep up the good work and keep offering the truth to those people that have the ability to hear it.

Mike

Anonymous said...

Its easy to find faults with anything that you don't like. Most of us have a job, and most of us hate someone telling us what to do. Ask yousfelf this Q, can you write about your boss like this, all we do is, yes sir, sure sir, no problem sir, with a huge smile. Amway is the best concept that i came across. It works, the Q is are you committed and are you persistant!!

Joecool said...

Mike, good to hear from you. Sadly, ever from many years ago, not much has changed in Amway. The same old leaders apparently still teach the same old things and try to pry money away from their downlines.

Joecool said...

Hey anon from Canada, I see you are still reading my blog. Too chicken shit to comment these days?

Anonymous said...

how are the religious cults involved in amway?

Anonymous said...

amway is a cult that inserts religion into it to appeal to the gullible and prey on the weak and the innocent.