So many IBOs have grandiose dreams of untold wealth, financial freedom. They think they will "build it once' and sit back on the beaches of the world sipping exotic drinks while the 6 figure checks keep coming in the mail. Sure it's a nice thought, but not a single IBO I have encountered can name a single IBO who achieved diamond, and walked away from the business to enjoy freedom while the money pours into their bank accounts. It is very likely that nobody like this exists. I suppose someone could go diamond and walk away from the business and still earn some bonuses, but very quickly, that business would likely fall out of qualification and the bonuses would shrink to nothing very quickly. Also, to earn bonuses, I believe an IBO needs to have side volume exceeding 2500 PV, which is roughly $7500 monthly in personal group volume. With normal attrition, it's easy to see how a diamond business can fall apart faster than a cheap suit without maintenance.
I also see and hear many IBOs popping off about how someone in their upline is earning $60,000 a year. While it may seem like a nice income to someone who has a low paying or entry level job, that income is gross and may not leave much left after taxes and associated business expenses. Even a diamond with an average income of $150,000 in a year likely has a very low monthly income from Amway as much of that income comes in the form of an annual bonus. As a former emerald once told me, you needed to budget out that annual bonus or you could be in financial trouble later in the year, if Amway is your sole source of income.
Also, you may have seen diamond showing off sports cars and other displays of wealth. My former LOS, WWDB has a function called "Dream nite" where they show off lavish displays of wealth. Well, it is my informed guess that most diamonds cannot afford the lifestyles and toys that they show off in these functions. If you do the math, you can see that after taxes and other expenses, a diamond lifestyle is likely to be quite ordinary. Normally, nobody would care about this but since diamonds use this display of wealth to recruit IBOs and to sell tools, it is significant for IBOs to know.
While it is great for someone to have dreams and goals, it is also important to have achievable goals. It is simply impossible for a room of IBOs to go diamond and to earn the kind of income that is shown in "the plan". Amway recruiters will show you "what's possible", but not "what's likely". To put perspective on that, it's "possible" that you can start a software company that puts microsoft out of business, but it's not likely. It's possible for you to win the lottery, but not likely. My advice to IBOs is not to quit your day jobs - ever. Your dreams and goals can be accomplished in many ways, but it is unlikely to be achieved with an Amway business.
Yes Joe, you're quite right of course. But that's because you are sane, sensible, rational, and thoughtful. You look at the facts, measure the probabilities, and make your mind up accordingly.
ReplyDeleteThis is the entire crux of the whole Amway problem! The people who are signing up to be new IBOs are simply NOT rational in this way. They are being driven by something other than mundane facts and statistical probability.
You'd need a psychiatrist or a theologian to analyze exactly what's going on in the minds of the many people (who are in all other respects sane) who fall for the Amway fraud. The best I can do is draw your attention to a song from the old musical "Man of La Mancha." The song was called "To Dream the Impossible Dream."
Think of how many millions of people were brought to tears by this silly song. They'd weep in the theater as it was sung. They'd be mopping the tears from their eyes as they went home. It's this kind of insane, utopian, pie-in-the-sky mentality that is the dream-engine in the souls of millions of little nobodies in modern society. And Amway fattens on it, like a spider fattens on flies.
Thanks for your comments. Spot on!
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ReplyDeleteHi Joe. That part about the ostentatious displays of wealth allegedly from the Amway program reminds me of this short fat Vietnamese guy who used to advertise on late night TV in the 1980s to sell his get rich quick seminar. He claimed he came to the USA from Vietnam without a penny in his pocket and then became rich by using his "methods" that he offered to teach others for a price. I can't remember his name and tried to look it up but couldn't find it. Anyway, he used to show off all of his "wealth" which was all phony. He hired a photographer/video guy and then rented the Rolls Royces, hired models to pose as his beautiful "girlfriends" and the mansions shown were not his. Total B.S. It was funny though, to watch his commercials.
ReplyDeleteAs for quitting their day job, I would advise any Amway "IBO" (that term cracks me up LOL) to draw up a realistic business plan on how they expect to remain in Amway without that J.O.B. Hint: they will need to step completely outside of Amway to find any such thing.
Was it Tom Vu?
DeleteJoecool I forgot to say Happy Thanksgiving!
ReplyDeleteSame to you!
DeleteI'm always amazed by the people who talk all about how great Amway is and how they claim their future freedom. I've yet to see anyone actually achieve it.
ReplyDeleteEven Shaun Guthrie from Edmonton, Alberta has fallen off the face of the Amway map and is now working a different job than he had when in Amway:
https://www.goauto.ca/about/management/
It's a pity we don't know the circumstances of his departure but he has clearly moved on to other endeavours in his life as a woodworker which he has on Easy:
http://etsy.com/shop/CaskWoodworking
I just find it very interesting when we were ridiculed for not knowing what we were talking about while he was out driving the roads and repeating and believing everything his upline told him.
He seems like a good dude an I wish him well. The only thing I find disappointing is the lack of willingness by former IBO's to share their experience. They didn't fail at anything, the business failed them because it can't possibly work in this day and age.
It was and continues to be a complete and utter farce. I've yet to be proven wrong in any meaningful way on that point.
Rocket, Happy Thanksgiving. You are right, even the most hard core IBOs end up going by the wayside and then disappearing. I wish more would come forward to share their stories. I did it to give other IBOs a feel for what I went through including my decision to quit. It was hoping it could enlihten others.
DeleteThanks Joe. Tom Vu is the guy. It was a trip down memory lane to view his old TV infomercials. And it also reminds me of what a friend of mine told me about those real estate get rich seminars. My friend used to do real estate (legitimately) and said that when those people walk into a real estate office, as soon as the sales people find out they have taken one of those get rich seminars nobody wants to talk to them. They don't want to waste their time and gas showing properties to people who don't have the money to buy it. They have unrealistic expectations, much like the typical Amway IBO.
ReplyDeleteI actually remember some of his infomercials vaguely. But yes, Amway IBOs often have unrealistic expectations about the business and find out the hard way that success is very rare in Amway.
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