Upline "Mentors"?

 I find it humorous that Amway IBOs refer to their diamonds as "mentors".  A mentor is someone who takes your personal well being and success as their personal mission to help you succeed.  I guess you could say that your diamond is your mentor but true mentors don't typically get paid for their advice and time spent.  When you think about it, a diamond is more like a paid consultant who gets paid with zero accountability.  The diamond cashes in even if you fail and go broke trying to build your Amway business.  

If you are considered a "serious" business owner, you are expected to purchase standing order, voicemail and to be in attendance at all meetings and functions.   And even if you do everything your diamond advises and still fail, you will be told you didn't do it just right or that you didn't try hard enough.  Amway IBOs who dedicate themselves to the system can spend hundreds or thousands of dollars a month on tools and functions.   In general, tools and functions are non income producing expenditures but your wise "mentors" expect you to spend most or all of your disposable income on these tools and functions regardless of whether you make a cent or not.  

Your diamond will make some excuse that you are investing in your business.  That's ironic because at the recruitment meetings, they'll tell you that Amway is low overhead and therefore, you should be able to profit very quickly.   That might be true if not for the endless supply or tools and functions that your diamond expects you to purchase, regardless of whether their advice is helping you to profit or not.  There is zero accountability on the diamond when faithful IBOs follow advice that only leads to net losses instead of profits.   The diamonds really must have an ability to have no conscience because there are countless stories of prospects and faithful IBOs going broke following upline diamond advice.

The sad sad thing is that if any asks the diamond to show evidence that they are as rich as they claim, they will be told it's none of your business or the subject will be changed without an answer being provided.  And that's because I strongly believe that diamonds (at least most diamonds) do not have the kind of income that they want you to believe they have.  They'll show you slideshows of Peter Island or other Amway paid trips and things but you'll rarely see a bunch of other trips or goodies that the diamond actually bought themselves with their excess income from Amway.  That's because it's all an illusion and a show they put on to entice prospects to join.  

There might be some uber rich diamonds but if there are. it's not because of the massive income from Amway.  It's very likely that the diamond augments their income from tools and functions or has other investments elsewhere.   Do the math and you'll easily see the truth.

Living The Good Life?

 I recall as a rank and file IBO (as a newbie), I thought how awesome it would be to have financial freedom, do what you want, when you want, and cost is no object.   That's certainly what was implied about the diamond lifestyle.  No worries, retired at age 29 and nothing to do but to figure out where you want to play each day right?   At least that's the illusion the diamonds want you to see.   It gives you something to hope for and hope is what the diamonds sell via audios/cds, functions and meetings.

I remember when I was out with my upline a number of times, we drove past our diamond while we were out showing the plan.   The diamond was dressed in a suit and I recall asking my sponsor why the diamond didn't simply walk away from Amway to enjoy a quiet life of wealth.  The answer was that the diamond cared about his downline thus he spent many evenings helping his downline show the plan and build the business.  While that might have been true, I later realized that the diamond was out conducting his Amway business, just like I was.   Because he probably had to.  

If you belong to a group in Amway or if you were around a group for a few months, you probably noticed that people doing little or nothing and quitting or people dropping out after a few months of trying was quite common.  And with that being a simple fact in Amway, you can easily see that there is no life long residual income and walking away from Amway to enjoy a quiet life of luxury.  when the majority of IBOs do little or nothing and quitting, it takes tremendous effort to maintain a viable group that produces enough PV to keep the diamond in qualification.  Also, if people drop out, them they are not paying for voicemail, meetings, audios/cds and functions.  The drop outs must be quickly replaced in order for a diamond to maintain their income plus the income augmentation from the tools and functions. 

Another little thing that might go unnoticed in the Amway common 6-4-2 or 9-4-2 plan is that a large portion of a diamond's income is received in the form of an annual bonus and not a large monthly bonus check.   During my blogging career, now spanning close to 20 years, I had befriended a former emerald who said her annual bonus had to be budgeted for the year because the monthly income was quite small.  I believe that to be true of most diamonds, save for the old and long tenured diamonds with large groups.  

So at least to me, it appears that a diamond is very much like a working stiff who works 9-5.  But the diamond works odd hours and often the night shift because most people have day jobs and can't do business during the day.  You can argue that the "work" that a diamond does isn't as difficult as a 40 hour per week job, but you could also argue that having a regular consistent paycheck along with medical insurance and benefits can bring you some peace of mind.  I'm sure there are many diamonds living on the edge, especially if they try to keep up with the Joneses and portray the diamond lifestyle.

If Amway Is So Great?

 This is a question that IBOs need to honestly ask themselves and be objective in their answers, not emotional.   If Amway is so great?     Why are the results similar to a lottery (a few winners and masses of losers) if Amway is so great?   If the system worked the way the diamonds advertised, wouldn't there be a constant churn of new platinums, diamonds and higher ups?  Right?   People would constantly be progressing and there would be countless numbers of diamonds.   Some years back I sent a question a friend who worked at a hotel where the diamonds held a diamond club convention and the answer was that approximately 160 families were in attendance.  Why is the count so low?  I suppose that many diamonds many have had better things to do but if the vacation is [aid for by Amway and these folks are "free", why wouldn't they attend?   You know the answer.

Also, why are IBOs told to purchase an endless supply of training materials is the system?   I was told as an IBO that Amway is "simple".  Simple doesn't mean easy but at the same time, you don't need to be a rocket scientist to build Amway is what I'm told.   But the pitch is that you can't miss any meetings or functions (or your business will backslide 6 months) because you need to be accountable.  But I've seen IBOs attend all meeting and functions for months and years and never sponsor a single downline and never progress beyond their personal PV.  It's a sad situation.

Even my personal sponsor went 7500 PV and was considered a "gold" direct (at the time) but never got beyond that and eventually started backsliding once I left.   He was in the business a few years ago but I'm not sure of the status now.   But I can say that I retired comfortably a few years ago while my sponsor is still working.  I'm financially free.  While I don't own any aircraft, I travel a lot and occasionally, will splurge for first class.   If Amway is so great, where are all the young retirees?   Instead I see diamonds quitting and/or dying on the job.  

During covid 19, businesses that are ecommerce like Amazon went thru the roof.  But Amway doesn't appear to have done so well.  I wonder why?  Is it because Amway is more about recruiting downline that actually selling a decent product at a competitive price?   If Amway was what the diamonds advertise it as, Amway would have gone thru the roof like Amazon and some other online retailers.  But they did not.   So my question worth repeating is;  what's so great about Amway?  

How IBOs Get Scammed?

 In my experience and opinion, Amway IBOs get scammed in the process of being recruited as IBOs because they mistakenly think they are going to become actual business owners.  The sad reality is that the prospects and IBOs themselves are simply being sold a system that's supposed to make them money.   Not much different than those late night informercials where the pitch man says he can make you rich if you buy his fool proof system of success.  Then they'll show testimonials of people who allegedly made money using the system.

In the meantime, nobody has ever verified that the guy making the pitch has actually made any real money following their own advice, nor do you ever see bonafide evidence that those giving the testimonials have ever made a cent from the system they are pitching.   It's really no different from the Amway diamonds who show you slide shows of mansions, fabulous vacations and sports cars.  Typically the diamonds will show you pictures of Amway sponsored trips and not necessarily trips that they paid for on their own.  

How do you know that your diamond is even currently qualified, much less "rich"?   The answer is you don't know.  You assume that they are because you're told so.  Oh, they might flash you copies of a large check they once received or something of the like but you'll be told "none of your business" if you ask for actual financial credentials.   But at the same time, these diamonds expect their faithful downline to blindly follow advice and invest their money following a system that may not have even worked for the diamond.

If you didn't know, a lot of money is made by selling get rich systems to people, which is why you see all those infomercials on TV or maybe heard them on radio.  The pitch is enticing and curiosity often makes people want to take a chance on seeing what is actually involved.  You know, like 2-5 years of hard work that is supposed to result in lifelong residual income that you can "walk away" from.   Even if it takes 10 years, that's better than working 40 years at 40 hours a week right?   That's the bait the Amway recruiters use on prospects and often, they use that curiosity approach.

But in the end, you are simply an unpaid commission only Amway sales person who gets no benefits and must even use your own money and time to promote and sell Amway products and hopefully the opportunity to others so that you can leverage downline volume with yours.  Most people do little and quit, or do nothing and quit.  You really cant build any kind of sustainable business where the participants are most likely to do little or nothing before quitting.  Your best chance of making money is to sell these teaching systems where you make nice profits regardless of the results of your customers.

The Big Secret?

One thing that I was unaware of as an Amway IBO was that our uplines were massively profiting from our tools purchases. I was in WWDB at the time and I was told very clearly that nobody made money from the tools and in fact, I was also told that WWDB was a non profit organization. Both of these statements were bold lies told by WWDB leaders and they have never been held accountable. We were told that upline cared about us and our success, thus they spent their own money to fly to functions to teach us how to succeed. Turns out they were all lies.

Eventually, the internet and other media made it impossible to cover up these lies and uplines finally admitted that they profited from tools. However, it looks like the upline downplayed the magnitude of the tools profits. I believe some upline may have made most of their income from tools, especially leaders who may have fallen out of qualification.  Amway doesn't publish currently qualified diamonds so nobody really knows who's a real diamond except Amway, and they don't tell. Now days, the upline admits they make some profits from tools, but there is still a great deal of secrecy in the tools business. Has anyone ever seen a written agreement on tools compensation? So say you qualify diamond and your crown ambassador decides you don't get tool money, what legal recourse do you have? 

What makes the whole thing with tools ironic is that the uplines are not supposed to entice Amway prospects into joining by using the tools money as a draw, but at the same time, they are told that tools are vital to their success. Uplines also show off trappings and lifestyles to attract recruits, but I believe that these trappings were likely obtained with supplemental tool income. I wonder if the diamonds actually owned the toys they showoff?   I suspect that some rent cars or houses to make the show attractive. And tool income has a higher profit margin than Amway products and fewer people participate in the pay plan so it makes perfect sense. Let's take Dream Night. It costs about $75 per person, but I can schedule a fancy dinner in a hotel for about $25 to $30 per head. The rest is profit. Same with FED, but FED probably costs less as there's no dinner and the fee is about $125. That's where the real money is made.  Just do the math and the answer is clear.  

I wonder how many prospects or IBOs would be fired up about buying tools if they knew that their uplines might not currently be qualified at the level they claim to be, and knowing that the uplines will make a ton of money whether or not you make a cent as an IBO? Also, some uplines are shameless in pushing the tools on downline. Sure they might cut the newest guy a break and loan them some cds, but once that IBO decides to start building downline, they are likely to be told that a real business owner buys their own tools, or that a business owner needs to be a leader and purchase extra tools for their downline.

How would you feel if your upline is touting themselves as a financial genius but in the background, their homes are foreclosed or they have financial difficulties? What if your upline touts their morals and you find out they are divorced or getting a divorce? What if your upline said Amway saves marriages? Your upline certainly won't say they are perfect, but conversely, they should be held to the highest standards if they are using their status to be able to sell tools and make large profits.  

These are some Amway secrets that your upline doesn't want you to know about.

The System Works?

One of the things I have heard over and over by Amway supporters is that their system works if you apply it. But is that really true or not? I contend that it is not true because many of the things recommended by the system comes with baggage that most IBOs cannot carry, or is not within the control of an IBO. For example, an IBO can be sure to listen to cds and read books every day, but being able to show a plan means you have to find someone who's willing to see it. Or selling a product means you need to find someone who's willing to buy it. While on the surface, that sounds reasonable, but in practice, many IBOs find it impossible.

There are reasons why the two biggest challenges facing most IBOs is finding prospects and being able to sell products. The challenge comes from the higher prices in general that Amway charges their IBOs. An IBO will often try to justify the price by citing quality, or concentration. But these factors are subjective and the vast majority of consumers will simply see a similar (or same) product at WalMart with a lower price tag and buy it there. For probably most consumers, the price tag is the bottom line and it is why the WalMarts of the world are wildly successful. Another hurdle many IBOs cannot overcome is the problem of finding people to show the plan to. Because of past IBO behavior such as tricking people into Amway meetings, or being deceptive about the purpose of the meeting, or outright lying, many people in the north American market think there is something shady about Amway IBOs. In some cases, it is unfounded, but still, the stigma follows because too many people have or know someone who had a bad experience in Amway, and many people in the past who did work the system, ended up losing money because of the system. These factors make business building in the US nearly impossible, and explains why Amway is stagnant in north America, and why groups are shrinking rather than growing. Amway recently did some PR things, including some commercials, but still I do not think it was done in time to fix the reputation issues. 

Aside from sponsoring/showing the plan, and selling products, nearly or all of the system activities are non income producing activities for downline and in fact, many activities such as voicemail or standing orders are major profit centers for certain upline. Thus it would make sense for upline to promote these activities to downline, because they profit from it. It may or may not help the IBOs. But there is no unbiased evidence that the system works if applied. Sure, Amway supporters will point out that all the new platinums and above were on the system, but don't mention that for every "success" story, there may be hundreds, thousands or tens of thousands of failures. To call that a success would be a tough sell in my book. 

So does the system work if you apply it? Based on the evidence and my informed opinions, I would have to say "no". But IBOs must make their own decisions. Are you experiencing a net profit? If the answer is no, ask yourself why not? Is the system the reason you have a net loss? If the answer is yes, ask yourself if you should continue. If you are told that the system saves your marriage or makes you nicer, ask yourself if you own a business or are you participating in a self improvement class. Ask the tough questions. As a business owner, you owe it to yourself and your business.

Amway And Gambling?

Let me make a disclaimer right off the top so Amway defenders don't try to discredit the post without reading it. The Amway opportunity is not a game of chance. But I will go on to explain how and why the opportunity can be compared to gambling and why the diamonds can be seen as a casino or the "house". In either case, the fact that Amway is not gambling, but yields lower success rates than gambling speak volumes.

In the Amway opportunity, the odds against someone going diamond are astronomical. Literally millions of people have attempted to build an Amway business in North America over the years and diamond club for North Anerican diamonds a number of years back had 160 diamond-ships represented. Certainly some north american diamonds may have turned down a free trip to Hawaii but I'm guessing that's not a big number. 

The odds are also stacked in favor of the diamonds. Casinos are not built by winners, but by the hoards of losers. Just as a diamond business is not built by having a foundation of winners, but layers and layers of IBOs who are losing. The Amway opportunity is simply set up that way. Look at your common 6-4-2 plan or whatever version your group uses. The newest or biggest layer of IBOs make very little and when you factor in expenses such as functions or standing orders, the losses can be staggering. 

A diamond, like a casino will attract many young dreamers who think they can conquer the world and will get rich. They use bright lights and profile former winners just as Diamonds show off fancy cars and testimonies to lure in recruits. The newness of the opportunity gets you excited, just as someone walking into a casino might feel the excitement with the sounds of the casino. All you need is some effort and little luck right? Sadly, that excitement is all too often replaced with the harsh reality that most must lose in order for there to be a few winners, both in casinos and the Amway business. 

Like casinos and diamond uplines, there is much caring for active IBOs and for players who are spending their money in casinos. But once you walk out of the casino, there is no special treatment, just as an IBO who stops building a business or stops being core quickly becomes forgotten. In Amway, people who said they were lifelong friends were never heard from again once an IBO missed a few meetings. If you re-emerge, you will find the love again, just as you will get free drinks when you start gambling again.

And yes, there are some exceptional people who can scratch out a nice living by gambling but they are few and far between, just as there are diamonds, but diamonds also have thousands of people who wanted diamond but could not achieve it. Those who can finally make it usually have an exceptional blend of skill and a bit of luck. Some even cheat/lie in order to gain a bigger edge, both in gambling and in Amway. 

Like a gambling "system", the Amway opportunity has "systems". In either opportunity, the system doesn't work for the masses. There are an exceptional few who can make it work. Except in gambling, most people understand that the odds are stacked against them. In Amway, many new IBOs are told that anyone and everyone can succeed when it simply is not true. 

Can you fulfill your dreams by gambling or with the Amway opportunity? The answer is yes, but the reailty is that few will ever do so. Like casinos and Amway diamond-ships, both are built on the backs of those who lose, not on those who win.