Network Marketing: What do you thing about it?

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Most of you by now will have been approached by someone in Amway or Avon, trying to recruit you to join their network marketing/pyramid scheme.

Basically, the idea is that you have to recruit others to join, and then you (being their upline) will get a percentage of everything that your downlines purchase.

A few articles:

http://entrepreneurs.about.com/cs/multi ... ithmlm.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-level_marketing

There are a lot of companies that do this: here is a list:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mu ... _companies

I thought that I would introduce the topic in this section, since this is where the economists like to hang out, and I enjoy economics lectures.

I don't really care for it. I see nothing wrong with the business model, but I just don't like most marketing mechanisms on a personal level rather than a political or intellectual level.

I'm too anti-social for it to work on me.

I don't think much of it and haven't seen many people make more than a very bare amount of money from these schemes.

Only a very small percentage of people who sign up with MLMs/network marketing companies ever make much money at it.

As I recall, Amway (now called Quixtar) was once forced to admit that the average distributor made less than U.S.$1.00 (one dollar) per month.

What I didn't like about Amway was it said parents should emotionally neglect their kids so they could build up their business to the extent that the kids could go to private schools and get expensive toys etc. It seemed to be almost a religion.

I agree with Pandora. I used to work with Amway, and it did seem cult like. You would get dirty looks if you pulled out a chapstick that wasn't purchased from Amway. They also didn't care for single parents, and when you went to a seminar, they kept you up all night preaching and ranting about success. I have always regretted falling for their promise.

I had to take my little girl to the first session I went to and got some "looks". I was a single mum so couldn't leave her (and didn't want to) with anybody else. My brother wanted me to go into it but it was a mistake. I didn't like the way they proselytised as if they were a religious sect. Their products are good but a bit pricey.

MLMs are a kind of populist capitalism. They don't work especially well, but, then again, corporate capitalism has been pretty destructive, too.

Never worked on me. The agency salespeople coming to your door, right?

actually quixtar is quite different on the mlm kind of scheme, i was in it for over a year (that was 2-3 years ago) quixtar is not a cult or anything, it's a site where you shop online and get a check at the end of the month, (but you have to spend like $200 (100 pv) to get a check, you get about 10 % back ($20 a month) if you buy for yourself and you get more based on recruiting and there effort. I did get quite a bit of checks, but there has been quite a bit of changes the last year (one was forcing the name amway) back on quixtar, and for the introduction meetings you have to watch a movie on the history of amway and some others that make it harder for ibos and much more. i have some information on quixtar on my blog. which you can find on my site. Also quixtar is a member of better business

but i strongly suggest that you really don't get involved into it now, cause there's several lawsuits on them in other countrys, and now there part of amway (they used to be a sub-sidery of amway) but they have changed the last couple years, they terminated like 17 top distributors that were like the top people in quixtar. So it's not the top people make the money, it's the cooperation kind of bullying. it used to be a respected company like 5 years ago, but now there in trouble with lawsuits and there bullying techniques, after they changed forced there brocures to have amway on it, 50% of the ibo board resigned... just something to think about.. it's bad now, IBO's dont have a voice in it now.

Quixtar=Amway in the U.S.

However, Amway has announced that they will soon abandon the Quixtar brand and go back to being Amway in the U.S.

I was approached by USANA, which I considered untill I thought better of it.

I do computer work for a group travel agency, and whenever they have an MLM company they have to ask for all the money up front because MLMs have skipped out on their bills so many times.

I had to write that exception into their accounting stuff.

yeah it's part of amway now, but it wasn't for a long time... anyway there is good network programs if you look such as affiliate marketing.

It is the same organization. Amway began calling itself Quixtar in the U.S. some time ago because of all the bad press they were receiving under the Amway name. However, for some reason, they have decided to dump the Quixtar moniker and go back to being Amway.