While in my lower 20’s, I had a brief stint as a Mary Kay distributor, mostly because I liked makeup and skin care, and being a distributor got me a discount on the products I loved. I remember being invited to a Mary Kay event for distributors, for the purposes of gaining further motivation and training. There we were, a group of grown women, standing in circle, singing the company theme song, complete with hand motions. We weren’t halfway through the first chorus of “Pink Cadillac”,  with our hands on our invisible leather steering wheels, when I felt a loud and resounding NO in the pit of my stomach. To this day I have difficulty articulating what all I felt in that NO. Some of it had to with childhood experiences with my dad’s involvement in Amway. A lot of it had to do with the juxtaposition of being in environment that was supposed to make me feel empowered as woman, it was supposed to inspire and motivate me towards success, and yet I felt this odd feeling of shame, silliness, and maybe the opposite of empowerment. Like, is this really what it looks like to pursue empowerment and success as a woman? A rah-rah sisterhood reaching for that pink Cadillac and hundreds of people in my “downline?”

It seems as though in the past few years there’s been a significant uptick in the number of businesses like this, or at least an uptick in the amount of people I know who are ambassadors, distributors, or whatever the title may be for each particular company. If you go online at all, it will not take you long to run into posts singing the praises of whatever company/products your friends are working with. Some days it feels like we’re being besieged, behind and before, with posts about miraculous results, recoveries, and healings from all manner of ailments, often followed by a disclaimer that these are not miracle products.

While I do not begrudge anyone the opportunity of making their dreams come true, nor do I presume to know their motivations or desires, I have long wanted to express my own thoughts on the matter, and give voice to what it feels like outside of the MLM world. Here are the 5 themes that bug me the most about MLM companies and how they work.

5.“Hi! How’ve you been? I really miss hanging out with you and would love to get together again! I thought about you the other day and wondered if you'd like to try this new product that has done so much for me and my family’s health!”

•    Raise your hand if you’ve received unsolicited messages such as these. The pitch can be worded many ways, maybe they are asking you if you want free samples, or telling you they only have 2 spots left in a group they’re putting together, (that one always makes me scratch my head); you might even get asked to lunch before the truth is sprung on you. What you thought was a reunion of a friendship, turns into you suddenly feeling like a target, and your old friend is the predator. You’re left with a sour feeling in your stomach, and unfortunately, fighting off the urge to mistrust anyone else in the business.

4.“I want to (or am so happy to) contribute to my family’s income, be able to give more, pay off debt, etc etc.” 

• PLEASE understand I do not think it’s wrong for a wife/mother to work and earn an income. What I do not understand is why explanations like the above need to be given. Aren’t those the same reasons any of us, male or female, work to earn money? Imagine if the men in our lives posted updates on Facebook, “All I want to do is provide for my family and be more philanthropic. Please consider hiring me to build your house, design your landscaping, etc etc.” I think we all assume you’re not using the money to buy drugs or fund terrorist groups. No one is opposed to you earning and having wealth, and what you do with your money is no one’s business.
• On another note, I do sometimes wonder, when I consider how poor we were growing up, with a head of the home who was, shall we say, not deeply burdened to provide for his family; I think about my mom and how I have never felt an ounce of resentment that she did not go to work to provide the kind of lifestyle we may have wanted, even needed. Would nice winter boots (instead of plastic grocery bags tied over shoes) have provided more value than her gentle presence in a home where the father was often missing? Would new clothes and non-holey shoes have made our childhood better than working hard with her in the garden to harvest and preserve food for winter? I would not trade loads of cash and treasure for the mental picture I have of her in that tiny kitchen with nine children, whistling while she worked, enduring hardships I couldn’t even fathom.
•  And lastly, on an even more personal and vulnerable note, as a childless woman, I sometimes have to swallow hard at some lives that look like my dream life. A husband who cares enough to work hard to provide, (now THAT I have), and a wife surrounded with children who depend on her to teach, nurture, and love them. Granted, I don’t know how hard it is to be a mother, but who ever said it was easy? It’s hard but it is work of unmatched value. Why is it that that calling, is not enough?

3.“These products are the best on the market, life changing, curing everything from anxiety to warts to stained teeth.

• Do you know the sheer mass of miracle products we are being urged to commit to? Herbalife, It Works, essential oils, Plexus, AdvoCare, Arbonne, Juice Plus, Nu Skin, and I’m sure many more could be added to the list. All of them posting testimonies, each one better than the last. Sometimes I wonder if the people who take them will eventually be so healthy that they will leave us like Enoch did; they will not die, but will be taken by God, their bodies so healthy there’s nothing left to do but ascend into heaven. One can only imagine what would happen if all these products were taken at once.

2.Any mention of “building my business”, or #girlboss #mompreneur 

• How is an ambassador or distributor different from any other sales person? How does selling lipstick out of your trunk make you a business owner? I get paid to provide customer service for an ERP software company. Does that mean I have software support business? As for the hashtags, maybe it’s just me, but they make me feel the opposite of what I think they’re intended to convey, which I think might be female empowerment? Girlboss? What if men used #boyboss? I could be alone in left field here, and that’s OK. I just don’t understand the need to state your gender next to your job.

1.“I just love these products so much, I feel so passionately about them, that I just HAVE to share!”

• This is probably one of the toughest ones for me to swallow. I simply don’t believe it. It feels like one of the more obvious untruths, or at the very least, an obvious overstatement. You’re not scratching and clawing and posting your way to someone else’s health, the struggle is for the next income bracket. Am I right? The executive, the director, the double black diamond or whatever the levels in your company are. If I am wrong in this, and you would put in the same effort and time for free, then forgive me.
• I love to support small businesses, creators who design products or services that are unique and meet a need for those around them. I’d guess they put massive amounts of passion and love and time and effort into their creations, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard that as a sales pitch from them. Their passion is literally in their product, and they create beautiful things that speak for themselves.
• Lastly, this may be a generalization, and feel free to correct me if I’m wrong; but from the research I’ve done, for most of these MLMs, the REAL product is the people. There is much more money to be made from signing up more people, than there ever will be in selling the product. The main incentive is not retail product sales, but the recruiting of additional participants to join the club. And that is what I personally, resist. I do not want to sign up for the privilege of trying a product, fabulous as it may be. Call me old fashioned, but I prefer to come and go as I please, shopping and trying products with a certain level of autonomy that feels stifled in the MLM world.

 

If you’ve read all the way to the end and feel like clobbering me over the head, feel free to do so in the comments. I would like to say to all my friends who are in this kind of business but have never pushed it on me or sent me messages with hidden agendas, thank you. These are only my opinions. Nothing more, nothing less.