Saturday 11 October 2008

My bitter experience with Amway: How I was forced to tell lies

Dear Friends,
Here is the bitter experience of a person who refused to part with his identity. He wanted to share his tryst with Amway scheme in which he experienced agony and mental torture. I am presenting his article as it is to present his views only.
Shyam Sundar
I appreciate your initiative very much. Here is my story. I am from Bangalore, India and I am working in an MNC as an engineer. I joined Amway in 2006, June and did every thing my upline instructed me to do for 2 months. But as I felt it actually was not very transparent one and indeed deviated a lot from the promises it actually makes during my upline recruited me, I left it immediately.
I will first share my experience and opinions regarding the promises you pointed out it generally makes during it introduces the “business” to a new person or prospect.
1. “You can earn a fortune in 12-15 hours a week. “ ………….Yes they told me the same when I was introduced to the business. Later I found out that its much more than that. Infact its like 2 to 5 hours everyday ! We were instructed to go for contacting for 30 min to 1 hour/day ... then making phone calls etc., for 30 mins/day … then showing the plan will take 1 to 2 hour/day and then almost every day there will be a meeting and stuff also it almost took 3 to 4 hours daily … still I have not taken traveling time into consideration. And on weekends (Saturday and Sunday it takes 10 hours in meeting contacting plan showing etc. etc. etc…… so per week it’s like 50 hours of work!!!
2. This business has created thousands of millionaires …. Yes they say it every time.
3. Little or no selling … just buy from yourself ……. Yes they say that it's not door to door selling but what I found out was shocking. In India they instruct to follow 9 “core” (fatal) steps to follow in order to be successful in the business. And every time they asks their downline whether they are following the steps properly or not. If you don’t follow all the steps they will make you feel guilty about it (by some sort of emotional pressure…. like upline will not help you much.. even some times my upline expressed his disgust about one of my crossline for he not following the steps) …. So one is emotionally or mentally forced to do it. And one such steps says “doing your personal 100 PV every month ….. you can do it by buying the products for you or retail it to outside “… Here “ personal means it can’t include your group volume. In India 100 PV means Rs 5000/- (almost US $120) since nobody uses the products worth Rs 5000/- every month one is forced to retail … almost like door to door selling. If the upline continuously tells you that you can’t succeed without doing personal 100 PV your mentally forced to do it … This particulars they deliberately hide during recruiting a new prospect and if I knew this fact earlier I would have never joined this business.
4. You can save at least 30% off your own shopping bill…. Yes they say that
5. Did anyone in the group you sponsored make a net income of one dollar after expenses? Did you make a profit? If not, how much do you think it cost you (approximately) ? ……………. Well I never make any profit.
6. You need to use 100% of the product in “your own business” regardless of cost…………………. Yes they strongly say that. Infact they say if you don’t do this you will never be successful. Although every time they use the word “recommend” again it’s almost like an emotional pressure to do so.
7. Did you find the products to be cheaper or more expensive than any thing at the store? How has this impacted you personally? Yes they are very much expensive. Although they say that products are concentrated and far better in quality than other company products I never found so. They say one needs to use the product in very less amount so that it lasts long and in the long run it saves your money …. But what I found is the products are hardly effective when you use them in small amounts.
In India the Amway nowadays sells a food supplement product under the brand called Nutrilite which I found extremely over priced and they claim it of very much superior quality than other food supplement products available in the market. I and my father used some of their product but we never found it that good as they claim. And they spread some super natural stories of the curing power of these product which can hardly be explained by medical sciences. They praise the products so much that one actually gets brainwashed about the quality of the product and never cares to verify the quality. (Andhra Pradesh State Food Laboratory found the Nutrilite adulterated and the District Consumer Forum at Vijayawada imposed a fine of Rs. 1 lakh on Amway on this count..Editor). One thing I found the most objectionable about Amway business process is that it's not professional, transparent and it teaches one to become a great liar. I and many people like me who were new to the business were advised to make many false promises and what was most shocking is that they deliberately lie about their income. My upline was showing a plan to a person I invited and when the person asked how much I earned my upline said something vague like “ You can’t even imagine how much he is earning” … whereas I earned almost nothing from the business.
I want to write more but I don’t have time right now so I will write in future.

Name withheld on request for obvious reasons.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

your just a pussy that aint got what it takes to make it

Shyam Sundar said...

Come on accept reality.