I can say Just Over Broke is all most people will be for as long as they stick it out with Amway!
Just another way of brainwashing the IBO’s into thinking they’re better than everyone else because they’re with Amway and they own their own business and don’t have an employee mentality.
So when did we hear the “employee mentality” sneer? Usually when we’ve told our upline about potential prospects who weren’t interested in coming to a meeting. The Platinum would put them down in his usual way dismissing them with bullshit about how they’ll always have employee mentality.
The other time we heard it was when an IBO had dropped out. The Platinum would rant about how the escapee’s “dream wasn’t big enough”, “employee mentality”, “broke loser”, etc, etc.
Do any of these bastards ever sit back for a minute and think about what’s so bad about having an employee mentality?
Probably not because that means they had to grow a brain and stop being brainwashed!
Not everyone has the personality, the intellect, the drive, the knowledge, the learning capacity, etc to have what it takes to start a business.
Sadly there are a lot of people who have physical and mental limitations who will never realize a dream to own a business. Do IBO’s sneer at people with missing limbs and who have brain damage? No compassion from those upline bastards for people who will never be Amway IBO's!
In any business the most important thing is sales. Whether that is selling your product or your service - if you own a business you are selling yourself. Nothing happens in your business until you get a customer and make a sale. There are many people who are good at what they do and think they can use that skill to open their own business but if they aren’t a good salesperson being an entrepreneur is a bad decision. Depending on the business the owner can hire salespeople. Its like everything else with being a small business owner. You hire others to do the things you’re not good at, don’t have time for, or are not qualified to do. Hiring salespeople is one thing. Teaching them how to sell your service or product if you’re not already a good salesperson can be disastrous and depending on the type of business, customers might only want to deal with the owner.
I would think that some people can learn to become better salespeople. Classes and books are available. When it comes right down to it not everyone has the personality to be a salesperson no matter how hard they work on it.
That’s the way it is with Amway. Amway Independent Business Owner is a fancy way of saying commissioned salesperson. The only way an IBO earns money is to find customers to buy overpriced products and recruit others to do the same. Commissions and bonuses are earned on the sales.
So when the upline sneers at people who aren’t interested in Amway or have quit Amway because they have an “employee mentality” what they really should be saying is the people who left suck at being salespeople.
There is no shame in having an employee mentality and working for someone else. You can’t force yourself to be a good salesperson.
I often wonder how our Platinum sack of shit rated Ambot after he quit. “That Ambot has an employee mentality!” Yeah right. Someone who’s owned their own business for years and hasn’t had an employer in a long time really has an employee mentality. Let’s see. Doesn’t that Platinum bastard have a full time job? Doesn’t he have a boss? That would be a big yessiree!
Who really has the employee mentality here? Ambot or the sack of shit Platinum?
And why does it matter?
I could never get over the price of the products in amway or any other mlm, for that matter. The prices are atrocious.
ReplyDeleteI used to be in a jewelry mlm, and women would show me what they got at Target for $4. How do you compete with that with a $69 item that looks identical. Well, the jewelry mlm would say its gold or silver plated, and it has a fabulous guarantee.
O.K. That's great. But to be honest, I don't give a shit if it's plated in the lava from the city Atlantis - it's too expensive. If I drive a Chevy, it's because I cannot afford a Hummer.
And the guarantee? Big freaking deal? To get that guarantee, you've got to locate the consultant (and since they last about 1 year, good luck with that one) and go to the hassle to take care of it. If she's still available, you mail her the pieces and go from there; whereas with a piece from Target, I can walk up to the service desk and just get refund for at least, what, 60 days?
I love mlm parties, I really do; but I'm starting to (after 30 years) really queston the hassle factor. I'm really downsizing my entire life including possessions. Simply don't need that much jewelry, or cosmetics, or jungle juice, or whatever.
I think the whole world is embracing minimalist ideas like never before.
Is it just me, or do you think mlm home parties are phasing out?
CASSETTE TAPE
Sorry, Anna, this was about 'employee mentality.'
ReplyDeleteI agree, there is nothing wrong with being an employee. For years I've asked the question, "How, if mlms are the end-all, be-all, did the world manage for thousands of years without them."
There are and have been lots of wealthy people. Ever heard of the middle class? Life is great for that huge segment of the population. Let's face it - if you're still eating 3 times a day and could get food for free at a food bank if need be, you've still got it good compared to the rest of the world.
It's a tough economy right now, but we don't have millions starving to death in the streets. There are still many optons for people who are in trouble.
My guess is, they'd be very happy to get a job. I don't think they would take kindly to some ambot telling them they are losers for taking the dreaded J.O.B.
Let's not forget, jobs for decades have provided what mlms have never provided - insurance, paid vacations, 401(k) or IRA contributions, sick days, paid holidays, personal days, etc. mlms can't compete, so they resort to character assassination.
Every single person on the planet who is employeed at an even half-way decent job, I believe, is happy to have it.
MLMs would do well to start teaching gratefulness.
What a concept.
CASSETTE TAPE
I've never enjoyed going to any MLM party.
ReplyDeleteYears ago a friend invited me to her house where someone was coming over to show something to do with painting or paints or drawing or something like that. She was a really pushy woman - the woman demonstrating the products not my friend. Just about everybody bought something because they were scared of her I think. She'd given me a drawing of a duck to color in and asked me what color I'd like and suggested yellow. I said purple and colored in that duck. After she left the other ladies at the party were killing themselves laughing saying did you see the look on her face when you said you were painting that duck purple.
My next door neighbor used to do these candle parties. I always bought something because they kept an eye on my place when we were away. But I usually shopped the specials. I didn't usually stick around for the party. Arrive early, put in a quick order or take an order form with me, put my name in for the raffle, and get out of there. Almost invariably she'd phone me later and say I'd won the draw and to come over and get the candles I'd won. 10 years later I still have some of those candles to use up!
Not every job has health care benefits, pension contribution, paid sick and vacation days, etc. Perhaps IBO's have better luck targeting people who don't have those job perks? Most jobs I've had offered those perks. I know I've stayed with some companies longer than I should have not because I liked the job but because of the perks.
A little bit of a tangent, but I really don't like how some of my "friends" rarely contact me but don't hesitate to when they're hosting a jewelry party, candle party, tupperware party, etc. They only want to contact me when they want me to buy something! -FM
ReplyDeleteFM - that is so true. There's people I haven't heard from in ages and then I'll get an invite to one of these things. Depends if there'll be refreshments - I just might go for some free grub!
ReplyDeleteOr suddenly you get an invite to their kid's graduation - whether 8th grade or senior. Um, I barely know your kid and he/she has never given me the time of day. Now they want my gift?
ReplyDeleteI'm so done doing that. I think this economy is really slowing down the 'throw money at everything' lifestyle.
Now, I'm really thinking carefully about every penny I spend.
And for the record, when I graduated from high school, it was such a normal event that my parents didn't go. I called my sister from out of town to ask for a ride. Hated asking her for that but I had no way to get there. If she hadn't been able to take me I would have stayed home and thought nothing of it. And I certainly did not get a gift for graduating. Had I asked my mother for anything, I'd have gotten a swift kick. Gifts for graduating were unheard of.
What's with these kids wanting a damned handout for existing? Get a job. Earn your money. Pay taxes for a while. Contribute. Grow up.
Sorry, but I'm old school. You get what you deserve and have earned and not one penny more.
Anna, you are right that not every job provides the benefits I listed, but lots do as a matter of course. Even just a few years ago, we couldn't offer a man on the street enough to take a job in our construction company. He had many offers a day. All the bennies plus were not gettin' it.
Boy, has that changed.
Some of the subs we've used for 30+ years have let go of all their employees and told them in order to hire them back, it's wages only. Take it or leave it. They're jumping at it.
We're trying very hard not to take away any of our bennies, but I don't know how long we can compete with the companies who have done away with them.
We just got a letter from our major medical provider informing us of a 30%-60% raise in premiums. The end. No one has tapped into their insurance in about 2 years. And we get this shocking increase?
Our unemployment inusurance just quadrupled. This is a battle. The average person on the street has no idea how hard it is to stay competitive.
The consumer wants the job done for the cost of materials only. They don't want to pay the cost of labor.
Now that they are collecting their fat pensions, they don't want to pay for our benefits. Funny how that works.
CT
Its crazy what kids get today for graduation presents!
ReplyDeleteA lot of people don't understand that business owners have already spent money on expenses before they even get out of bed in the morning. Insurance is the big one. There's so many types of insurance that we have for the business that people who don't own businesses have no idea about.
And the employer social security match just doubled. We were stunned. Where do people think this money comes from?
ReplyDeleteWe are forced to raise our prices to the consumer.
That pisses the consumer off and they try to go elsewhere for their product/service. I totally understand that.
But I work with retired people all day long and it's amazing how many of them came from big big big paying jobs (that money had to come from consumers) and they have retired with huge pensions (that money continues to come from tax payers) and full medical, etc. They have the gall to demand to know the wages of our employees. Kiss off. That's none of your business. Let's see. I'll call them in here one by one and you can ask them. See if they tell you.
Do these same people demand to know the exact wages of every employee at Wal-Mart when they shop there?
This whole pension debate is getting ugly. They can claim all day long that it was 'promised' to them. I don't care what was promised. No one came to me to ask if I would promise it. If they had, I would have said 'Hell to the no!!!!'
Grow a pair like the rest of us. Save and invest your entire life and live off your own efforts, not the efforts of the already squeezed tax payers.
For 35 years we have asked ourselves the same question every week: 'Did we put something away for our future?'
When you have no hope of a pension or an inheritance, you galvanize yourself to action. And in many cases, you resign yourself to never retiring.
This is exactly what is happening all over the world. Spoiled pensioners demanding money like little children from their mummies and daddies. I know it's hard to let go of free money - and that's exactly what a pension is - FREE MONEY.
The hypocrisy of these kingpins never ceases to amaze. they deride jobs and want poor ambots to buy their tools, with their job incomes cash since we know the vast majority never make reasonable profits on amway products. the sad part is how the poor ambots cannot critically think "wait a sec. uplines demonize jobs, i am not making money from amway products, my job income pays for the tools yet these guys will happily take the cash anyway." this is akin to blood money or blood diamonds - never question about the source just take it!
ReplyDeleteif they keep berating the jobs as being so bad they need not to take the cash for tool sales unless they verify that cash is from amway product sales profits only, not contaminated by goodness forbid J.O.B. money! i think that will actually help out a lot of ambots to keep most of their cash and stop loosing their money/shirts.
P/s about graduating and gifts thereof :- where i come from people call parties for masters or phd programs, some for bachelors level but that is becoming more rare. anything below that there are no parties/gifts, that's what you are supposed, and expected to do!
The cult leaders pass on their shitty attitudes about jobs to the IBO's who then duplicate that shitty attitude back in the workplace and put all their co-workers down for having jobs. I think Amway and their cult leaders are responsible for many IBO's losing their jobs! Once they've lost their job thanks to their obnoxious attitude in the workplace how do the leaders expect them to pay for Amway products and functions? The only way IBO's can afford to be in Amway is because of the money they get from their job and some credit cards with enough of a limit to handle the spending they need to do to keep the upline happy.
ReplyDeleteyou are right anna.b. it's defies logic and common sense. i remember a couple i went over to their home to stp. i knew the lady from long ago and that was the first time i met the hubby. i spewed kingpin crap and attitude about jobs. i left thinking how i gave a strong attitude/posture. it was very dumb of me and uncalled for. looking back i realize they must have been shocked after i left - later they even cancelled on attending the weekly night meeting and they didn't join of course (i'm glad they didn't). i targeted them because they had good software engineering jobs just like some of my then amweasel uplines. well i called them a little while ago to apologize after many years - it went well, they were kind but i realize i messed up the friendship. i shoulder the bigger blame bcos i should have thought for myself. yet i know now why i didn't just like many other ambots don't. anyway i continue to do this with everyone i gave attitude, posture, etc to, it's the least i should do.
ReplyDeleteA non contributory pension is free money but one where you need to pony up is not necessarily free money.
ReplyDeleteIt's the ratio of pony-up~ to~ match that is seriously out of balance compared to the private sector.
ReplyDeleteOur employees contribute to their 401(k)s and we match them as much as is legal. They will get nothing (save for ss) from any taxpayer.
They will get no bail-out ever. And they know it. Puts a whole new edge on it.
I grow a horn every time I hear bail out. It makes me furious.
Sorry, but I AM the private sector and as business owners we are feeling the shocking tax increases along with a much slower economy.
Those of us who have been in business for decades gutting it out, are doing all we know to stay solvent and keep our guys fully employeed. Obama will never know that feeling.
He'll just rob me and our guys and give it to whoever the hell he pleases. It's a sure vote. Not mine, however.
CASSETTE TAPE
I've had some employers match dollar for dollar and others 50 cents to the dollar. Anytime you can get an employer to put any amount in is free money! When I bought my first house I cashed in my 401k after 2 years of contributions for my down payment. So my employer helped me buy my first house!
ReplyDeleteNobody's bailing us out! That is annoying. Either close up shop or reorganize. The government shouldn't be giving out free money unless they're giving it to everyone.
amen
ReplyDeleteCASSETTE TAPE
ExAmbot - that's one of the joys of being in Amway: destroyed relationships. Good on you for apologizing for the days when you were brainwashed and quoting Amway tapes. Often destroyed relationships can't be repaired. People need to keep that in mind before signing up for Amway. It means insulting everyone you currently know until they don't want anything to do with you any more. The problem is when you quit Amway these people might not be willing to renew a friendship after all the hateful things they were subjected to thanks to Amway.
ReplyDeleteThe average employee with an average wage of about $18-20/hr. (not including bennies at which the average jumps to about 25-30 hr.) contributes about $1200 - 2,000/yr. to social secruity. Let's be generous and say they contribute that for 40 years (in 1977 with average pay, my ss tax was about $6/wk.) w/o factoring in inflation, etc. That's about $48,000 - 80,000 over a 40 year span. I am astounded to hear many people are getting about $1500+/mo. in ss bennies as we speak.
ReplyDeleteLet's see: 48,000 - 80,000 divided by 1500/mo. = 32 - 53 mos. to get back what you put in. That's about 2.6 - 4.5 years. And how long do people draw? Sometimes, dacades. FREE MONEY! No wonder they are keeping mum about the whole thing. They know they are making out like bandits at our expense.
I say, you only draw out what you put in plus the going interest rate. Period. After that, move in with your kids.
I don't owe anyone a living. And I wil empty my 401(k) before the government gets it hands on it to bail out public pensions. I'd rather get 50-75% of what is mine than nothing.
Google 401(k)s and government bailout. It'll make you sick if you have been contributing to your 401(k) for years and are depending on it for retirement.
P.S. The government is now looking to make employees report their employer paid major medical as income. Let the howling begin. The employer would no longer be able to take it as a deduction/work expense.
No one gives a crap what the government does to businesses unless it happens to them.
CT
CT the people managing the social security fund, pension plans, etc are supposed to be investing wisely all that cash so that is why we are able to get much more out of it when we retire than just what we out in. We are living on all their smart investments. They diversify so it's not a huge loss if something doesn't work out but that money is being invested not just sitting there. IBos would have you believe otherwise and try the old fear line that social security won't be there when you retire. Maybe you still need to be deprogrammed from what your upline tried to sell you?
ReplyDelete