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The MLM Epidemic in 13 Maps

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Re: The MLM Epidemic in 13 Maps

#21

Post by Matticus_Rex »

jbob2000 wrote: post #16
elil17 wrote: post #2

This article doesn’t dig into the details, but these companies are really vicious. They aggressively recruit at my college and I’ve seen them to convince students to take what they would have spent on next semesters tuition and use it to buy “inventory” (i.e. more products than they’ll ever be able to resell) instead. These things ruin people’s lives

How do you craft a law to make this illegal though? And then how do you enforce the law? How do you bring these companies to justice? A fool and his money are easily parted. If those students didn't blow their tuition on MLM garbage, they'd have blown it on something else. I'm sure there's a kid somewhere who blew his tuition making ridiculous option trades based on something he read on r/wallstreetbets.

I don't think that's necessarily true. I know plenty of smart people who just didn't know enough about MLMs and had a bunch of people around them who were doing them, and got sucked in. They're smarter now, but these things are really toxic and cult-like.

Re: The MLM Epidemic in 13 Maps

#22

Post by thephyber »

jandrese wrote: post #19
jbob2000 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These companies are active in areas of low education. They aren't present in coastal cities because that tends to be where smart, educated people congregate. Checkout this map of Red vs. Blue states: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/var/plain/storage/images/med... There is a slight correlation with Red states and high MLM activity. Hmmm....

The article lists a lot of MLM companies that started on the coasts and worked inward, including pretty much every snake-oil "wellness" product supplier.

> that started on the coasts

9 of the 13 companies didn't start on "the coasts".

Re: The MLM Epidemic in 13 Maps

#23

Post by sct202 »

jbob2000 wrote: post #13
devmunchies wrote: post #6

I wonder why MLM's are so rampant in the mountain west. I know "mormons" and "sales experience from missionary work" but the analysis can go deeper. From personal, anecdotal experience, a lot of these MLM people I've seen are moms. Could it be that that area is so sales heavy that stay-at-home moms want to run their own thing so they get into MLM on the side?

These companies are active in areas of low education. They aren't present in coastal cities because that tends to be where smart, educated people congregate. Checkout this map of Red vs. Blue states: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/var/plain/storage/images/med... There is a slight correlation with Red states and high MLM activity. Hmmm....

I think it depends on the products, like Rodan & Fields seems to be popular specifically in higher income / educated demographics compared to other MLMs, like I've seen people who seem like they should know better get roped in to RF but they'd turn their noses up to Herbalife.

Re: The MLM Epidemic in 13 Maps

#24

Post by bilbo0s »

Spooky23 wrote: post #7

When I worked retail sales in the 90s there was an Amway cult meeting nearby. Every few weeks, they would drop in after a pep-rally type thing and try to waste your time looking at the most expensive thing and talk about their amazing business. Then they'd drop the pitch (at the time it was about their e-commerce business). Once you ran into them, you could spot them. It was a mix of desperate mid-life crisis guys lo…

>It was a mix of desperate mid-life crisis guys looking for cash, clean-cut naive younger people, and diligent moms starting a business.

Something struck me as a bit familiar about those descriptions. And then I remembered, around here, it matches up with the demographics of the gig economy types. Uber, food delivery, etc. Only difference being the gig economy types are drawn more from the poor. I wonder if the desperate who are poor do gig economy jobs, whereas the desperate who are middle or upper middle class, (or those who like to think of themselves as middle class culturally anyway), tend to go for the "start a business" MLM thing?

Re: The MLM Epidemic in 13 Maps

#25

Post by imglorp »

Aloha wrote: post #11
devmunchies wrote: post #6

I wonder why MLM's are so rampant in the mountain west. I know "mormons" and "sales experience from missionary work" but the analysis can go deeper. From personal, anecdotal experience, a lot of these MLM people I've seen are moms. Could it be that that area is so sales heavy that stay-at-home moms want to run their own thing so they get into MLM on the side?

I wondered the same thing - why do so many MLN's seem to start in the Mormon Corridor[1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_Corridor

I've wondered that too. One would think that religious people would have some aversion to harming others. Harm to the people you recruit is basically what direct sales amounts to.

Another question is, are religious people more likely to fall for this scheme? It seems Western religion almost requires habitual suspension of critical thought of all claims.

Re: The MLM Epidemic in 13 Maps

#26

Post by didgeoridoo »

jbob2000 wrote: post #13
devmunchies wrote: post #6

I wonder why MLM's are so rampant in the mountain west. I know "mormons" and "sales experience from missionary work" but the analysis can go deeper. From personal, anecdotal experience, a lot of these MLM people I've seen are moms. Could it be that that area is so sales heavy that stay-at-home moms want to run their own thing so they get into MLM on the side?

These companies are active in areas of low education. They aren't present in coastal cities because that tends to be where smart, educated people congregate. Checkout this map of Red vs. Blue states: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/var/plain/storage/images/med... There is a slight correlation with Red states and high MLM activity. Hmmm....

This map shows MA, MD, and VT as “red”. These are three of the most reliable Democrat-voting states in the country.

Something is wrong with your map.

Re: The MLM Epidemic in 13 Maps

#27

Post by bigtex »

Spooky23 wrote: post #7

When I worked retail sales in the 90s there was an Amway cult meeting nearby. Every few weeks, they would drop in after a pep-rally type thing and try to waste your time looking at the most expensive thing and talk about their amazing business. Then they'd drop the pitch (at the time it was about their e-commerce business). Once you ran into them, you could spot them. It was a mix of desperate mid-life crisis guys lo…

I remember working retail in 98-99 and an older couple came in. They starting to talk to me about starting an internet business and I was interested as I didn't know any better and the web was all the rage at the time. They came to my parents house and it was basically a version of Amazon Subscribe and Save where they would send you items on a monthly schedule. It sounds like the same e-commerce business idea you encountered.

Re: The MLM Epidemic in 13 Maps

#28

Post by jandrese »

thephyber wrote: post #22
jandrese wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article lists a lot of MLM companies that started on the coasts and worked inward, including pretty much every snake-oil "wellness" product supplier.

> that started on the coasts 9 of the 13 companies didn't start on "the coasts".

By my count 6 of the 13 started on the coasts:

ASEA, ATOMY, Jeunesse, Kannaway, LulaRoe, World Global Network

If you count Texas's Gulf Coast the figure would be higher. For many of the rest it's the Mormon effect. Neighbors want to help neighbors and that ends up involving them buying into MLM snake-oil pyramids.

Re: The MLM Epidemic in 13 Maps

#29

Post by CameronBarre »

Spooky23 wrote: post #7

When I worked retail sales in the 90s there was an Amway cult meeting nearby. Every few weeks, they would drop in after a pep-rally type thing and try to waste your time looking at the most expensive thing and talk about their amazing business. Then they'd drop the pitch (at the time it was about their e-commerce business). Once you ran into them, you could spot them. It was a mix of desperate mid-life crisis guys lo…

Cult is the right word for it. I went to a meeting once, met the leader, and it was fascinating. I caught every bit of the psychological warfare in play.

Shortly after, I realized an important fact about MLMs, or at least Amway:

They encourage members to work harder at their real jobs (their plan A) in order to finance what they call the member's plan B (independent business, early retirement, wealth, etc). This results in a siphoning of capital from the legitimate economy to the pyramid organization, producing mind numbing amounts of physical waste in the process.

What's missing from most pyramid scheme diagrams, including the one in this article, are the arrows pointing from the legitimate economy (value adding corporations that the members work for as well) through the member, and then up the pyramid to the top.

Viewed through this lens, it's obvious that MLMs function as parasites, like a tick on a cow.

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