Count the Mary Kay Lies
Mary Kay nsd Krista Neal Warner has a training document on her area website called “Don’t Say No Until You Know About Mary Kay Inc.” Except the document is filled with lies. They range from the typical lies about Mary Kay being the best selling brand, to fabricated numbers about how much consultants and directors make. Some of the more outrageous ones include:
- Mary Kay is #1 in brand loyalty among customers who buy skin care products. Three out of five women will buy the product after being introduced to it. It is estimated that 80% will continue to use the Skin Care after they have been introduced to the product
- Some 30 million consumers purchase approximately 200 million Mary Kay products each year.
- Mary Kay is the #1 best selling brand skin care in the U.S. for the 8th year in a row!
- Mary Kay returns 37% of her dollar to Consultants and Directors in the way of bonuses and incentive programs. In 2000 this amount equated to over $400 million.
- Fortune Magazine stated that one-year in Mary Kay was equal to $4,500 worth of training.
- According to the Wall Street Journal, there are more women in Mary Kay who earn over $100,000 a year than any other company in the world today. We have developed more millionaires than any other company in the world.
- Mary Kay training classes are equal to college courses in marketing, communications, personnel, and small business management. Training is free and local.
- Approximately 66% of all consultants work a full-time job and work Mary Kay part-time. They learn the business, build a customer base, and may begin building a team to manage. They may quit their full-time jobs when they are making more money in Mary Kay.
- It is estimated that more women have earned over $1 million from their Mary Kay careers than at any other company in the world.
- Mary Kay is #4 in Internet Retail Sales in the World!
- Mary Kay’s marketing plan is taught at the Harvard School of Business and several other major universities.
- Average ANNUAL income for management positions in Mary Kay: Grand Achiever – $19,000, Sales Director – $50,000, Senior Sale Director – $75,000, Exec. Senior Sales Director – $100,000, National Sales Director – $250,000
The lies about the earnings are so concerning because the company doesn’t have any idea how much people actually make. They know it’s not close to those figures, but beyond that, they just don’t have the tax returns of consultants and directors so they can’t know how much they make. And the truth is that most people lose money in multi-level marketing.
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Aside from the blatant lies, their terminology needs to be defined.
“Some 30 million consumers purchase approximately 200 million Mary Kay products each year.”
Who are these consumers? Are they the consultants? And do they consume them because they think it will bring them wealth? Is it pure desire for the product, or the “opportunity” that makes them purchase the product?
A normal customer might buy a cream or two. But tell them it’s an “opportunity” and Mary Kay Inc. has just made a $1000+ sale. Clever, clever. But wait there’s more,
Not only does the dupe make a huge purchase, she finds more dupes to do the same. Now that’s a genius scam……turn the scamee into the scammer concurrently.
I call B.S.
” It is estimated that 80% will continue to use the Skin Care after they have been introduced to the product”
I watch a lot of beauty channels on you tube – a lot have moved on from makeup to also covering skincare, and guess what I have never ever seen them use a MK product. I see them re purchasing CeraVe, Drunk Elephant, Cetaphil, The Ordinary, Laneige, Pacifica, Burt’s Bees, Pixie, Sunday Riley, 4Th Ray beauty… But I have never ever seen them use or mention MK, I rarely see anyone in the comments mention MK unless they are trying to sell it & the other thousands of subscribers thumbs down those comments pretty quickly….. There’s no way 80% of any age group under 70 is using MK regularly…..
I have to agree with Char.
Are the consultants or the consumers purchasing these products? There is no tracking of actual “sales”, unless it’s to the consultant.
Yes, there may be 200 million products sold, but to who?
My thoughts exactly! Since MK doesn’t track retail sales after the product is purchased by the consultant, where do these numbers come from? And even IF MK is the “#1 selling brand in the US”, I bet it’s only based on consultant purchases, not end-users.
That’s funny because my Leadership Conference training wasn’t free, nor did I make $50,000/year prior to being in a Cadillac. That math alone would mean most Directors are doing $16,000 wholesale production, and they’d all be in Cadillacs with that production.
And let’s not forget the other non-free training: Career Conference, Seminar, Fall Retreat, guest events, unit meetings. Not one bit was free.
“And let’s not forget the other non-free training: Career Conference, Seminar, Fall Retreat, guest events, unit meetings. Not one bit was free.”
Not only does the dupee find more dupes for the scam company, the dupees also spend their own money for the privilege of learning how to dupe others – while being duped themselves at the training event. Funny, not funny.
And, the company makes big money off these events. It’s a double win for the scam company. Brilliant.
Fortunately, it’s not as easy as they make it sound to find dupes. That’s why they need to lie! See article. If they told the truth, too few would financially support the real business, MKC.
It amuses me that consultants tout that Mary Kay is debt-free. Don’t they realize it is their big purchases, under the guise of a business opportunity, that make that claim possible for Mary Kay? Helloooooo.
But, let’s be positive and give credit where credit is due. Mary Kay is a clever, genius, brilliant and truly magnificent SCAM aka MLM company.
Mary Kay is an MLM company. Fact! One might ask why they need to hide that fact and call it dual-marketing instead? Oh that’s right. MLM = Pyramid Scheme = Scam
“Not only does the dupee find more dupes for the scam company, the dupees also spend their own money for the privilege of learning how to dupe others – while being duped themselves at the training event. Funny, not funny.”
On Reddit, I described it as paying someone to convince you to give them more of your money.
“Mary Kay returns 37% of her dollar to Consultants and Directors in the way of bonuses and incentive programs.” 100% of this money comes FROM consultants purchases of product, and most of it is distributed to the consultant’s upline as commissions and bonuses. A director can get 25% or maybe more of the purchase price her recruit paid. And the ones above her get their cut …
They just keep parroting the same lies over and over.
Harvard has stated publicly and categorically that they do NOT teach the Mary Kay business model. Yet the lie persists.
The Fortune Magazine and Wall Street Journal “quotes” are always given without attribution, because they never happened, either.
The implication that building a customer base may bring in enough income that you can quit your full-time job: yeah, right. No one on the bottom of the pyramid makes squat, and they know it. Once the ink on your contact dries, you find out the only way to make more than pocket change is to recruit, and hope the people you recruit also recruit, and that THEY recruit, ad nauseam.
All you really need to know is this: Mary Kay corporate sales divided by the number of consultants works out to something less than $2,000 per consultant. Even if all that product were being sold at retail (ha!) The average consultant is taking in less than $40 per week selling product, before expenses.
Let’s carry the math further. 37% of that $2,000 per consultant in corporate sales, or $740, goes back to the uplines in commissions and bonuses. If you’re midway up the pyramid, you might receive (being generous) half of that, or $370. So how many do you need in your downline to gross, say, $37,000 per year? 100. A downline of 100, and after expenses you might earn as much as $20,000 per year.
Your downline will need to be at least 3 levels deep. If you recruit 4, and they recruit 4 each (16), and THEY all recruit 4 each (64) that’s only 84 in your downline. Oh, and they’re dropping out right and left. Keep recruiting! Stay on that hamster wheel!
Of course Harvard doesn’t teach this business model. The people at Harvard are smart.
And, yes, it’s Double Credit time. Again. But, look how many will be claiming they sold that much product!
https://thinkpinksoftware.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/TPS-DoubleCredit.pdf
We all know MK Legal reads here daily too and theirs “contractors” put these lies out
I doubt that 37% is returned to their dollar. Even if they do, the constant Changes in products contributes to an enormous burden on its sales force.
I always wondered how multi-level marketing company distributors’ taxes worked out. I’m surprised that the company doesn’t know how much their workers make, but I suppose that’s par for the course if you work independently from the company (i.e. are not an employee). Still, this is interesting stuff. Thanks for sharing.
If you have to explain what “International” means, and don’t know how “Johns Hopkins” is spelled….eeeeek.