Nothing Has Changed in Mary Kay
Written by SuzyQ
Hello again. Did you know that I sent my inventory back to Mary Kay in 2007? (Yes, that was almost 16 years ago!) And that many of the articles on Pink Truth authored by me were written then and in the few years after? We keep updating and re-sharing them on the front page because nothing has changed in Mary Kay.
Everything that the “old guard” wrote is still applicable, and as I said in one article, there is a “backstage reality” in MK, meaning that the audience changes but the play remains the same.
When I sent back my products in 2007, I used a return form found on Pink Truth. I remember clearly not using the company return form because I did not want my senior director to know I was sending back around $4,000 of inventory. I didn’t know that it would cause a chargeback for her in June, but I took special delight in that once I found out.
I still think about MK and come to Pink Truth to check out what new idiocy is spewing. It’s rewarding to see new people STILL finding the site. I remember my first visits and reading my story when I hadn’t written it yet. It was so validating to learn my concerns were not demonic and I wasn’t crazy. There came a point when I couldn’t sustain the smoke and sequin lies anymore. It was pretty dramatic all in all. My “free car” was towed, the company told me that if I quit being a director I would lose my unit, my senior director told me I could still be a team leader, and my NSD sent me a birthday card wishing me “Your best MK year ever!”
I “knew” about the shunning from the other directors, I did not KNOW about the shunning from the other directors. These women had been in my life for 10 years. Those were years without personal boundaries. I knew more about them than they knew about themselves. There was nothing we didn’t share. Even our fear of failure. Those talks occurred after we drank copious amounts of alcohol in dark rooms at events where alcohol was not permitted. (Mary Kay does not permit alcohol at events.)
We also talked about kids with problems and the guilt of leaving them at home because we had to attend events. (Mary Kay does not permit children at events) And on and on.
The hypocrisy was stunning and somehow it was justified, and I was okay with that. Those director high checks at events that were represented as normal monthly commission checks? They were probably one-time things that happened years ago. We were supposed to “Sell the Sizzle” and draw unsuspecting women to us.
And what was not to like about us? Our makeup was perfect, we were neatly groomed and had “slammin’ haircuts,” we were poised and confident. And we put God first, family second and MK third. We were all in this, all in, together until one of us “stepped down.” Or quit.
The shunning began immediately. No more email, no more phone calls, nothing. I knew what was being said about me because it had been said about others before me. I was negative, didn’t work my business, didn’t beelieve enough, didn’t have a high enough deserve level, looked at “that evil site,” and my personal favorite, “I let satan steal my dreams.”
Everything I have read about Mary Kay since I “stepped down” continues to reinforce all of the abusive cultish behavior that persists in MK (and other MLMs). I do believe that I could still recruit someone today, because I was that good at recruiting. Recently, when I was talking about my experience in MK, I launched into the recruiting spiel, and the woman I was talking to responded in a positive manner to my questions. I stopped and said something to the effect that this is all a lie! She said “Damn, this is what happened to my friend.” Her friend is no longer in MK and has visited Pink Truth.
I believe we are making a difference with Pink Truth. It was so wonderful being in the 20/20 episode and having at least a small voice from the “other side” of the MLM debate. It is satisfying to watch numbers of consultants drop, and I enjoy learning that some seminar areas have been absorbed into others, career conference cities have decreased and there is likely only one leadership session in 2020. (Please note that the “easier” the company makes the requirements to be a director, the more likely she is to be unable to sustain her unit. This only benefits her senior director.)
I also enjoy watching the newer NSDs continue to find themselves on the never-ending hamster wheel of churning new recruits and directors. As our beloved MK told us, “people are coming in the front door, and leaving by the back door” and” your unit is like a bathtub with an open drain…” or something like that. SHE KNEW. She knew and spewed this opportunity anyway.
One last thing. I was told to burn my bridges. I was told repeatedly that MK did not want her directors to work, so I let all my licenses, certificates and assorted initials behind my name go. (If I “burned my bridges,” I would be more focused on my Mary Kay career.) So, I did.
Fast forward to many years after a non-stellar Mary Kay director career (although I did have 40 stars on my ladder of success, 96% of them green). I was in the Court of Sales (ordering) and I sold that ring for $50 to a gold dealer because the “diamonds weren’t worth anything. “ I also “won” 4 career cars and had numerous other awards and honors. If you were in MK in my huge national area back then, I might have been a speaker at a retreat or event. I was a short lived very big deal. But, hey I am a failure.
I had to take refresher courses, clinical practice(s), many exams, and spend thousands of dollars to get all my initials and credentials back. I got them back. Thank God.
Technically, I should retire. I am above retirement age and I am still working. I love my job and the work I do. And if I retired now, I would be bored stiff. But, the other issue is that I lost 10 years of earnings that could have contributed to my social security. (Those fantastic business write-offs and the low commissions, resulting in little to no taxable income.) I had to work longer because of that!
You can judge me all you want, I did what I did because I was told and I believed it was the right thing to do. I believed it was the right thing, the Godly thing to do. I believed that I was the only Bible some people would read and that Mary Kay was my mission field. I was changing lives and offering the best opportunity in the land to women!
All that I believed at the time was a lie. If you are defending Mary Kay, you have bought into this cult. I wish I could talk to you and tell you the truth. If you “stumbled” upon this site and are horrified at the “negativity” please continue to read. You can access the archives. You, too, will be able to read your story before you have written it.
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Thank you SuzyQ. One thing I’ve gleaned from reading Pink Truth is the awareness of what is meant by MK when they say they are “empowering women.” Recruiting into Mary Kay does not help the recruit. It helps the recruiter, the women above her, and Mary Kay Corporate…all at the expense of the recruit.
In business, loosely defined, when one part of the business gains at the expense of another part of the same business, it is called “cannibalization.” But in this case nothing in Mary Kay Corporate is cannibalized…rather it happens entirely inside the sales force…and mostly to the newest members.
Cannabalization isn’t the perfect descriptor here, I agree, but is a good way to explain why the constant recruitment needed for MLM is doomed to fail. Everyone is familiar with the “Starbucks on every corner” joke/meme/whatever you want to call it, and understand how too many of the same business competing for the same customer base is liable to result in bad news for all the locations.
You can apply the same logic to MLM: too many consultants trying to appeal to the same limited customer base and pool of potential recruits, bad news for everyone.
I remember on one documentary on LuLaRoe I saw, one consultant they interviewed had neighbor right next door to her in the exact same apartment building who was also a consultant. Both had huge inventories they couldn’t sell even though they were both doing everything in LuLaRoe-approved ways, and no wonder. (Well, and because the clothes were ugly, cheap, badly made crap, of course.)
I think cannibalization is the perfect description if you’re looking at the financial operations of how MK works. Corporate is “eating” from NSDs, SDs, and IBCs at all levels. NSDs “eat” from their SDs and IBCs. And so on down the chain. The only way corporate and the upline get paid is through purchases by the bottom of the pyramid. There is no other funding stream in Mary Kay other than consultant purchases of products. To survive and make a profit, it MUST be because your downline is taking a loss. Corporate likes to pretend that the bottom of the pyramid is making a profit by selling the products they order to actual customers, but, for the vast majority, this simply is not true.
Thanks Frosty…well said and excellent explanation. The reason I used the term to begin with is the fact one part of the organization is gaining money at the expense of another part of the same organization.
Yes! It’s the Tale of Two Pyramids. The corporate pyramid is funded by the cannibalizing MLM pyramid. Corporate uses the fraudulent MLM pyramid system to feed the company money, and they are willing to provide relatively small kickbacks to the hungriest MLM beasts eating their own offspring.
Corporate owners sit back and enjoy watching the single mother carnage because golf, yachts, and Cowboys’ Stadium suites; and they probably laugh at how serious the sash and crown wearing pseudo princesses take themselves as they share four to a hotel room.
Honestly, I don’t know who I dislike more: Corporate, or the women willing to eat their own?
No judgement here. It’s 100% the fault of the company and their scuzzy recruiting tactics that are designed to get inside your defenses and exploit your weaknesses. There have been plenty of times in my life when the sizzle would have sounded like a godsend: fresh out of college and couldn’t find a job, the retail years where I had a job I hated. What could be better than set your own hours, work from home, get a free car, make executive income? If it meant no more mother giving me little passive-aggressive speeches about being a leech / no more taking two buses to a shady part of town to deal with miserable people during the crap shifts no one else wanted, I’d have signed up for anything.
Younger Me was a meek doormat who was taught to follow authority without question and that failure was the worst thing ever. I’d have plugged along at it, knowing I’d been lied to and that I was doing the wrong thing, but too afraid (mostly of my mother) to quit.
I’d have spoken the lie, lived the lie, believed the lie, hated the lie. Running into a site like this would have been crazy upsetting (admitting the lie is a lie) yet unbelievably validating (because others saw the lie for what it is). And that’s why Current Me goes overboard in exposing the lie, to protect the Younger Me’s out there.
I love this.
Although I had no actual “success” during my 2 years in MK, I briefly felt like the best thing since sliced bread. I was “working to retire” my full time job that I worked SO hard to be licensed in and absolutely love to do. I was told it was a waste of my potential. That my real calling was making women feel beautiful. It makes me a little nauseous to think of what I’d have done to my little family had I followed this ill served advice.
I’ll never forget my “ah-hah” moment…it was in a training class on how to get more recruits. I asked how I softened the blow of encouraging inventory orders, since it IS pushed so hard. My emphasis on this was not appreciated. I was quickly told that it wasn’t my job to do that. My job was to get them to sign the agreement and let my director do the rest. That I needed to “give them just enough to drink to satisfy their thirst, not to blast them with a hose”. Direct quote and a line I’m positive all directors are taught to tell their new red’s and team leads. Manipulation at it’s finest.
My ah-hah moment also came after I asked a logical question, and got incredulous stares. But, it was only one of many ah-hah moments.
Another was when my millionaire NSD refused to pay for a Diet Coke instead of the free iced tea at the Seminar dinner. I requested from the waiter, who then went to her table to ask if it was okay, at which time I heard her say, “If she wants to pay for it. Sure.” I had just spent thousands of dollars to go to Seminar, not to mention all the inventory in my home. Here she was with the “go give spirit”. I don’t know. Something in me just shifted suddenly and I saw. I truly saw the hypocrisy. It’s not so much that I didn’t want to pay the $2 for the Diet Coke, but I think it was overhearing her say, “If she wants to pay for it”. It seemed so catty and petty for her, a successful millionaire, who supposedly provided this dinner for us, to refuse to substitute my soft drink. Now I know that I actually paid for my own dinner.
In Mary Kay, the customer is always wrong.
The licence plate on that pink land yacht is MARY K-1. I wonder if her dog had one with the licence plate MARY K-9 and its own chauffeur to take it to the doggy parlor and pet store.
My license plate was WWMKD. JFC.
Of all the comments to get Ridiculous Downvotes ™ on. OMG. SMH. CBGB.
SuzyQ- Great article. You must have been in my head when you wrote this. I also found Pink Truth in 2007. I was a car driving Director and just could not believe what I was reading…but in my gut knew it was all true. I stayed up all night reading every single word on the site. By morning, I knew what I had to do…The shunning was horrible. Very tough to move past that. Mary Kay messes with your head…no matter what your role or connection. It took years to let go of the anger and shame. Fortunately I had kept up all my professional medical lic/certifications. Kudos to you for reclaiming your professional life. That’s not easy or fun.
To this day, I still live by my lessons learned from my involvement with that cult…TRUST YOUR GUT and you CAN’T LIVE OUTSIDE YOUR COMFORT ZONE. You only step outside your comfort zone to grow. If it feels wrong it is. And Mary Kay is so wrong on so many levels.
Thank you for putting that article together after all these years. You will continue to help many women. <3
Thank you. I knew my experience was not unique and I felt so alone… If I hadn’t had Pink Truth I don’t know that I would have made it back to real life. Thank you!