Directors Who “Stumble Across” Pink Truth
Written by SuzyQ
Dear Directors,
Many of you have “stumbled across” the Pink Truth website and have read with horror and anger some of the articles and comments. Someone used the “watching a train wreck” metaphor and that is pretty descriptive. I did the same thing not so long ago.
I was bored and googled “negative Mary Kay” and found enough reading material for several days. I was stunned. I ended up reading everything on Pink Truth (which was called Mary Kay Sucks way back then).
While reading I started making a list of “don’ts.” Frontloading was number one. I had never heard of the term until PinkTruth. Mary Kay Ash always said “You can’t sell from an empty wagon.” Start MK without an inventory? If I did that, I would be setting my new unit member up for certain failure. I was unable to “pull” emerald and pearl orders, and believed I was at fault, because I was not an effective director.
Dual marketing? Believed that. If someone was naïve enough to ask me about a downline or an upline, I would patiently explain that MK was different. We build “families” not up and down lines.
We’re Number 1? I believed that too. It never occurred to me that MK didn’t track our SALES to customers, only the purchases we made from the company.
Business owner? Yep. FOR myself, not BY myself. I sincerely believed what I told people. I really did. I thought I was conducting my “business” correctly. It took some time to come to terms with the idea that Mary Kay isn’t really a business.
What about when things were bad? Every month was a clean slate, and I would turn my unit around. We would be working together to make everyone’s dream come true. Every new seminar year meant there was another opportunity to change and be successful.
I started posting on Pink Truth. The first time I hit “post” I thought I would throw up. My paranoia was rampant. I argued that MK could work, it could be done correctly. I loved the women in my unit and certainly would never have done anything to hurt them. Mary Kay was my mission field.
I knew MK could work, I had “seen” success with my own eyes, I had talked to the top directors, I knew several NSDs personally and thought nothing of giving them a call if I had a question.
The posters on Pink Truth were so patient with me as I wrote my comments under a variety of names because I couldn’t remember what name I had used… Other women posed questions and made me think. They provided info to me that I had never heard before and made me think. They gave examples from their own experiences and made me think.
I was so scared, so paranoid, feeling so disloyal to the company I loved, so afraid my dream of being an NSD would not come true, terrified about money and expenses. I had made such a huge financial and emotional investment, so many years and it comes to this?
To really be shown that MK is MLM and that’s all there was. If someone had approached me with Amway, I would have told them to go away because Amway was MLM and no way would I be involved in that sort of scheme! It broke my heart when I learned MK is the same thing.
So, directors, if you stumbled onto this site by accident, keep reading. Keep thinking.
It’s always about the timing isn’t it? This may be your time to learn something new about Mary Kay. I am not going to tell you to send your product back, to quit recruiting or to lower your goals and expectations. I know you believe you are doing the right thing and you believe God has placed this dream in your heart and He will guide your steps on the right path.
I know you believe MK always has and always will make decisions based on what is best for the sales force. I know you believe. I hear the arguments going on in your head, most of us said the same things to ourselves.
All I want you to do is to be honest with yourself. Look at your finances. Expenses. Time management. Stress level. Meeting attendance. Recruiting prospects. Inventory expectations. Consistent customer sales vs. ordering patterns. Events, advances and retreats. What you will do with new consultant inventory suggestion? Will you order products for them knowing that some of the products will be changed or discontinued before they can sell them?
There is a lot to think about. A lot to pray about. We’re here if you have questions. I wouldn’t be here if people had not been kind and patient with me.
Peace be with you.
Sincerely,
Another Former Director
Visit the
“Mary Kay was my mission field.” Just glad to see that this is no longer the case. I applaud your courage to see through the manipulation and lies that are MK.
Quitting Mary Kay is not an easy, spur of the moment thing when you have been involved ( brainwashed) for decades. One statement that struck me was when she said she got approached to look at Amway and said she could never be in MLM. And then realized that’s exactly what she was in! It’s so amazing it takes them so long to admit it. When you look at any training chart for red jacket, grand achiever, DIQ, Director or NSD, they are all in the shape of a pyramid with you at the top. Or it’s some sort of disguised configuration of crossing off squares, hearts, stars, jackets, or faces as you recruit your way to the top! All the while “leading” the way with multiple product orders of stuff you’ll never sell.
Continuing….
Team, unit, group = MLM downline = pyramid participants
If you are recruited by someone who was recruited, and then you can also recruit someone who can also recruit, it’s MLM.
If you are [offered a business opportunity] by someone who was [offered the business opportunity], and then you can also [offer the business opportunity] to someone who can also [offer the business opportunity], it’s MLM.
MLM = multi-level marketing
MLM is not a company or a product; it’s the system decribed above. All companies that use the MLM system allow you to resell a product (never actually required), so the “dual-marketing” term is playing consultants (MLMers) for fools.
You can join Mary Kay, make money, and never retail/resell a product. This is achieved by recruiting people to order products, aka a product-based pyramid scheme. Yes, pyramid schemes have products.
Imagine if all the boxes delivered to consultants were empty, but the money is still flowing in from consultants. Nothing would change for “upline” making commissions on downline orders (of empty boxes).
The fact that you *can* retail is irrelevant to the MLM con game. If you are a recruiting consultant, you are an MLMer. That means that you are a pyramid schemer scamming your recruits for a commission……no matter what you call yourself.
Why “scam”? Because you are telling your new recruits that it’s about retailing products, so they will order products that you make a commission on! And so does your upline.
You’re probably also telling them that it is not MLM. 🤥