Lying About Sales Director Income
The lies about the money made in Mary Kay are rampant. Almost no one makes money in MLM. But they’ll convince you that if you make it to sales director, THEN you’ll be making BIG GIRL MONEY. After all, it’s the top 2% of the company!
This graphic was made almost 10 years ago, based on the suits shown, but they’re still circulating it. Lies like this are widely circulated, even by NSDs like Dacia Wiegandt, who should know better. Notice they say that sales directors make $5,000 to $25,000 monthly. Even if you assumed you were going to make the lower end of earnings, you would believe you’re going to make at least $60,000 per year as a director. (And that’s before expenses!)
But the truth is that you will mostly likely make MINIMUM WAGE as a sales director. At last count, there were 9,000 sales directors in the U.S.
At least 5,100 of those directors (i.e. more than half of all sales directors) make less than $16,800 per year. If you worked 40 hours per week for 50 weeks out of the year, that’s $8.40 per hour. Don’t let anyone tell you things like “oh they only work part time” or “they make a ton of money from product sales too.” Those are both lies.
About 3,000 sales directors make between $16,800 and $40,800 per year. (Remember: the numbers I’m quoting here are gross commissions BEFORE paying any business expenses.)
Add it all up and you see that 8,100 sales directors (90% of them) make $40,000 or less a year. Most of them much, much less. So the statement that directors make between $5,000 and $25,000 monthly is a blatant lie.
And national sales directors making $25,000 to $150,000 monthly?
Half of NSDs don’t even make $10,000 per month!!! If you take a look at the numbers in this article, you see that in June 2020, 30 Mary Kay NSDs made $25,000 or more, out of about 220 NSDs total. And $150,000 per month? The highest earner in MK is Gloria Mayfield Banks with $124,074. Sure, that’s a lot of money (all made by swindling hundreds of women per month into buying inventory packages), but the point is that the claim in the promo piece is a big lie.
For the millionth time I ask: If the Mary Kay opportunity is so wonderful, why do they have to lie about it?
Visit the
LOL “opitomy”
That was the first thing I saw when glancing at the photos. It’s such a glaring typo.
YES! I didn’t have to post it myself lol. Not only do they not UPDATE THE FREAKING PHOTOS, but CORRECT THE TYPO???? Hasn’t ANYONE let the “author” know, no one out of all the ranks of MK??? How do they not realize how ignorant that causes then to look, and then the old photos don’t embarrass them as well? Another one they can’t process is Voila! Wala! omg….
Former sales directors, when you were “in” and you saw these false earning claims, did you think “I must be doing something wrong because I’m not making this amount of money” or something along the lines of “Yeah, yeah, there’s corporate exaggerating earnings again? I WISH I made that much.”
No, you just shamed yourself for not trying hard enough. Not enough bee-lief. Not enough training. Working with the “wrong” people. Focusing on the “wrong” things. You don’t need to be at EVERY one of your child’s concerts – you could stay home and make phone calls. You don’t need to take family vacations in June – there are 11 other months you could vacation during.
They brainwash (manipulate) your thinking so intensely, you really bee-lieve there’s something wrong with you and what you are (or are not doing) that you don’t have this success.
In addition, if you visit sites like PT, or you discuss valid concerns about income earnings, you are shamed for your negative thinking and redirected to pray more, attend a training, make ten calls/texts, do some IPA, or so forth.
It’s sick. And then “train” your downline the same way.
That’s really too bad. ☹️ All these women blaming themselves when the expectations were never realistic in the first place, and even worse MK Corp knowingly conned them all while shaming them at the same time.
100% I thought there was something wrong with me. But if it was a “me” problem, then it was also a “me” solution. I can’t tell you how many trees I killed strategizing how to achieve these results next month. How many faces, how many interviews, how much personal production, how much I could expect from my current team. How many emerald star orders. Just one hot shot new consultant would take me there! Whether I found her or not, I was always in the same situation the next month, too. Such a vicious cycle, and 95% of Corporate’s resources are focused in making sure you don’t figure it out.
Another way it’s deceptive is that they make these positions seem attainable. If only 2% of IBCs make it to director, that’s 20,000 for every 1,000,000 IBCs. If, say, 1% of directors make it to NSD, that’s only 200 for every 1,000,000 starting IBCs. That’s only .002%. Cut that in half for the NSDs who make anything like a living wage.
It’s like putting a drop of wine into a swimming pool full of water and then expecting it to taste like Beaujolais.
What I don’t understand is why it is has always been “top 2%”. Is that the limit allowed for directors, that only 2% can be allowed (lololol) to be directors? It may be me, I realize that, but shouldn’t that percentage change at some point OVER 60 YEARS? Do I make any sense here?
I was thinking this very thing yesterday in the discussion of Nationals. Do they have a target number of people they want in that position, and that’s where they are getting that number? ONLY 2% CAN be at that level – because how would they pay out the big commissions if, say, 50% of the sales force made it to NSD? That helps in understanding what is going on behind the Pink Curtain.
O.M.G.
The PINK CURTAIN
That’s the perfect stake through the heart of the vampire, could not be more accurate!!! Dreadfully accurate.
For a while, I was hearing them say “top 1%”, but now it’s back to top 2%.
Here’s some fun math around all of this…
According to research for the FTC, 0.4% of MLMers don’t lose money. Let’s be generous and state that 0.4% actually make money (after expenses). That’s one in 250. Now, Mary Kay claims that 2% of their consultants make it to director. That’s 1/50th of the IBCs. So, of the 2% that make it to director, what percentage of directors are actually turning a true business profit? 20%, or one in five directors. 20% of 2% is 0.4%.
This means 80% of directors are actually losing money, after accounting for expenses. And remember, this is lifetime MK engagement, not just last month. Total spent on Mary Kay (lifetime) minus total received in commissions and bonuses from Mary Kay (lifetime) is a loss for 80% of directors, and 99.6% of all participants (if you believe Mary Kay’s numbers about directors).
Just like everything in MLM, their numbers can’t add up, because the story they tell is incomplete. The sales reps are the true customers, which is why so many must lose money. These losses are fundamental to the MLM business plan. The money for upline profits actually comes from these down-line losses.
They don’t deal in “real” money anyway. My former director lost her pink caddy after I “relinquished ” my unit. (Big eye roll here because they took it from me for not meeting my quotas), anyway, she posts to her current newbies about only needing $52,000 wholesale by the end of June. “We’ve got this girls!” She enthusiastically posts. I’m like, wow! If you need that much still, how do you plan to maintain that pink puff on wheels if you do end up “earning” it? It’s so unrealistic!
But, but, but…. Mary Kay has no quotas. lol.
My director used to say stuff like that, too. We’re ONLY 50k away. Ummm, ma’am. That’s a lot of freakin’ money.
I love when the up-line congratulates them for breaking even.
“You didn’t make any money, but you didn’t lose any either! You broke even! And you got 10 leads!”
Wake up.