False Income Claims from Mary Kay Sales Director Roya Mattis
Written by The Scribbler
False income claims are the primary recruiting tool used by multi-level marketing companies to lure in new recruits. Mary Kay sales director Roya Mattis loves to say “if she can do it, I can do it too.” But what if “IT” is complete fiction, as is the case with Mattis? In yesterday’s article, Mary Kay Elite Executive Senior Sales Director Roya Mattis made the following three claims about her Mary Kay business:
- “…the home of our dreams, we moved in after three and a half years totally debt-free.”
- “[We]live in a new 7500 square foot dream home that my Mary Kay business paid for.”
- “I drive a FREE pink Cadillac.”
It was proven that Mattis was not “totally debt-free” upon moving into her dream home (nor is she now, as the house is under water with two mortgages), her Mary Kay business did not pay for said home, and the pink Cadillac she drives isn’t free.
Today we’re going to examine two more of Mattis’ income claims and determine if there’s more fudging going on here than a bake sale hosted by the Keebler elves. Take it away, Roya!
Mattis says this about her family’s financial situation:
“Financially, we went from renting a condo, to buying our first townhome in our first year. To building our dream home 2 ½ years later, a 7-bedroom, 6-bathroom, 7500 square foot home. I don’t share that at all to brag or boast…my husband even got a choice to retire two years ago from Corporate America, and so, Mary Kay’s been our sole support.” (Making a Business Plan -Inventory Options by Roya Mattis)
I discovered this version of Mattis’ I-Story tucked into an inventory discussion aimed at brand-new consultants and thought, “Why do new consultants need to hear Mattis gush about her dream home, anyway? Aren’t Mary Kay I-Stories meant to grow both a sense of desire and a feeling of lack in potential recruits?”
Yes, and it’s serving that purpose here as well, albeit with brand-new consultants. You see, Mattis insinuates – through the mention of her home and husband – that her Mary Kay business has pulled in enough money to allow her husband to retire, hence the claim of Mary Kay acting as the family’s sole support. The claim paves the way nicely for Mattis to frontload inventory as she vigorously sings the praises of getting a $4800 store and how it can “build your confidence instead of your frustration.” (Making a Business Plan -Inventory Options by Roya Mattis)
In a nutshell, the message Mattis is sending to new consultants is “Invest in $4800 worth of makeup and you, too, will be living my rosy lifestyle in no time.” But really, are things as rosy as they appear to be in Mattis’ Mary Kay world?
Mattis claims in her inventory discussion that her husband Noah had the choice to retire “two years ago.” My first question was “When was that?” Fortunately, Mattis admits in the discussion that she’s been “full-time in MK for over seven years.” Mattis joined MK in October 2000 and admitted to quitting her regular job eight months later to do Mary Kay full-time. That brings us to June 2001. Fast-forward ahead seven years and we can deduce that Mattis’ inventory discussion was recorded in the latter part of 2008.
Knowing this,the LinkedIn profile of Noah Mattis tells a very different story about his so-called “retirement” from Corporate America:
April 2006-July 2008 National Account Manager Localeze/TargusInfo
August 2008 – March 2010 Media Advertising Specialist, Major Key Accounts, Washington Examiner
March 2010 – January 2012 Major Account Manager, Public Sector, Oracle
January 2012 – Present Account Manager DOD Army – Major Commands, CA Technologies
Noah Mattis is not only neck-deep in Corporate America, he was neck-deep in it back in 2008 when his wife made the “retirement” claim in her inventory discussion!
I doubt Noah Mattis was/is working for all these companies for free, so that means Roya Mattis’s Mary Kay business is NOT her family’s “sole support.” What I want to know is why Mattis feels the need to lie about her financial situation not once, but four separate times in her I-Stories! This is absolutely unacceptable behavior, as a fake Mary Kay I-Story has tremendous potential to exploit – and even ultimately harm – its listener.
Imagine a woman (we’ll call her Teresa) who’s in dire financial straits. While browsing about the internet, Teresa comes across Mattis’s I-Story, hears the claims about the free car, the dream home that Mary Kay paid for, the husband who retired from Corporate America, and how Mary Kay is her family’s sole support. Teresa – filled with excitement and fresh hope – joins Mary Kay, not realizing that every last one of Mattis’s wonderful-sounding claims is false. Thanks to Mattis’s fakery, Teresa is now a member of a pink pay-to-play recruiting club that will require her to lie (in various forms/methods) so she can move up, and on it goes. Quite frankly, there are few things more repugnant than a company that proudly boasts a motto that begins, “God First,” while knowing full well that its livelihood hinges on the perpetual deception of women.
I’d like to close with an interesting tidbit taken from a video version of Roya Mattis’s I-Story. On the video, Mattis talks about being tracked down by the “cheesy” Mary Kay ladies and getting hounded to sign the dotted line. Mattis claimed to have questioned the consultants for two and a half-hours, adding, “My dad taught me that if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.” (Roya’s Personal 5-Minute Story, http://vimeo.com/55381039)
I’d say that’s very good advice to keep in mind the next time you hear a Mary Kay consultant, director, or NSD launch into an I-Story. If you’re being told that the dream home is paid for, that someone’s totally debt-free, their spouse retired, and by thunder, it’s all thanks to their Mary Kay business, look further. It probably isn’t.
Visit the 
Oh Boy. Once the command goes out to scrub all forms of recruiting documents and retract any false claims, what WILL they all talk about?
LOL.
“Welcome Guests! We invited you tonight to hear about why we need replacement recruits to bolster production for our Units! We’d like you to meet our Directors, who will tell you what they did before, how many cars they qualified for using your orders, and their highest commission check registering the largest month they had finding recruits who would buy full stores worth of merchandise. We use the highest cause we dream big, and any day now we might repeat it! We’re hoping you sign up tonight so we don’t have to keep paying co-pays on our awarded cars, which have cost each of us on average of about 10K. But they do pay for our tags and part of out insurance! So open your ears and minds and see if Mary Kay isn’t for you! We’re living the dream!!”
More like, “We’re dreaming the life!!” ‘Cuz they sure aren’t living it.
From how often he jumps from job to job. It does give the impression he doesn’t seem to hold onto them for very long. I could be wrong though depending on what he is trained to do.
Nah, given what he’s doing, it’s not that unusual to change jobs every few years. These days it’s the best way to increase your compensation.
Of course he probably really needs to keep increasing his compensation so his wife can continue to live in the style to which she’s become accustomed. How else to sell the dream?
I agree…in his industry, Government Contracting (even if he is not specifically involved in the government contracts) the norm is right around 2 years.
The job bouncing is normal for the IT industry … he’s had steady employment and that’s what counts.
You know what would help? Corporate requiring its directors and NSDs to record/reformulate a new I-Story every 3-6 months. Things change a LOT in the Mary Kay world due to the nature of the business; rank changes, units are lost, people leave, life goes on. Current (and honest) I-Stories would reflect reality, but then again, reality might mean telling potential recruits, “Along with my husband’s income, the income from my Mary Kay business contributes towards our house payment” instead of “[We] live in a new 7500 square foot dream home that my Mary Kay business paid for.”
It’s easy to see which statement sounds more impressive, and the Mary Kay world is all about putting forth the APPEARANCE of success so the fresh recruits (and their “optional” inventory orders) keep on coming.
The question I put forth to the women underneath Roya Mattis’ leadership is this: Is Roya one of those “bad apples” I keep hearing about, or is she blameless?
If Roya’s a bad apple, then wouldn’t it make sense to take a stand against such negative behavior – behavior that is NOT characteristic of a good leader – and speaking out against it? Mary Kay Ash even said, “Honesty is the cornerstone to all success.”
If Roya’s blameless, then I’m afraid your sense of ethics is as tainted as hers, which makes you an ideal candidate for the position of National Sales Director.
I’ve been lurking for awhile now, and this piece has finally prompted me to comment.
I was brought into MK about 6 months ago by a co-worker friend of my husband. She’s making good money, but her dream is to move away from the area and stay at home full time with her kids. She is very good at selling and has sold about $18,000 retail in the last year working MK part time. She has completely bought into the MK dream, and can’t stop talking about how wonderful Roya is after seeing her as the featured speaker at this year’s January “Jump” rah rah session (Roya is one of our local SDs).
My experience with people new to MK is that they are generally dissatisifed with something big in their lives (job, work/life balance, geographical location, etc), and MK has sold them on the idea that they can have what they want if they are willing to work hard at their business. My friend is an intelligent woman, but she has thrown reason and logic out the window because she wants to desperately to believe that MK will give her the life she wants.
My friend is currently in DIQ and refuses to acknowledge as truth anything negative I have to say about the company. Knowing that the odds are stacked against her, I’m currently struggling to decide if I should try to help her make it through DIQ by regaining my active status and then sell my stuff back once she’s done, or if I should just sell it all back now.
You know it’s a racket. Why assist your friend in digging her hole even deeper?
You say your friend has sold $18k retail in the last year. Are you sure you don’t really mean she has ORDERED 18k of retail products in the last year? You have no idea whether those products were really sold. And IF they were sold, after discounts and expenses, your friend has made a MAXIMUM of $7,000… probably much less. And chances are that she’s put all of that theoretical profit back into new products and going to events like Seminar… so her family likely hasn’t seen any of that money.
She will go into debt to get through DIQ, placing orders for phantom recruits to meet the production requirements.
Please don’t aid her in this quest.
When someone in MK says “I sold $xxx Retail” that is a code phrase that REALLY means “I bought $xxx wholesale, doubled the price I paid, and got applauded because I just know I’m going to sell it for full retail price. Eventually. Maybe. I hope.”
I had a good friend who signed up with Mary Kay assured me that she would never buy inventory, yet was eventually strong-armed into buying inventory anyway. A few months later she told me that she has “sold” $1800, and I asked to whom she sold it. Then she added up all her receipts. Didn’t take long. The total was about $30. She looked at that for a while, then said it seemed kind of funny to have been applauded for “selling” $1800, when all she had really sold was about $30.
You are an active consultant, so your DIQ friend will strong-arm you to place an order, too. You’re going to get a call, maybe in the next two days, saying that she “just needs one more order and would you PLEEEZZZEEE help her! She is sooooooo close!” After all, you are Her Friend, and Friends Help Friends, and she will repay the favor, you means so much to her, you’ll never regret it!
She’s reading from a script, and it’s a bunch of BS. As soon as she has your order she’ll move on – until she needs another order.
Remember that everyone wins the free facial from the fishbowl. The script for DIQ Dialing for Dollars is no different. She could be the full $4000 away from her monthly quota and she will lie to EVERYONE she calls saying that she “just needs one more order and would you PLEEEZZZEEE help her! She is sooooooo close!”
I have a few additional points I’m very interested in hearing your perspective on.
A) Roya shares her 1099s at her team meetings, so I’m curious why you suggest her income claims are false. I’m quite confident that she is making the money she says she is. Whether you believe in the “way” she makes her money is a different story, but she is making it.
B) I have a large house myself that I would argue is ‘paid for’ by my job. That doesn’t mean I don’t owe money on it. I have a mortgage and it’s my [non-Mary Kay] job and income that provides me the ability to continue to pay that hefty mortgage. That’s what I’ve always inferred from Roya’s story as well – that Mary Kay has given her the ability to pay the mortgage for her dream home, although maybe I’m just discerning enough to know better when I hear an I-story like Roya’s to know that people don’t just pay $700K in cash to buy a house. Maybe other women think otherwise when they hear her story? Did you look up her student loans and wedding debt? Were those paid off when she bought her home (thus, was she debt-free before she entered into a mortgage agreement)? I don’t know the answer.
C) Mortgage interest rates have dropped over 2 percentage points in the last year. Do you think refinancing seems reasonable as a result? I’ve refinanced 3 times in the last two years, primarily because I just wanted a better deal, not because I’m underwater on my home.
D) I live in a 4,000 Sq ft home that is listed on Zillow as 2,750 sq ft – because the basement is not included in the footage. I’ve been inside Roya’s home and it’s significantly bigger than mine. My only point here is that I don’t believe Zillow to be the perfectly reliable source – I’d use a surveyor first to validate against her 7,500 sq. ft claim (having been inside though, I wouldn’t be surprised if her claim is close to accurate).
E) Noah did leave corporate America for about a year to explore jobs that were more aligned to what he wanted for his career and I would suggest he was in a position to be able to do that because Roya was able to be the sole supporter for a period of time. “Retire” is probably the wrong word, so I understand your view, but there is some truth to her claim.
I see what you’re trying to get at from this expose, but calling her story “complete fiction”? Isn’t that just propaganda in the opposite direction? Can we agree that reality is somewhere in the middle ground between her story and yours? I am humbly curious to hear your reaction to my points above.
Jessica – I can sum up your position in one sentence:
In order to believe that Roya’s statements are true, we must set aside all common sense and all common meanings of words and phrases, and instead apply a twisted interpretation to her words.
More specifically: She lies about her income because she is claiming she has income that has paid for a house with no mortgage. The truth is that the house is much smaller per the public records, she has a mortgage and always has, she didn’t “refinance” the house as she went through a mortgage modification (totally different thing), she is not her family’s sole support, and her husband never retired.
Good try, but you’ve failed miserably. Roya is a liar, and the proof is in public records and other publicly available information.
“Can we agree that reality is somewhere in the middle ground between her story and yours?”
Unlikely. Do you know why?
If you knew an article was being written about you that claimed to debunk several of your Mary Kay income claims, and you were given the opportunity to provide clarification to help make sure that article provided an accurate portrayal, wouldn’t you seize that opportunity?
Roya Mattis was contacted multiple times and failed to respond. I was fully prepared to scale back or even scrap the article entirely had she responded with detailed information, but she didn’t.
That, quite honestly, tells me she’s in no rush to correct what I’ve written.
“Noah did leave corporate America for about a year to explore jobs that were more aligned to what he wanted for his career”
Looking at his job history from his own Linked-In profile, I see no year long gaps in employment. He’s been stepping from one office into another, not “exploring his options”.
April 2006-July 2008 National Account Manager Localeze/TargusInfo
August 2008 – March 2010 Media Advertising Specialist, Major Key Accounts, Washington Examiner
March 2010 – January 2012 Major Account Manager, Public Sector, Oracle
January 2012 – Present Account Manager DOD Army – Major Commands, CA Technologies
So either he’s lying about his job history, or she’s lying about what he did to make her income look more impressive. You choose.
I too was “under” Roya and although she was very good at what she did and a lovely person…. she had the “talking points down alright”…. I fell for it hook line and sinker.. I bought a ton of inventory I never sold instead of having it be ok to order just what you needed… I went to the convention…. for what? To get pumped up and that is it.. a waste of time and money… its all phoney and I am much older and wiser now, but I wasted a ton of money (probably over 4,000.00) and all I did was make Roya money…. I too have been to her house and the same claims were made about it being paid for etc… I just wish they would be honest and tell you that you “could” make money at it if you spend every waking moment suckering others into believing that you can be a National some day…. ISNT HAPPENING>…
“A) Roya shares her 1099s at her team meetings,”
sorry, 1099s only show money and the value of prizes received from MKult over $600 in a year, not her own income from sales etc….. So we need Schedule Cs – what is filed with the IRS – to see how much money she is actually making after her costs of doing “business”.