Network Marketing / Pyramid Schemes / Distribution

At some point or another in the average person's life they will come across a friend who wants to share with them an amazing opportunity to become fabulously wealthy. The friend or relative will invite them to a demonstration or a gathering of like-minded people, and then a stranger will do a presentation.

I was first approached in 1979 by a friend on his way to millionaire status as an Amway rep who promised me untold wealth and success and offered case studies of doctors and lawyers who had turned their backs on vocation in favour of soap. Well, not quite soap, but a distributorship of distributorships of soap.

In the ensuing 35 years I have lost count of the number of people who are convinced I would be a perfect distributor, reporting to them, buying from them, becoming rich from the crumbs of their table. Here's what I've learned.

1. If millionaire status is so possible, why are we always meeting in something less than a mansion, with a car somewhat less than the dream Porsche sitting in the driveway?

2. If there are so many doctors and lawyers who have abandoned their vocations for soap, why can't anyone introduce me to one of them? Wouldn't this presentation be so much more effective with even one millionaire in the room?

3. As a professional sales person, I can tell you that the most difficult challenge for most sales people is prospecting. It takes a great deal of courage to approach even known associates and ask for business; no one enjoys rejection. The professional sales person gets used to it, and some face 10 or more rejections for every appointment accepted, and 10 or more meetings for every sale. Is the unprofessional up to the task?

4. Some math shows that if every distributor really does recruit 10 underlings, and they really can recruit 10, and they can recruit 10 - in that first three moves our entire city and county would be distributors. In 10 moves, the entire planet. Is that even possible?

5. And finally, if Amway really is the answer (and face it, everyone else is just trying to imitate them) then how do they manage to keep bellhops and housekeepers and valets at the Four-Diamond hotel they own in Grand Rapids? Shouldn't it be impossible to find minimum wage help in the very birthplace of distributor marketing?

I guess not everyone's cut out to be a millionaire. I've got more bad news for my starry eyed friends - not everyone wants to be one either.