I have been doing amway for the last 8 years, and I have seen a lot of ups and downs throughout my experience. No matter how my business was doing, I was sold on one thing, Amway works. If it is not going the way I want it to go, it has to do something with me, or the way I run things. Recently however, things have changed. New discoveries, personal studies from Amway's own literature, I have come to a conclusion that it will not work for me. The thing that I was sold on (Amway always works) was mostly a subtle thought injected in me by the CDs and seminars I have listened
For my accomplishments, I attained a platinum business few years ago, and have been doing good, no great. I also have another platinum business under me, and other legs all silvers. For anyone who knows a little about Amway, that’s a solid Emerald foundation. Emerald these days makes roughly around 100k gross. Please don’t think this 100k is yearly.
Average Founders Emerald income in North America is $135,826. As an average, obviously some earn more and some earn less.
The residual nature of the business that is being sold to everyone works in one way, and one way only. As long as you are working, showing the plan, selling training materials, and getting qualified again, you will make that 100k as an Emerald again.
My sponsor is a Founders Emerald. Each one of his qualifying legs has multiple downline Diamonds and two have multiple Crown Ambassadorships in the downline. Believe me, he does not need to be out "working, showing the plan, selling training materials, and getting qualified again".
This applies to any pin starting from 100pv all the way up to crown, as long as you are showing the plan, getting people started, and doing every trick in the book to make people stay, you will get paid. Forget getting paid. The free trips that your upline brags about, you have to get qualified for these trips every year. If you went diamond and then stopped performing, guess what. That peter island trip will only come once.
None of this is a secret. Of course your business needs to keep generating sales volume to keep generating income and qualify for trips. That's the way it should be.
Why did I quit? Well, few reasons. The 100k I mentioned earlier, not every Emerald will get it. It is tricky. With my structure, 3 platinum’s of, roughly around 60 people, I am going to make 60k.
Only 60 people for a platinum business is on the verge of Amway investigating if it was built legitimately. That's extremely unstable. In Europe the average Silver Producer has 150 people in their network. Having platinumships with only 60 people is .... well, odd, and predictably low income and unstable - a lot of work to maintain.
Is that what BWW teaches?
A good amount of money nevertheless. The problem with this is, to achieve this, there is no amount of work that I will do, will justify the leadership that I have reached my true limit (and I have a great work ethic, paid my college tuition during college, working 2 jobs with 15+ credits). If I complain the leadership why I am getting paid less than what is written, I would get the following answers:
Amway pays out
exactly what is written in the compensation plan. The bonuses at your level you can work out *exactly* what you will earn every month. Complaining to someone that you're earning exactly as much as you should be is a bit pointless isn't it?
Another reason. The amount of lies my uplines have told me, and the amount of lies I have told people about Amway (knowingly and not knowingly) is unimaginable. I was encouraged to lie to the prospects and new IBOs.
That is clearly an absurd and dangerous way to run any business, not to mention unethical. Complete opposite of what I've been encouraged.
Why? To help them in the long run. Additionally, I was told to break up with my girlfriend few years ago, because she was anti amway. I was not told directly, but implied during a "core training" session. I will quote accurately "Ladies, do you like your men to be dreamers? Gents, do you like your women to be goal setters, go getters? Would you ever settle with a person without these qualities? If you are dating someone who is not a dreamer, go getter, or who is antiamway, there are plenty of other options out there. You cannot afford to jeopardize your future with someone who is against what you are doing here"
Joecool reported something similar. Even if true - and to an extent it is, nothing to do with Amway, it's the same any endeavour - it's not something you "teach" or encourage.
I would also like to point out the claims people make that leaders get a side income by selling tools. Let me tell you, you are correct!
Well known.
For every CD and for every book you move, there is a margin of 60-80 cents at the lowest level. For example, Platinum will get some cut(60 cents), emerald will get some cut (more than 60c) and diamond will get a cut.
This is a BWW thing, not an Amway thing.
Other organisations pay nothing like those amounts. Can you post the rebate schedule?
Even at platinum level, the profits that comes through selling CDs and Books, covers the cost of all the products needed for one household
Emerald's in our organisation average less than $600/mth income from these sources. Platinums significantly less.
Are you in the US or elsewhere?
So why are some people successful? You will be successful as long as you are willing to do the work, and the work is dirty, shady and never 100% satisfying. If you are ok lying to people, forcing people to do things, influencing people to believe what is not there, then yes, you have a chance.
And yet I built an Amway business that continues to generate me an income to this day, and I never did any of those "shady" things. Work, yes. Lie, force etc? Never.
In the end, I would like to add that icerat has been informative in the past, to me at least. Why did I like his comments? Because I was so blinded by the religious teachings of Amway/BWW, I was not willing to accept the truth. After re-reading 5-6 pages, I know one thing for sure. what icerat writes here is what they teach in their seminars and special training sessions. This is called bullet proofing. Answer to every negative question, any critic is provided here. Needless to say I have heard the exact same things over and over again in these seminars. No offense to you icerat, I like you. I would recommend you think over this whole process critically, rather than emotionally. Again, just a suggestion, no need to start an argument
Good luck to you all
I always think critically and rationally. You give your experience, I give mine. I've read and studied more about Amway then, I suspect, anyone in the world. Every book, every court case, every academic paper I can source. One of the things I've learned is there is HUGE variation in the way Amway affiliated organisations around the world. BWW is different to Mueller-Meerkatz is different to Julia Yu is different to URA Association is different to Network 21 is different to etc etc etc.
Which is the way it should be, as independent businesses.
Don't make the mistake of believing what you do or are taught is the same as everyone else.
