icerat
Philosopher
Got me. icerat's link works, but when I search for Juice Plus+ in both the search box and the member list, I still get no results.
However, it's pretty obvious they are a member after all, so I was wrong.
With this new information, I also have to change my recommendation. Not only should the OP sign up, but they should try and get their family members, neighbors and workmates to sign up as well. After all, who doesn't like juice?
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tsig
a carbon based life-form
- Joined
- Nov 25, 2005
- Messages
- 39,049
They do it for the fun of it?
When I clicked on member's list I went to J's and it was there as IIRC The Juice Plus>
https://www.dsa.org/forms/CompanyFormPublicMembers/search?action=find lists the members, icerat's came up this time as the exact listing and info on the company..........
Maybe using the + symbol in the name messed up the search.
In any case, there's quite a selection on offer, some 169 companies to choose from. How does someone interested in direct marketing figure out which company is right for them?
Best way is to talk with people (if you have contact with some) who worked with the company but have gone on to other things. My reasoning on that is that they will not be trying to bring you in for any benefit of theirs by that point so maybe they will give you the facts and a bit of how it worked for them and why they left. Pretty much the most you can do without private eyes and other such hunting. Be careful of those still in the company - you have to assume they have an agenda. For Amway, they never tell you you are coming to a meeting about Amway, they tell you they want to introduce you to a wonderful way to make good money reasonably fast. If 10% of the people at each newcomer meeting signed up and started selling product remotely well it would take only a short time (12-20 months IIRC) to saturate a major metropolitan area with the product and sellers of same so that sales/income drop precipitously for most of the people brought in.
icerat
Philosopher
People primarily do it to either earn a supplemental income or they do it to get more time.
icerat
Philosopher
(1) you want to use their products yourself. Trying to get other people to buy or sell a product you wouldn't use yourself is (a) going to be harder (b) may be unethical. Having said that, one of Avon's top reps in the UK is a (non-gay) male.
(2) try it out. Legitimate direct selling companies offer money-back satisfaction guarantees on pretty much everything, including any training material and services. The idea is that the best way to see if something fits is to try it on. Critics of the industry interpret this process, of people actually trying something to see if its for them, and then deciding it's not, as "failure" when it is in fact the process working successfully.
xjx388
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- Dec 1, 2010
- Messages
- 11,392
The importance of fiber is absurd? No. It's absence from these products does take away much of the nutritional value that is in whole fruits and veggies.
I am disputing the benefits of lowering homocysteine levels.
That study wasn't even placebo controlled or blinded in anyway. And it was very small. Not a great study to make a positive claim on.
That study has many limitations as admitted by the authors 1)It focused on nurses in Germany who may have other confounding variables which are not discussed 2) it relied on self-reporting "cold diaries," which are subjective and 3)It was still a relatively small effect even if it reached significance. Again, not something strong enough to make a claim that Juice+ reduces the severity of cold symptoms.
I have and I stand by my statement: No positive health outcomes have been found from taking Juice+. In other words, does it affect morbidity and mortality from cancer, heart disease, etc?
Absolutely. Juice Plus supplementation may result in certain antioxidant levels being increased in the blood. But so what? Does that translate into demonstrable positive health outcomes? Nope.
You are missing the point. Taking supplemental antioxidants that are much cheaper than JuicePlus will result in increased presence of the antioxidants in the blood just as JuicePlus does. But, people need whole fruits and vegetables, not pills. Only the increased intake of whole fruits and vegetables has been demonstrated to lead to better health outcomes.
No. If someone has high-choloesterol, then statins might be a great treatment. If someone has pernicious anemia, then B-12 is beneficial. If someone has Vitamin D deficiency then taking Vitamin D is beneficial. There is no such thing as plant polyphenol deficiency. Thus, there is no demonstrated benefit to taking them.
But we don't know that taking them in isolation or in the form of dried extracts of fruits and veggies has any benefit.
No. But there is no evidence that if they took JuicePlus that they would get the same benefit (or any benefit really) as if they ate the proper amount of F&V.You can get better results than statins much more cheaply through changes in diet and lifestyles. Thus, the medical profession is a scam.
So, tell me this xjx318, do you and everyone you know eat seven or more different fruit & veg a day?
These subjects have been covered ad nauseum elsewhere. Facts are facts: Lots of people will enter, few will win.
5 or 7 a day - fruit and veg are not the best
I recently read an article that stated that the 5 a day concept was originally a marketing ploy to sell fruit and veg created by a large wholesaler of fruit and veg, then picked up by medical interests as a good way of promoting healthy eating. If you really wanted to maximise the health benefits from your food and were determined to eat 5 portions of something per day you could do a whole lot better than fruit and veg. Oily Fish for example was high on the list. Google "Five a day the truth" and you'll see what I mean.
Reading the posts I don't see anything damning about Fruit Plus, strikes me it is the equivalent of cosmetics....
I recently read an article that stated that the 5 a day concept was originally a marketing ploy to sell fruit and veg created by a large wholesaler of fruit and veg, then picked up by medical interests as a good way of promoting healthy eating. If you really wanted to maximise the health benefits from your food and were determined to eat 5 portions of something per day you could do a whole lot better than fruit and veg. Oily Fish for example was high on the list. Google "Five a day the truth" and you'll see what I mean.
Reading the posts I don't see anything damning about Fruit Plus, strikes me it is the equivalent of cosmetics....
ThunderChunky
Master Poster
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- Jul 16, 2007
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- 2,456
I always found it interesting that one of the big selling points of MLMs is that you get to "own your own business" or be an "entrepreneur." In fact, you are doing the opposite with MLM. You are basically just a salesmen. A lot of the products sold are unsophisticated. With a little extra effort you could actually create your own product and sell that. Not only would your profit margins be higher, but you would actually own a company and brand that would grow in value and could eventually be sold.
xjx388
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- Dec 1, 2010
- Messages
- 11,392
I somewhat agree that agricultural interests have a big influence on the Dept. of Agriculture's food pyramid. But as far as consumption of veggies and fruits, there is plenty of research supporting that recommendation.
The most "damning" thing about it is that it's a product that has no more demonstrated effectiveness than cheaper alternatives. And the demonstrated effectiveness for supplements like this is pretty dang close to zero. It is no substitute for real food, as Juice Plus themselves admit; therefore, instead of taking 6 of these pills a day people would save money and get tons more benefit from simply eating a few more servings of veggies and fruit.
Sure, no one's physical health is harmed by taking this pill but they are certainly being ripped off, financially. Cosmetics at least serve a purpose; they actually do something. Put on blush; your cheeks turn red. This pill has not been demonstrated to have any kind of an effect on health outcomes.
icerat
Philosopher
Not even remotely what I said. What's absurd is the idea that "Much of the protective effect of fruits and vegetables is due to their fiber content"
Some, yes. "Much"? No.
I wasn't using it to make a positive claim. I was using it to dispute your claim that all the studies were just about blood markers of particular nutrients.
Pick a fruit or vegetable, the same can be said. Nutritional research is extremely difficult to do.
Source?
Yet if we put the same standards on those "demonstrations" you would dismiss the studies as invalid. No or extremely poor controls, no placebo group, no blinding etc etc.
No. If someone has high-choloesterol, then statins might be a great treatment. If someone has pernicious anemia, then B-12 is beneficial. If someone has Vitamin D deficiency then taking Vitamin D is beneficial. There is no such thing as plant polyphenol deficiency.[/quote]
Can't find a good source at the moment (can't read Chinese!) but China introduced reference intakes for a number of phytonutrients last year.
So before Vitamin A deficiency was understood, Vitamin A defiency didn't occur. Got it.
There is a far far bigger jump from fruit and veg to synthesised chemical isolates than there is from fruit and veg to powdered fruit and veg.
At which point do you believe the fruit and veg stops having a positive health benefit?
The blood studies show the micronutrients in J+ are reaching the blood, but you dismiss that as irrelevant. So I assume that means you think it's the fiber itself that is important, not micronutrients?
Not even Juice+ claims that. The problem is people don't eat the proper amount of F&V. Supplement != Replacement.
icerat
Philosopher
You're a salesman in any business you start. If you're not (or don't employ them) you won't be in business for long.
You work where you want at whatever time you want with whomever you want and as much or as little as you want. Furthermore, the government treats you as a business, with all the pluses and minuses that entails.
I've no idea how you're defining "a lot", but there's a lot of those types of products in the marketplace in general, so I'm not sure the relevance
You are aware that people sell MLM distributorships, sometimes for 7 figures?
I've owned, built and sold several companies. It has it's attractions but it also has it's downsides. One thing I can assure you is that it requires A LOT more than "a little extra effort" to create and sell a product and brand from scratch.
I'm involved with two startups at the moment. One we estimate needs $10 million to get going, and to be honest I think the odds of success are quite low. If it works however, the payoff could be huge, so I'm risking investing some time.
The other one is launching now with small investments of around half a million. We expect to make that money back and be in the black in 2-3 years. I've already put in several years of unpaid work in to the concept. It's looking a pretty good bet, but it will take time to be making money.
By contrast my wife and I started building a network marketing business seriously in December and we're already in the black with nearly $1000 profit (most of which is asset generated, not personal sales based). And that with taking all of January off for a trip to Australia and putting in no more than 20hrs/wk between us.
xjx388
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- Dec 1, 2010
- Messages
- 11,392
Demonstrated by scientific studies? Much.
Juice Plus is strongly implying a positive claim; "Look at all these studies that show benefits!" When, in fact, the studies don't show anything of the kind.
Here is one review of studies to start off with. So we have diets high in F&V having demonstrated benefits and we have J+ with none.
Show me the reviews that demonstrate the efficacy of J+ and I'll change my mind. Nutritionally, we know that F&V are effective and we also know that products like J+ can't replace F&V. So what is the J+ doing? Nothing demonstrable.
That's interesting, but we don't really have much to go on as far as research establishing reference levels.
Understood. Until such deficiencies are demonstrated to exist, it is premature to sell a product with the kinds of claims made for J+.
I have no idea. All I do know is that whole fruits and veggies have demonstrated benefits; J+ does not. Thus, buying that expensive supplement seems like a scam to me. When supplements like that are demonstrated to provide better health outcomes, believe me, I will jump on board like I have with all the other recommendations that have been borne out by research.
I don't know what's important. It could be that fiber is important in the absorption of the nutrients. One of my pet theories is that consuming whole foods allows the body to access the nutrients on a slow gradient rather than all at once. Thus, eating whole food throughout the day gives the body access to nutrients as it needs it. Conversely, consuming supplements gives too much nutrient at one time which the body ends up eliminating because it can't use it immediately. But that's my own little explanation of why supplementation has failed to show benefit in healthy people.
I know that whole foods have a benefit. I know that studies of all kinds of supplements have failed to show a benefit. J+ is just another supplement, so I can infer that J+ has no demonstrated benefit. The studies up until now have been insufficient. If and when J+ is demonstrated to have benefit, I will jump on the bandwagon.
Exactly. So what is the point of J+?
icerat
Philosopher
I think we need to define what we mean by "much" to continue this discussion.
One could also say that "much" of their benefit is that if you're eating F&V you're probably eating less of stuff that's bad for you
Except they do.
I assume that's the wrong link? It appears to be a study of a F&V concentrate (J+?) showing no effect on insulin/glucose.
What I asked for was a double blind placebo controlled study on the efficacy of a fruit or vegetable.
One could argue the same with other better known nutrients, which is one reason why the reference levels are different in different countries. There's a lot of controversy in this field.
You do realize there's entire journals on the health effects of various phytonutrients?
btw, have you heard of insufficiencies cf deficiencies?
Link to a double blind placebo study please.
We know that's true, so it's not just your theory. Depends on the nutrient actually, they're optimally absorbed in different parts of the GI tract.
And do you know how science typically studies this stuff? Blood serum levels. Occasionally they're getting in to cellular utlization, but most of the time it's blood serum levels. The stuff you dismiss as worthless for J+
Sure, but there's also an enormous body of research showing positive benefits of supplements, particularly when the diet is inadequate - which it nearly always is. The problem is together with the also enormous body of research showing no benefits (and occasionally negative effects) it's big complicated mess.
Tell me this though, xjx, why does the government effectively force people to take supplements if they're worthless?
Insurance.