First and most importantly, I apologize for misquoting you. I did in fact read a different post regarding "fudged" paperwork and attributed that to your former Market America (MA) business practice. Please accept my apology as sincere.
In your original post you did make serveral observations that are highly emotional and tend stronly to mislead the reader. I have copy/pasted one paragraph from your post that I would like to address. My comments will be encased in [boxes].
You stated: I hear a lot of people ask if Market America is “multi-level marketing” or a “pyramid” or “like Amway”. I can tell you this is how it worked for my “business”. It cost me almost $1350 to set my business up in the beginning. [Less than $1,500 to start a legitimate business, not bad, in fact, peanuts] After that, I was required (or at least ‘strongly encouraged’ to set up a monthly transfer buy which cost $125-$150 a month in order to meet my quarterly sales requirements. [The Transfer Buy requirment has nothing to do with quarterly sales requirements. Regardless of how much product you purchse for your own personal use, you still must retail $200.00 in product every 90 days, or, quarterly. The only thing that could possibly have a connection is the fact that you can, if you wish, retail the product that you have obtained via Transfer Buy] Of these purchases, about 30% could be personal use and the remaining 70% (approx) was required to be resold to customers. [There is NO REQUIREMENT that you sell the product that you obatined through the Transfer Buy. Your 70% here and 30% there "requirement" is simply 100% false.] I did this for a year spending almost $4000 [$150.00 times 12 months, (one year) totals $1,800.00, not $4,000.00. I hope you weren't you own accountant. Furthermore, if you "did this" for a year, by your own admission you retailed 70% of your Transfer Buy purchases which through retail profit would have paid for your entire transfer buy expenses, or, are you misleading the reader?] and never earned a paycheck from MA. Why you ask? I accumulated all these points for my purchases [The points that are associated with products obtained through Transer Buying do not accumulate in your business as points, so, you DID NOT accumulate "all these points" from your Transfer Buying. Once again, you're ranting and misleading the reader with wholly and utterly false information] but could not collect any money for all my efforts [You couldn't collect money for your efforts? What efforts, or is the truth "in the middle" because you did not fulfill the REQUIREMENTS? How do you equate buying product with the term "efforts?" The fact that you refer to buying product as an "effort" very clearly indicates that you had extremely unrealistic expectations. There are a lot of people like you, that get involved in a business and think that they are going to get rich through TRUE efforts of others. Your type just want money to start falling in their lap when they "sing up" as you put it. The world doesn't work that way and neither does the business world. You actually have to WORK at making money. You don't make money buying product as you very obvioulsy indicate in your rant that you should have. When you shop, that usually means to the average person that you SPEND money, so, when you made your transfer buy you were SHOPPING, not building your business] *until* I signed up at least one (if not two) downline distributors underneath me who would then be required to also purchase and who would not get paid until they, too, had someone signed up underneath them. [Market America expands their points of distribution through one-to-one marketing. You are required, in order to receive commission checks, to personally sponsor two people in this business. Not 100, not 50, not 10, not even five, TWO! One person on the left side of your sales and distribution organization, and one person on the right side of your sales and distribution organization, thereby, expanding two points of distribution. The company also teaches a person how to develop ten to 15 customers, not 500 or 300, not 50, ten to fifteen, period. It's not difficult, if you follow the business plan. Once you have expanded your points of distribution, you teach others how to do the same. Sam Walton expanded his points of distribution by building stores. Ray Kroc expanded his points of distribution by buiding restaurants and finally, by franshising them. MA owners expand points of distribution by teaching others how to start and manage their own online product brokerage businesses. It's very simple and very profitable but it's a business that must be treated like a business. It seems that you are a bit miffed that you didn't get "paid" just for buying product. Of course you didn't get paid for buying product. The requirements are spelled out in black and white in your Career Manual. I opened a child care center in 2005. I spent nearly $300,000.00 getting the buisiness built, buying furniture, educational supplies, toys, cribs, oh, get a load of this, I had to put in a fire alarm system, oh my gosh, carpeting, a playground, bathrooms, and after ALL THAT EXPENSE, I STILL didn't get paid. UNREAL. I had to "get" customers in the door WITH CHILDREN. After "signing up" TONS of parents, then and ONLY THEN, could I get my first check from my accumulated debt of almost $300,000.00. Oh, the best part. I had to "GET" employees and then, I had to PAY THEM money! So, I had to spend more than a quarter million dollars to "get" my child care business, then I had to "GET" customers and then I had to "GET" employees. Oh, here's the really scam part of this child care business, those employees were technically "under me" in my business. Wow, what a scam!!! Child care centers must be a pyramid thing because you have to "get people." Your terminology alone indicates to the reader that you looked at this Market America as a "getting people business" and it is not about "getting" anybody. It's about learning, step by step, now to manage the business and then, showing the business to others in order to expand points of distribution. When you meet a like minded person that wants to own their own business, you show them how to PROPERLY manage their business, thereby expanding THEIR points of distribution. Then, they do the very same thing and you are now your own organization, teaching and mentoring others, and they do the same and become successful business owners as well. I have partnered with seven other people and five of them are cashing commission checks and one of them is soon to PASS ME in commission checks. Why would he pass me up, I sponsored him? Because he works harder and anyone that ownes a Market America business can, financially, pass anyone else in the business, regardless of whether they are "under" you or "over" you in the graphics of the organization. Last week, one of them thanked me. A man that I sponsored some months ago, serveral times, thanked me for showing him this wonderful business. This is not about "getting" people and making money from them, it's about partnering with quality, business minded people and making money WITH them, while providing your customers with high quality products, great services and a better way to shop.] Then and only then would I get my first check from my accumulated points. I believe I read somewhere that the owner of Market America is worth (approx) $77 MILLION DOLLARS. [Class envy? If the owner is worth $77 MILLIONI DOLLARS, so what? Sam Walton's estate is worth BILLIONS!!! Does that make Walmart a scam? I believe I read somewhere that Elvis is actually still alive, wahooo!] MA routinely fills large stadiums with their pep rally “business meetings”. Profitable MA up line [Profitable? How can that be? How can anyone make a profit? I'm hearing from you that you spent all this money and never got a dime! Oh, that's right, they made money from you. Truth be told, you were NO HELP to your business partners, trust me! I've had people like you in my MA business and I always breathe a sigh of relief when they bail out. Your business partners were HAPPY to see you leave, truse me. Successful Market America owners don't make money from deadbeats. We make money when our business partners make money, and you can take that to the bank!] routinely host educational type meetings and meeting for business education and recruiting others. [Wow, meetings by successful business owners. I wonder if they make you drink secret Kool Aid.] Bottom line is, speaking for myself, I spent almost $4000 to open my business and make monthly product purchases during the time I had a Market America business and have not so much as one cent in earnings to show for my expenses, time and energy. [Speaking for MYSELF, I spent less than $800.00 to open my MA business, I've earned thousands of dollars in commission checks and many, MANY of my business partners are doing the same, and I've done this in less than eight months. Speakign for MYSELF, I followed the Market America proven business plan. It's little different than opening any other franchise style business. Follow the plan and the training and you will succeed. Face it, you put little or NO time and energy into your MA business. If you had, you would't be whining about your failure, you'd be doing what I'm doing, defending the company] Yet the people above me (up line) made money from me signing up. [False, fake, untrue and quite simply a bold lie. No MA owner, anywhere on this planet makes money by signing up or sponsoring other Distributors. That's called Front End Loading and it's a common practice in Multi Level Marketing or, MLM which I refer to as "Make Little Money" style companies. Market America is not Multi Level and it not a front end load company, period. When you placed your original product order, senior business partners received product related points but NON OF THEM received "pay" as your accusation states. They were not "paid" just because you opened your own business. Any of your senior business parnters that are participating in the commission plan, ie., receiving commission checks, are doing so because THEY treated their business like a buiness and opened up at least two points of distribution. THEY sponsored others and in doing so, allowed themselves to receive commission checks on ALL the volume that moved through their points of distribution and their business partners' points of distribution. You sure think a lot of yourself don't you, to make self a serving statement akin to other people making money from you signing up.] Then when Market America was unreasonable about the identity theft, my up line and the up line above them not only declined to help me with my attempt to reason with this company, they made it clear I was pretty much on my own in sorting this out. In fact, I was told this fiasco was my fault and when I became frustrated saying I was going to have to quit over this issue I was told "I think you should quit because you are not working your business”. [AMEN, they said it and I'll gladly repeat it. YOU WEREN'T WORKING YOUR BUSINESS. The proof is in the pudding, or, in this case, quotations and SHE quoted her own business partners' observation! I will only address the issue of your $25.00 snafu by saying this. If you'd followed the business plan, allowed yourself to be trained and WORKED your business LIKE a business, the $25.00 issue would not have caused you to walk away in a million years, no matter how obnoxious and uncaring the customer service staff members may have been. For the record, I've found most of the customer service staff to be wonderful and a few of them to be less than wonderful. The less than wonderful employees eventually wash out, just like the less than wonderful MA business owners. I'm earning thousands of dollars, as are a number of my business partners. Do you honestly think any of us would toss our arms up and walk away from our business over a $25.00 overcharge? Now, I'll give you this. You're pissed off about the $25.00 thing but don't rag on the business that YOU failed at, and sell it to the reading public as though the business is some type of scam. Good grief! You're bitter and that's unfortunate but again, not everyone succeeds.] I spent over $4000 helping these people above me make money. [No you didn't help them make money. You aggrivated the snot out of them, I know, I've had business partners like you. So you spent 4 grand piddling around when you should have learned how to manage your business. That's MA's fault? And by the way, how did you spend 4 grand when your transfer buy ranged from $120.00 to $150.00 montly? Your start up costs were $1,350 and your montly Transfer Buy should have come to no more than $1,800. Now, that comes to $3,150.00. Are you intentionally misleading the reading public or did you just err in your math calculations? $3,150 carries a difference of $850.00 when you compare it to $4,000.
Finally, here's where your entire tirade falls apart. You have offered NOT ONE SHRED OF EVIDENCE that Market America is a scam. All of your ranting aims itself in the direction of self spun, postured failure. Please, tell us, PLEASE, how and why MA is a scam, PLEASE. Don't pontificate, don't be emotional and insulting (as no doubt if a $25.00 snafu can irritate you, my comments have gotten you to the point of a heart attack) and don't run on and on about how it didn't work because eveyone else failed you and made money from you. Please articulate with concrete, solid, unyielding evidence, as to exactly how Market America is a scam. Your readers deserve it! Again, for those of you who've decided to research this company and pained themselves with the reading of all of MY "rantings" I strongly urge you to meet with any of the thousands of successful MA Unfranchise business owners. They will be happy to give you a close look at the company. They'll even be glad to show you the annual financial report. Market America is a privately held company and STILL, they show all of us where all of the money goes, every last red cent. No privately held company is required to offer a financial report and very few do, but MA does. That is truly impressive. So, good luck in your research but be ever so careful. There are a number of people that will share the kind of garbage that this pouting gal will share, but they can never, NEVER give factual evidence that MA is anything but a legitimate company that has legitimately shown tens of thousands, literally tens of thousands of average busy people how to earn a six figure income, owing and managing an internet based, product brokerage, franchise style business on a part time basis.
Why file a report here? Ripoff Report is a permanent record! Other complaint sites copy our content then remove reports for money.
