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Report: #305298

Complaint Review: Coastal Promotions - San Diego California

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  • Reported By: San DIego California
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  • Coastal Promotions 6790 Top Gun Street, Suite 5 San Diego, California U.S.A.

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For the record there are hundreds of stories worse than mine on the Internet under the company name Scentura Creations. Fox 6 news has been doing stories on this company for years, but they are still around. The San Diego name and location is Coastal Promotions, 6790 Top Gun Street, Suite 5, San Diego, CA 92121 858-554-1156

I answered an ad on craigslist that was looking for an office receptionist. I was called back the next day and asked to come in that day for an interview. I was led to the Executives office, Valerie Aleman (619) 672-0713, for an interview with four other people. After Valerie asked us a few dumb questions, she let us know that there were also positions for Branch Managers and that we didn't need to have any experience. She called me back and told me to come in for a second interview the next day. The next day I showed up for the second interview and was led to a room with about 25 other people. We sat down and Doug Zirbel turned his music down and started asking us what we did for New Years and a few other silly questions. He is a foul-mouthed 48 year old and apparently the owner of Coastal Promotions. He began giving us a motivational speech occasionally barking out racial and sexual jokes. His wife who by the way looks sophisticated, occasionally walks in and tells us that Doug wants us to smile and stay positive the entire time. She is apparently there to make us believe that the things being said are not a lie. They have an entire script is said in such a way that it leads you to believe you are going to be making tons of money after eight weeks of training. After four hours of this he gave us all a time to call back within 2 minutes of each other, and we were told that if we were not picked it was because he didn't think we were the right kind of person for the job. He wanted to make sure that we knew it was also because we were not sitting close enough to the front and smiling enough. He later told the people that were stupid enough to show up that he didn't trust some of the people that didn't come back and that they looked flaky. I will assume he told us all to come back and that some didn't. Anyway, I called back at the time Doug told me to and he let me know I got into his management training course and that I should be really excited and he was going to make me a rock star. I showed up on Monday ready to learn all of his BS and his "be positive crap". In a nut shell he actually told us all to dump all of our family members and friends who were not positive. After about four hours of his cultish motivational speech and giving us a brief description of what it was his company sold, Doug asked us to take a simple test to ensure we were what he was looking for. He asked us to make a list of everyone we knew and asked us to sell his crappy product, the knock off perfume, to the people on our lists that night. He wanted to see who was manager quality. He had slithered his way into most of our minds by this time so we were all sort of blind to the way in which we were supposed to get paid. Basically we didn't get paid unless we could sell his crap. I went through this for a couple more days until the day he had his other trainees drive us to a location that was about 45 minutes away. He wanted us to sell the perfume to businesses, and wanted us to be unaware of what we were taking the trip for. We didn't realize this until it was too late. By the way, we had no food or water this entire time. I refused to do this after walking around in my heels for an hour and finally got to the car where my purse was locked in. I had to find a ride back to Mira Mesa from Vista through traffic. That was after I sat embarrassingly in an industrial park I wasn't familiar with, while people drove by starring at me sitting on the ground. Before I left I was asked to give Valerie the executive back the 6 cheesy bottles of perfume. I called Amy Su Zirbel and let her know I was going to come pick up the money owed to me and leave. She said that was fine. She conveniently left the office before I arrived and her husband Doug gave me the run around. These people have my family and friends credit card information and my SS#. They trick young people to come in and do the same routine every week to get free labor out of people. They have foul mouths and constantly make it known that you are there because you have messed up your life and now you need their company or you will be working at McDonald's. I don't believe this company has a business license and I don't know if perfume peddling is legal. This company scams people to get free labor and wastes your time and money with their lies. Some poor suckers end up believing him until they end up on the streets! Please help me get this company out of San Diego and shut down for good.

Itsascam
San DIego, California
U.S.A.

This report was posted on Ripoff Report on 02/01/2008 03:41 PM and is a permanent record located here: https://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/coastal-promotions/san-diego-california-92121/coastal-promotions-wasted-my-time-lied-embarrassed-me-san-diego-california-305298. The posting time indicated is Arizona local time. Arizona does not observe daylight savings so the post time may be Mountain or Pacific depending on the time of year. Ripoff Report has an exclusive license to this report. It may not be copied without the written permission of Ripoff Report. READ: Foreign websites steal our content

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#5 UPDATE EX-employee responds

BEWARE!!! - Coastal Promotions SCAMMERS are on Craigslist

AUTHOR: Stop Scentura - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Tuesday, September 02, 2008

These scumbags are back on Craigslist again advertising for jobs that do not exist peddling fake perfumes. Here is a cop of the ad:

-------------
Established 20 year old San Diego company needs 8-12 enthusiastic individuals to help expand our FUN, casual and professional company on the west coast.

Our company requires us to train both experienced and inexperienced people. Will train in all areas of our company including:

***Assistant Management/Management
***Branch Management
***Distribution
***Administration/Office
***Marketing/Sales

Full paid training for all positions. Minimum potential $300 ++ per week.
Branch Managers $62,000 per year min potential after paid training!

Must be a people person with a GREAT attitude! Rock-n-Roll atmospher with
non-serious people.

1st come, 1st served. Call and ask for Becky @ 858-554-1156
------------------

You can help stop them by getting on craigslist and flagging their ads as spam, prohibited and miscategorized.

It's hilarious how some are listed under Customer Service.

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#4 UPDATE EX-employee responds

WE HAVE TO MAKE THEM STOP

AUTHOR: Jacqueline - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Wednesday, May 07, 2008

I was a victum myself. I really hope we can do something about it and everything that i read of this reports are so true. i Fille dthe report before reading all of them and i was just picturing the same BS i was told. what can we possibly do.

JAcquelien

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#3 UPDATE EX-employee responds

We need to take action or they will continue to operate!!!

AUTHOR: Stop Scentura - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Thursday, April 03, 2008

They do this every week when they bring in new faces. The two step interview process and contest to FFAR is always the same. They rely on people that are desperately in need of work and young, impressionable people also. You don't find out you'll be peddling knock-off perfumes until your second or third day. Every Friday are the fun cars filled in with occasional satellite trips to distant locations.

They promise your gas and room will be paid for on trips, but the catch is you have to sell bottles to get the trip money plus make your numbers. The so-called managers/trainers are there to keep the FNP's (F**cking or Fabulous New People) motivated and their blinders on. If they were truthful from the start hardly anyone would show up the next day to peddle on the streets.

Please the see following links on how to shut them down!

scentura shut down - Google Groups
http://groups.google.com/groups/search?q=scentura+shut+down&qt_s=Search+Groups

Look people, we can't just sit around and post on websites and rely solely on that. We must take action or nothing will be done. Use the link above and start contacting your local newspapers and job websites, local and federal government agencies.

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#2 Consumer Suggestion

they still exist?

AUTHOR: James - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Friday, March 21, 2008

I remember applying for this same position in 2002 (in Fresno, CA). When I realized that it was basically selling cheap knock-offs of perfumes & colognes...i basically pretended as if i was interested...they called me incessantly trying to get me to pay a start-up fee and i told them where to go in not so many words. Now, call me weird but, one usually never PAYS to get a job...ever!

ok, sure...you might have to pay for certain things that a company might not cover like getting your licenses or certifications that are requirements of getting a certain position...such as getting your real estate license, sherrif's card, notary, MCSE....etc. But to have to basically pay for product to sell, that's unlikely...most companies provide you with product...you're paid on a commission only basis (usually, some places offer a base hourly + commission)...and usually those types of jobs aren't deceptively marketed.

One thing I just remembered is the presentation i was given (in a room of 10 or 15 others). It was basically to the effect of watching a video: "this person makes gazllions of dollars...he's a success...he hangs out with debbie gibson (and other b-d list celebrities)....you should take his advice" the girls giving the presentation were very condescending as well....basically tried to make you think that because you don't have a house that looks as if it should be on Cribs...you're completely worthless. Yeah, right...i wanna work for a company that insults and belittles me....


Any company that asks for money up front for you to work for them is nothing more than a scam.

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#1 Author of original report

Coastal Promotions has supposedly changed their name to UWD

AUTHOR: Itsascam - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Saturday, February 16, 2008

BEWARE should be their name. They have also go an attack dog and she will come after anyone who exposes this company. BEWARE!!!! What's really sad is that the few employees who stick around for a long time, seem to be people who were brought up with abuse or inner city violence (very dirty behavior and mouths). Maybe that is the only chance they believe they have? Regardless of this, the company is still wasting peoples time and money with their BS and lies. The owners have been doing this for so long, that they believe their own lies and they don't realize their potential could be put toward running a good business. They are obviously smart enough to fool you into working for them for sometimes years! What a waste of talent!

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