NWR: Friends in Direct Sales

holyguacamole79

Okay, I would like to vent. I have several friends in direct sales. I'm happy that these women have found a way to make some extra dough, and I admit that I love me some Pampered Chef toys. But, I'm getting tired of my Facebook feed clogged with friends asking others to host a Jamberry party or buy a bag from Thirty-One. And they always seem to find ways to work it into a conversation. I hate that I feel like I avoid these people because of it, but I just get so tired of it. Ugh. Please tell me I'm not alone here ....

mysticl

I just unfriended someone because every single one of her posts was trying to get you to buy some supplements that apparently cure everything or trying to get you to sell same supplements.  I've got another person who is on the potential chopping block because about 95% of her posts are about some shakes she's selling or her latest work out routine that will change your life.  

mrsmorales2be

No, you're definitely not alone.  And if they find one thing, there's usually a few more they'll try, too.  Surely one of them will be the one that takes off, right?

holyguacamole79

mrsmorales2be said:

No, you're definitely not alone.  And if they find one thing, there's usually a few more they'll try, too.  Surely one of them will be the one that takes off, right?

Yes! I have a friend who sells for 3 companies! I have no idea how she has the time or energy to do it!

chibiyui

Totally not alone. Some one needs to come out with a sales filter.

beethery

I had a hairstylist friend try to get me to come in for a haircut with an added on mani-pedi because my hands looked rough in my profile picture.

It's the same picture as I have on here. I photoshopped my face onto a portrait of the Pope, and left the Pope's hands in instead of using mine. Apparently she didn't put that together.

JCbride2015

Yep, bugs me too.  Technically I'm a "consultant" for Arbonne but I don't sell it, I just use the discount for my own stuff.  If people compliment my skin and ask what I use, I'll tell them, but I don't have parties.  I had one party in college and a) it was way too much work and b) I felt like an ass inviting my friends.  So I stopped.

I have all that shit on my news feed though.  Drives me crazy.  If I haven't talked to you in five yeras, NO I don't want to buy a body wrap from you.

Inkdancer

I have blocked so many people because of this crap. Ugh.

RebeccaB88

Plexus Slim.  It's eating my college best friend alive and it makes me stabby. 

I'm not defriending. Just hiding people. It's more peaceful... but I miss my friends, at least who they used to be.

JoanE2012

The Rodan & Fields seems to be the latest on my feed.  It reminds me of a pyramid scheme with people trying to get other people to join their team.

theexactlee

Yes, for some reason bloggers tend to have a ton of "side business" with direct sales companies. So my feed is basically 40% sales. The big ones right now are oils. There is an Oil for everything and for every oil brand there are 12 bloggers waiting to take your money! The wraps were big for a while. The other big one right now is the Younique Mascara but ya'll I swear by that one so I actually do purchase it every 3 months. LOL. Otherwise, ugh...

KytchynWitche

I am a shameless abuser of the "hide" button. I know I'm old-fashioned, but when I want to buy something I go to a store. Having people push products at me actually makes me LESS likely to buy. Thankfully, direct sales aren't nearly as big in SA as they were in the 80s and early 90s, so I don't have too much of it. My US, Aus and NZ friends though... "Eish".

theartistformerlyknownas

chibiyui said:

Totally not alone. Some one needs to come out with a sales filter.

Download the "Rather" extension. Idk if it works in all browsers but I've used it in Firefox and Chrome. You give it a list of keywords, and it replaces those posts with pictures of puppies. It's the only way I survive election season.

chibiyui

lolo883 said:

chibiyui said:

Totally not alone. Some one needs to come out with a sales filter.

Download the "Rather" extension. Idk if it works in all browsers but I've used it in Firefox and Chrome. You give it a list of keywords, and it replaces those posts with pictures of puppies. It's the only way I survive election season.

THAT'S THE GREATEST THING EVER

wandajune6

I only have one friend selling stuff- Mary Kay. I've actually never heard of a bunch of things mentioned above.

I used to get invited to adult toy parties. My friend was in town and I tried to use her as an excuse not to go but got pushed to bring her along. Adult actresses are bad for sales and I never got back again. We all learned a lot about buying good toys!

theexactlee

Seriously ladies, Younique Mascara, it'll change your life. No, I don't sell it. LOL

flyingfoxes

I hate MLM.  I've hidden a few people for plugging up my newsfeed with it.   Admittedly I have been curious about the Younique mascara, but for the $30+ price tag, I just can't pull the trigger on it.  My ex was always thinking these companies were going to let him sit on his ass and get rich while people under him sold ridiculous shit like supplements, or video calling, and the last thing he was into before we broke up were those damned ViSalus shakes. 

clarke10

Yeah, this drives me crazy. I had a friend in college who sold Mary Kay. Every conversation we had ultimately led to her asking me if I wanted to buy anything.

MrsMack10612

Years ago, I was a Pampered Chef consultant. When I first got started, I asked a few close friends and family to hold kick off parties to get me started. After that I just worked from the leads I got. Everybody new I was around if they wanted anything. I also know that I wouldn't have pushed it on FB as I'm annoyed by folks that do it on my feed. One of the reasons I stopped is because I don't have the pushy, sales person mentality to keep annoying the ever loving shit out of friends & family. I have one friend that it seemed like every post was about Tastefully Simple. She's finally backed off and I didn't find the need to block her, but it was getting close.

Senecaf

I block them out. Jamberry, scentsy, itworks, shakeology, multiple purse companies etc. If they are friends I know in real like I say no so often they've stopped asking. One of FI's gm is into some pyramid scheme travel thing. He is killing me with his inspirational videos and posts about changing your life. I don't even know what his product is but it's obnoxious.

holyguacamole79

enecaf said:

I block them out. Jamberry, scentsy, itworks, shakeology, multiple purse companies etc. If they are friends I know in real like I say no so often they've stopped asking. One of FI's gm is into some pyramid scheme travel thing. He is killing me with his inspirational videos and posts about changing your life. I don't even know what his product is but it's obnoxious.

I had totally blocked this from my memory ... I had a friend (and she was a very close friend at the time) who sold / sells Beauticontrol.  EVERYTHING we did revolved around that.  I had a series of anxiety attacks at work and slipped into a rather deep depression.  It was the darkest point of my life and I had even confided in her that I had attempted suicide.  Her response to me was "have you thought about changing careers?  I just got back from a Beauticontrol conference and it inspired me SO much."

I have not spoken to her since.

flyingfoxes

OMG YES - everything they sell will CHANGE YOUR LIFE, for realz.  For realz, give me a break and work a real job like the rest of us.  lol

Senecaf

sarahbear31 said:

enecaf said:

I block them out. Jamberry, scentsy, itworks, shakeology, multiple purse companies etc. If they are friends I know in real like I say no so often they've stopped asking. One of FI's gm is into some pyramid scheme travel thing. He is killing me with his inspirational videos and posts about changing your life. I don't even know what his product is but it's obnoxious.

I had totally blocked this from my memory ... I had a friend (and she was a very close friend at the time) who sold / sells Beauticontrol.  EVERYTHING we did revolved around that.  I had a series of anxiety attacks at work and slipped into a rather deep depression.  It was the darkest point of my life and I had even confided in her that I had attempted suicide.  Her response to me was "have you thought about changing careers?  I just got back from a Beauticontrol conference and it inspired me SO much."

I have not spoken to her since.


That is terrible!

theartistformerlyknownas

april182015bride said:

OMG YES - everything they sell will CHANGE YOUR LIFE, for realz.  For realz, give me a break and work a real job like the rest of us.  lol

Yeah. I promise nothing you can sell me will change my life. It could be the coolest food storage/home scent/skincare/makeup/accessory/kitchen tool I've ever seen, but change my whole life? Call me crazy but I like to think my life is a little more meaningful than to be changed by a moisturizer or an ice cream scoop.

RebeccaB88

Would any of you guys ever (privately) confront them about any of this, and if you would, how? I mean, I seriously don't know who my Plexus friend has turned into. She's not who she used to be. I don't feel like a friend anymore, just a target. Occasionally she makes posts like 'actions speak louder than words', and 'I love creating emotional connections and nurturing friendships', but the constant sales pitches really contradict that. I miss my friend but I'm afraid she's gone for good. It's becoming cultish feeling.

theartistformerlyknownas

RebeccaB88 said:

Would any of you guys ever (privately) confront them about any of this, and if you would, how? I mean, I seriously don't know who my Plexus friend has turned into. She's not who she used to be. I don't feel like a friend anymore, just a target. Occasionally she makes posts like 'actions speak louder than words', and 'I love creating emotional connections and nurturing friendships', but the constant sales pitches really contradict that. I miss my friend but I'm afraid she's gone for good. It's becoming cultish feeling.

You tell her exactly that... the same way you would if someone was talking about her wedding, her SO, her job, whatever to the point of monotony. "I miss spending time with you, but can we have a Plexus-free day? I understand that it's important to you but it's not something I'm interested in so I hope you can respect that. I'd love to have some time to chat with you as a friend rather than you as a salesperson."

theexactlee

OMG I can't believe I didn't remember this story until now. I had a friend that sold some type of product that was like Away, but wasn't Amway. I don't remember what it was called, maybe you even mentioned it. So anyway, she kept asking me if there was a time that my husband and I could talk to her and her husband either on the phone or at dinner. It was so odd to me so I kept saying "you can talk to us anytime, is everything okay?" So finally she hit us with a sales pitch! I was so weirded out. We told her that under no uncertain terms would we be interested in selling this under her and her husband.

I was really upset so I asked another one of our friends named Jen about it and she got really defensive. Kind of like "Hey, Renee is my friend and I don't want to sit here and listen to you talk bad about her." 

So then a few weeks go bye and Jen comes to work livid. I ask her what happened and she tells me that Renee invited her to dinner knowing that Jen's husband can't come. When she gets to dinner Renee and her husband have brought along this guy so it looks like a double date and they start hard core pitching Jen. She was so sick upset over it that she ended the friendship! 

So yeah, friends don't end friendships, direct sales ends friendships

Kauris

I worked for a magazine that's client list was exclusively these kind of companies. Pyramid scheme was a bad word in our office, you had to use multi-level marketing. BUT at least working there provided a wonderful excuse for why I could never go to any of the parties... Sorry I can't go to your {juice, makeup, electricity, energy drink, travel opportunity} party, it's a conflict of interest. 

Unfortunately I don't have that excuse anymore, because it wasn't anything they could argue with. But I still won't go, unless I somehow get tricked into it.

And Amway changed their name to QuickStar for awhile in the U.S., because they got such a bad rep, but Amway is HUGE in Japan. Or it was when I worked for this magazine.

climbingsingle

This stuff is so annoying. Rodan & Fields and the Younique crap is taking over my news feed.

lovesclimbing

My mom seeks Mary Kay, but she has an FB page for it. And she only posts a couple times a month on the page. And she never posts about MK on her regular profile.

I have one friend who sells DoTerra (essential oils) but she only posts maybe 15% of her posts about it. (I think she also has a page dedicated to it.) I feel bad for those of you with friends who go crazy with this stuff!

I find myself unfollowing people for political stuff or sharing tons of links. I'm on FB to see what YOU'RE up to. I want to see photos of what you're doing and hear about your life. Not about your politics (even if it's politics I agree with!) or random links. I unfollowed three people on the day the Hobby Lobby decision came out.