MikeGaffney
- 16 Mar 2005
First let me start by saying, that I love and normally support my wife in everything she does, that is until she joined MK. My wife’s director, who was also our neighbor across the street – knew how I felt about Mary Kay, yet she recruited my wife, by giving her the ra-ra speech.
I have read almost every post on here about Mary Kay, both pro and con. Now, I have a few comments. When I lost my job that I’ve worked at for over 20 years; my neighbor recruited my wife informing her about all the money she can make, and how she will be her own boss and have her own business – yeah right! My wife decided to tell me that she had signed on after the fact, and on top of that took our money of over $1,200 from my educational financial Aid, and borrowed the rest from our son. My wife and I have been pretty honest with each other up to this point. The point is, she went behind my back; there was no talking about this. Then she proceeds to spend money we didn’t have, to buy her kit, and initial inventory. Yeah, all you consultants out there, I know what you’re going to say, she could have said NO! When a person is starving and you tell them I know how you can get a steak…….And you tell these women how they can earn all this money, etc….they make it very difficult not to refuse. Our neighbor knew when to sink the hook - the day after I lost my job.
But what they don’t tell you is that if you are married, your wife uses the car to drive to her appointments, yet the family pays for it. So far, my wife states she’s making all this money, yet I ask well where is it. I get the same response – I’m building up my inventory. Yet her director calls every week to make sure she’s producing, and pushing her to make more cold calls. Telling her, or should I say begging her, to sell more product (so she doesn't loose her car) – even if it means my wife buys the product and increase her inventory, because ever month Mary Kay comes out with a new line. I’m lucky in a way – I don’t have a family (I’m an orphan), on the other hand, her entire family is sick of hearing about MK.
The other thing they don’t tell you is that we have 4 children, 1 dog, and two cats at home. Since my wife is gone most evenings including Saturday and Sunday. Who is it that now has to do 100% of the house work, taking care of the kids, taking care of the shopping…..etc. I can see now why there are several divorces. If Mary Kay is so religious, where they constantly talk about god this, and god that - what about the sanctity of marriage. This has now been going on for over 6 months. I have had several conversations with my wife about spending time with us, but she is so hell bent on wanting to make her first million dollars – or drive that new car that her director has; that I no longer have a wife but a house guest that stops by to eat and sleep.
You say MK is not a pyramid…sorry but whose skirt are you trying to puff up! Let’s see if I get this right – My wife goes out and recruits a bunch of women to become INDEPENDENT consultants; my wife now makes money from each of these consultants from their sales, after so many consultants or a monthly income of a certain amount, my wife becomes a director. Now these consultants hire other consultants – which my wife also gets a cut of, all the while my wife is now escalating up this so called ladder (they even give the consultants a gold one to wear on their lapels of their business suit). Who was it that said, “If it looks like a duck, and it quacks like a duck……then it's probably a duck!”
Even though my wife works her buns off, makes at least 100 cold calls a week, goes to all the meetings (now she’s talking about spending money to go to Texas for some conference), does all these facials, and hold parties that almost no one but the host attends. In six months, my wife has paid one (1) phone bill for $127 – most of which was because of MK anyway. But I’ve been told that it’s all tax deductible – like the new desk, computer, printer (ink), camera (before and after shots of these women she has to provide to the director) not counting the many shelving units I’ve had to make to hold her entire inventory on (which takes up more space than all our dvds) – yet if someone needs something she has it (I hope). Plus the new suit we had to purchase – because of the so-called corporate image they have to maintain…..god forbid if my wife had to put makeup on some lady who really needs it, in jeans……or the countless gallons of gas that my wife goes through each week to drive into some of the worst neighborhoods in the city (that I wouldn’t even go in without a gun!), because there are so many consultants, that she is now forced to go into some pretty rough areas to try and sell a product.
With over 3 MK consultants just in our neighborhood……no wonder why no one is making any money, but the directors. If my wife is so independent and can run the business the way she wants too – then why do I have this women (director) calling and reminding my wife that she has to produce so much each month? If my wife is truly independent then why does she have give a report to her director, letting her know how many people she’s called, how many show’s she’s booked, how much each sale was, and what her weekly income (not counting deductions) she made? And now she’s trying to convince my wife to give up her job as a nurse and do Mary Kay fulltime….which I informed my wife that if that happens, I won’t be here to see it! Enough is Enough!
MikeGaffney - 16 Mar 2005
Mike: So sorry you are having to go thru this - click on the mlmsurvivorclub link below if you need some more advice how to handle people who are deep in these situations. She's definitely fallen for all of the hype and the TRUE reason why her director has latched onto her is that she'll start recruiting for her. Directors' love to see women move up - I was a director and prayed for 'hot dogs' to help me build my unit. I ran out of people to recruit and as my director told me once, you get people to go to things to benefit you, as a director. That little tidbit really opened my eyes. The director is simply making sure your wife is 'working her business' and is salivating (undercover) at the thought of new prospects your wife will bring in. It's more and more about the initial inventory orders and I am not surprised that she did this behind your back. I, too, was sneaky about putting money on the credit cards, etc., and have to deal with my shame in doing so.
The conference in Texas you talk about is Seminar - Mary Kay's annual "Miss America/Academy Award" end of the year celebration where women pay dearly to cross stage (some women actually earn it - I think) and it will cost her around $700-800 depending on where you live (no discounts going thru MK travel to make arrangements).
Good for you to make a stand to her already about her giving up her fulltime job. Thankfully, my director told me NOT to do that because I had considered it and my National mentioned that my 'job' was getting in the way of Mary Kay. I hope your wife is not that stupid to give hers up. They praise 'recruiting machines' - that's what I was called - you're building their units and what's bad is that they KNOW the retention rate of consultants, yet keep pushing these women to recruit more and more to become directors. Once you become a director, then if you lose it after 2 months of non-production and you've used your grace month, your unit and your recruit's recruits go to the Senior director after you lose it. Nice, huh?
Would she be privvy to sitting down with you and reading thru all the posts too? Maybe something will click like it did in alot of us somewhere along the lines and she'll begin to have those doubts that will eventually lead to her realization of what she is becoming - that's a hard thing to do and she'll be full of shame if she does, not a good feeling - pray that her eyes are opened somehow and stick to your guns!
Oh, and when you get the "I have to sacrifice now to gain later" - know this; it never ends - the sacrifices.
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