[nabentre] Major Changes In Network Marketing

[Kane Brolin]

To Mary Ellen And Other Listers:

I am blind and the proprietor of a small, independent business that
concerns itself with financial planning and investments.  Before
choosing the financial services route, I and my wife familiarized
ourselves with network marketing and were involved on a small-time
basis with Equinox International, which sold an array of fine health-
and cleaning-related products.  Equinox International did not end well
as a whole.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equinox_(MLM) But never
having grown up in a small business or around family members who
engaged in one, my wife and I learned a lot about how business owners
should and should not act when we made this first foray into network
or multi-level marketing in the late '90s.  We did not stay with an
MLM, but dipping our toes in the water with an MLM was a great way to
learn what we were made of.  Eventually, we decided we had the skill
and fortitude to be business owners--we just chose a slightly
different path.

What I came to understand through our Equinox International experience
is that the MLM model, if correctly executed, is just as valid as any
other business model.  And whether one is blind or not, network
marketing and other forms of small business ownership become a lot
more appealing as we get older and find it harder and harder to become
employed for competitive wages by companies who seem just to want
younger and younger workforces these days.  I am convinced that if you
have the skill and fortitude to sell things, the native intelligence
to learn about what you're selling, the passion to resist objections,
and the ethics to resist evil, you'll never have to worry about the
prospect of earning subminimum wages in a sheltered workshops; and you
don't even have to earn a four-year degree or an advanced degree to
avoid that kind of hell-hole.  Those blind people who have succeeded
in the Business Enterprises Program through vending operations have
known this principle for years.

Mary Ellen, you mention the FTC's playing a much more active role in
policing network marketers nowadays.  In like manner, the U.S.
Department of Labor is beginning to play an increasingly significant
role in the regulation of investment companies' policies whenever IRAs
are involved.  Like many other practitioners in my industry, I don't
like this added layer of oversight.  But on the other hand, if abuses
hadn't been happening and if brokers hadn't earned a lot of
unnecessary commissions doing things outside of the best interest of
their clients, this kind of increased regulation would never have
gained enough traction to become politically expedient for President
Obama and Labor Secretary Perez to push forward.

Thanks for informing us all as to the subtleties in this area of
business ownership.  Thanks also for pointing us to the vision for
what a good network marketing organization should look like in 2015
and going forward.  This will be useful not only for others on the
list, but perhaps for some of my clients who are considering entrance
into such a life and who ask me for advice.

Happy Thanksgiving to all.

Kind regards,

Kane Brolin.