Recruiting Millenials into Mary Kay

Written by The Scribbler

This document isn’t necessarily a script, but a spotty transcript of a speech given to NSDs.  It is a game plan discussing how to recruit younger people into Mary Kay.  It talks about the characteristics of these Millenials (sometimes called Generation Y) who were born in the 1980s and 1990s. There characteristics will no doubt be exploited later on!

Friends, if you have daughters of any age or know teenage girls in your neighborhood, drop a few nuggets about what this company does to its women.  Young girls are not stupid – like sex education, these girls need to know from YOU before they learn the “facts” from a hot-to-recruit Mary Kay Consultant!  It is crucial that we guard the next generation of women from the prison of emotional hurt, manipulation, and credit card debt!     

Who is going to take Mary Kay into the future???  Our job is to study trends to the next level.   We must look at Generation Y – these are the daughters of our sales force.  They add vitality to our sales force.  Will someone who is 30, 40, 50,60 be able to buzz from someone who is 20?  YES!

To bring all age groups into the business and make them all feel comfortable is our goal.

Ages 10-28.  We want them in our future. There are 79 million Generation Y people.  This is the same size as the Baby Boomers.  Here is what they are like:

1. Highly Educated:  80% of teens are going to college.

2. Trendsetters:  Daughters show moms how to dress.  These are the next new set of parents.  They are not stressed out all the time about having it all.

3.  They have dual income mentalities; they want things.  Generation Y wants to do one thing at a time.  They want to have a fabulous career, then stop and have a baby, then go back and have a fabulous career.  OR… A HOMEBASED BUSINESS++$$  They could be CEOs of their own home-based businesses.

“Born to Luxury,” whether they can afford it or not, is one way to describe them; Think of Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blond to know what this generation is like.  They need to be recruited so they can make some money.

They are optimistic; all their glasses are rose colored.  They default to happy and they are fun to be around.  They are driven by a sense of entitlement gained in their youth.  They are flexible.  They embrace technology in everything, not afraid of it.  They are into customization and personalization. They make it fit into their lives.  If you poll them, 80% say they are fashion trend setters.  Very concerned about their appearance.

Our challenge would be how to work with this customer and personality.  We love fund and we are optimistic.  I look forward to bringing all this into the business in the next few years.

How do we tell them in a way they will perceive this is cool?  Our big challenge is to make it cool so it appeals to this woman, from both the product and the career as well.  A few nips and tucks here is all we need to do – this is not an extreme makeover.

26 COMMENTS

  1. Ummm. Older Millennial here . (actually I am that sandwich generation between X and Millennial. Xennials is what we are ).
    Counter Points : 1) Yes can’t get a job with high school diploma

    2) Daughters always taught moms how to dress or at least attempted to.

    3) I live in Canada, we have 1 year of mat leave so we can leave our career and go back to it after. And it is not a CEO we don’t run business with MK. We are independent contractors at best.

    Think Reese Witherspoon? Isn’t Legally Blonde like 20 years old now and irrelevant.

    The self- entitlement yes. The default to happy… no.

    We want quality products that are ethically sourced and are willing to pay more for it (at least people in my circles). We got very jaded by MK when they said they do not test on animals however, they are in China… which they test on animals.
    We also want to know what we are putting on our face and in our bodies and it is damn near impossible to find an ingredients list.

    We think MK is for old people, the colours are not on trend, the pigmentation is not the greatest. I can get better quality for a better price at Sephora.

    We are a woke generation and hate being lied to and deceived.
    I thought I did my research with MK when I joined up, however, when I dug further, I realized that their practices were not ethical, I gave up.

  2. The absolute audacity of this coming out right as we’re about to hit another financial crisis, when millenials (howdy fellow Xennial!) are increasingly angry, despondent, existentially terrified and most importantly -out of money-, you’re comparing them to Elle Woods? How absolutely tone-deaf.

  3. Ugh, more lies from an out-of-touch NSD or ESSD. A simple Google search will show that around 40% – not 80% – of Gen Y will attend college. Similarly, I highly doubt that 80% of Millenial women would claim to be trend-setters.

    Coffee Queen makes excellent points, showing the deception in this MK approach to Gen X and Y.

    I’m actually a little surprised that anyone under 30 even considers becoming a Mary Kay consultant, especially with all the great skin care and makeup brands that are out there. Why would you settle for Mary Kay when Sephora, Ulta and all of the Internet is at your disposal?

    • “I’m actually a little surprised that anyone under 30 even considers becoming a Mary Kay consultant” –

      Or any affluent person over 30. They’d rather shop at Wal-Mart and save money, or buy prestige brands at Ulta with a 20% off coupon, buy what they want at Saks, and work a real business. MLM is not a business.

      “Why would you settle for Mary Kay when Sephora, Ulta and all of the Internet is at your disposal?” –

      True. But also, why would anyone, of any age, want to join an MLM company aka pyramid scheme? 99% fail, top 1% are liars, and they are illegal. MK just hasn’t been audited yet like Herbalife and Vemma. “Legal MLM” is actually an oxymoron. MLMs are legal if…….but the “if” doesn’t consistently happen. That’s why it’s all about recruiting – making it a pyramid scheme.

      Fact check for lurkers: Does your upline or Corporate focus on “building your business” and recruiting new consultants? “You” placing orders?

      I do find it particularly reprehensible that this scam is targeting our daughters. Shame, shame, shame.

  4. You are CEO of your own home-based business.

    Another lie.

    Where you’re a consultant or distributor or coach (call it what you will) for a multi-level marketing company, you’re NOT president of anything! This includes Mary Kay, and yes, “dual marketing” the way Mary Kay does it IS multi-level marketing.

    Your contract gives you NONE of the control over your business that a real CEO has. The company you buy your products from has all the control. They dictate where, what, and how you can sell. They dictate that you can’t sell any products except theirs. They have the right to terminate you at any time, with no notice. And when they terminate you they TAKE the business downline you built, with no compensation to you whatsoever.

    That’s not being a CEO of a real business. All you really are is a commission-only outside sales representative, pushing products that are almost impossible to sell. When the company tells you one thing, but does the exact opposite, they’re lying to you.

  5. Not only is Legally Blonde massively out of date, surely a big part of the story was Elle’s pampered sheltered child of a wealthy family transitioning to adult life. Elle didn’t need money – there is no suggestion she got scholarships so she came from a family who could afford to pay cash for a Harvard education to satisfy her whims.

    Also one of the first scenes used to show she wasn’t just an airhead bimbo was when she analysed the history of a dress and refused to be ripped off by someone trying to sell it as current season. I would love to see Elle Wood’s view of Mary Kay – I really doubt it would be positive.

  6. The future national area I was with was specifically looking for 20 and 30ish women. One of their most productive recruits , now director, was born in 1990.
    (I’m old). She is doing well but hubby helps out a lot w $$ and orders. not sure all women in that age group have that. I did not. Had hubby but he would not have contributed. Then I know a director in her mid 30s who swears nothing else but Mary Kay helps/works for her skin… That she does not know what her face would look like wo it. I find that somewhat hard to believe w the technology in brands now. maybe back 30 yrs ago but skincare has a lot more to offer now.

    • We were actually taught in a Director meeting that the most recruitable were young adults and biggest sellers were those over 55. This came straight from corporate’s mouth. I can’t remember the specific ages, but you get the general idea. So, if you needed unit growth. You knew who to focus on. If we needed big sellers to wow at our unit meetings, we knew who to dote on.

      And I agree completely that skin care has come a long way in the last 20 years. My eyes were opened the moment I sent my product back, and I had a ball exploring!

      • Last week while waiting for a table at a local restaurant, I witnessed the old “celebrating women” night by giving out (fake) roses and getting phone numbers – “We’ll text you if you win the free facial!” I was preparing my reply, but alas, I was not chosen for the fake rose and free facial opportunity. I am in the over 55 category, so I know they were really looking for recruits, not customers.

    • “She is doing well but hubby helps out a lot w $$ and orders. not sure all women in that age group have that. I did not. ”

      I hope she is not proud of “doing well” with a corrupt company that runs a pyramid scheme.

      “Then I know a director in her mid 30s who swears nothing else but Mary Kay helps/works for her skin… That she does not know what her face would look like wo it. ”

      The product in an MLM company is only used to mask the endless-chain recruitment “opportunity” aka product-based pyramid scheme. It has to be just good enough. No doubt she can get an equivalent product cheaper, or better technology elsewhere; and not support a scam that harms women.

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