Mary Kay Inc. reports annual statistics on consultants, directors, and commissions for Canada:

2007:

• 31,891 sales orce members
• Of the 4,795 who were in the independent sales force for at least one year and who earned commissions, 51%, or 2,445 earned $100 or less in commissions.
• Of the 659 sales directors, 329 earned $17,500 or more in commissions.
• Of the 25 national sales directors, 17 earned $100,000 or more in commissions

I love these kinds of numbers. They’re fun and exciting for Pink Truth. Seriously!

In Mary Kay’s July 2006 letter to the FTC about how horrible it would be to make recruiters actually provide proof related to their income claims and other such heinous information-providing-activities… They stated that there were over 700,000 consultants in the United States.

Currently on the Mary Kay InTouch website for consultants, they say there are 650,000 U.S. consultants. Now I don’t know when the number changed, but all I care about is that it’s changed! There are at least 50,000 fewer consultants who will be lied to and victimized this year!

Written by Raisinberry

If you were paying attention at your “practice” recruiting interview or guest event, you’ll recall your recruiter or Future Director telling you about all the ways that you can make money in Mary Kay. Ultimately it came down to 3 “avenues of income”. One way was selling your own product to consumers, one was recruiting for commissions on their “sales”, and then you had the last obscure method called dovetailing that happened when you got a percentage of a class you booked but didn’t hold.

Then of course there were reorders, but that is really just you selling to end customers again. Three income streams seemed to be the key to success and would lead to being “paid what you are worth”…not what some “job is worth”.

What a difference a year makes. Check out these numbers that Mary Kay Cosmetics is reporting for calendar years 2007 and 2006. They are admitting to losing 1,000 directors in the U.S.

Anyone want to bet it's more? They had 14,000 directors year after year after year…. now corporate is admitting the numbers are dropping.

2007:

• Wholesale sales of $2.4 billion.
• Mary Kay® products are sold in more than 35 markets worldwide.
• The company’s global independent sales force exceeds 1.8 million.
• Throughout the company’s 45-year history, some 500 women worldwide have risen to the rank of Independent National Sales Director, the pinnacle of achievement in the independent sales force.
• Approximately 34,000 women across the world currently hold the position of Independent Sales Director, with approximately 13,000 of them located in the United States.
• Currently, some 1,900 independent sales force members in the U.S. have earned the privilege to drive a Mary Kay pink Cadillac.
• Currently more than 12,000 women worldwide have earned the use of a Mary Kay Career Car.

2006:

• Sales reached $2.25 billion at the wholesale level.
• Mary Kay Inc.’s international presence spans more than 30 markets.
• More than 1.7 million Independent Beauty Consultants worldwide.
• Approximately 500 women worldwide have attained the position of Independent National Sales Director, the highest status within the independent sales force.
• More than 33,000 women across the world have reached the rank of Independent Sales Director. In the United States, more than 14,000 women have attained this position.
• Currently, approximately 10,000 independent sales force members have qualified for the use of a Mary Kay Career Car in the U.S.

If you look closely at the figures, you see that the growth in top line revenue is strictly attributable to expanding overseas, to countries like India. It's clear that the sales figures in the U.S. have fallen, and there are at least 1,000 fewer directors than there have been for the last several years.

We all know that Mary Kay lives and dies by DIQs and sales directors. They're the ones pushing production to meet qualifications and minimums. Fewer directors means much lower income for Mary Kay Cosmetics.

Consider this: At the minimum production of $4,000 wholesale each month… 1,000 fewer directors in the U.S. means a reduction of income by at least $48 million per year.

I've continued to look at some of the "top" units in Mary Kay. These are units with some "top directors" held up as women to admire for "doing Mary Kay the right way" and helping women to better their lives. Yet there is little to no actual retailing of products going on. Mary Kay is an endless chain recruiting scheme, plain and simple.

According to statistics on this "top director's" website, 338 consultants placed orders with Mary Kay through April 30. Of those 338, not one will make Court of Sales this year, which requires $36,000 retail to be ordered from the company.

And as you can see below, 3.25% of Kim's consultants have ordered enough to profit more than $500 per month (if they sold everything they ordered, and we know that's not the case). Impressive. I guess there's not much "teaching women to sell" going on in this unit either. 

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Here's a unit from a newer national area that is known for really selling! What does really selling look like? Surely not these uits where 3% or less of consultants are profiting $500 or more per month (with very generous assumptions on my part) are simply oddballs. Surely someone is selling a lot of Mary Kay, right?

Well not in this unit. See below…. Through April 30, 74 consultants placed orders with Mary Kay Cosmetics. Of those 74, two… yes two consultants have ordered enough to profit more than $500 per month. Assuming they sold everything they bought, which we know isn't the case. 2.7% of the unit members are ordering enough to make more than $500 per month profit. Wow.

I know what we're missing. We're missing the old-timers. Maybe the newbies aren't teaching sales, but the women who have been around practically since Mary Kay started! Now THEY now how to sell products, and surely they teach their consultants to sell too!

Guess again, sister! Even in one of the oldest and largest areas in Mary Kay, the numbers are even worse, if you can believe it. This old nsd has a huuuuuuge area. If you add up just the units in her area with 50 or more consultants, it totals to 4,127 consultants. Let's just round up to 4,500 total consultants, but understand that the actual number of consultants in her area is probably higher.

Check out the Top 20 consultants in the area, below. The bottom consultant on this list makes an estimated monthy profit of $764 (if she sells all that she buys, which is unlikely). That's less than $10,000 per year of profit. Those 20 represent 0.44% of consultants in the whole area!

Do you realize that this means at least 4,480 consultants in this area make less than $10,000 from selling Mary Kay products??? That means that 99.56% of these consultants don't make a living selling this stuff!

And to all the Pink Truth haters… please don't try to tell me that all 4,480 of those consultants are lazy losers who don't really try to sell the products, and could sell lots if they really wanted to. 

I know! A rising star. A national-in-qualification. Surely her unit is selling! I mean, how else do you move up to that level in Mary Kay if not for product sales?

That's it. We've figured it out. I bet this niq's unit is selling a lot. She's been around a while and that lady is a superstar.

*sigh*

Guess again. Not much selling going on there either. I'm not sure how many consultants she's got, but you can see that only the top 4 are profiting more than $500 per month. (And if you haven't heard this before… that's if they're actually selling all that they buy, which we know isn't likely.)

The search continues for all those women selling gobs and gobs of Mary Kay Cosmetics….

*slaps self on forehead* 

Of course! Silly me. The people in Mary Kay Cosmetics who are really selling all those products are the sales directors! You know… those 14,000 sales directors out of 750,000 consultants in the U.S.

Surely the sales directors are selling a lot of Mary Kay products, since they're so knowledgable and have been around so long. Yep. Selling products is the "right" way to do this "business" so the Mary Kay sales directors must be selling a lot.

A well-established national area…. they must be selling a lot. I mean the nsd is so great with her directors and I'm sure she's teaching them the right way to do it. How many directors do you suppose she has? 30? 40? Who knows. But a whopping eight of them profit more than $500 per month from product sales, if they sell everything they buy.

Wait a second! Most of them make less than $500 per month profit from product sales? As a director? As in less than $100 a week??? That's it? From the Mary Kay sales directors?

You get the picture, right? No one is really selling much Mary Kay, despite the (false) claims to the contrary. Even in the best, fastest, top units and areas in the company, there's next to no one selling enough Mary Kay to make a living. How much more proof do you need? 

Welcome to our latest installment of “No One’s Making a Living Selling Mary Kay Products.”  Remember: Mary Kay isn’t about selling a product, although that’s the front they use to suck you in. Mary Kay is really an endless chain recruiting scheme, in which the name of the game is recruiting as many people as you can.

Here are the most recent statstics for Mary Kay Canada (2007):

The vast majority of the independent sales force members’ primary source of profit is selling product. In addition, all Mary Kay Independent Beauty Consultants can earn income from commissions, dovetailing, prizes and awards. To be eligible for commissions, Independent Beauty Consultants must be active themselves and have at least one active recruit during the relevant period. Members of the independent sales force are considered active in a particular month (and for two months after) when they place at least $200 in wholesale orders for cosmetics intended for resale during the month.

Written by MKWidower

Every company uses them… the fine print at the bottom of the page. They tell a lot about the limitations on your life insurance, the warranty on your VCR and even how much money you will make.

wea·sel words. plural noun. Definition:. misleading language: deliberately misleading or ambiguous language ( informal). (from MSN Encarta)

But your income in weasel words???

Yes! Go grab your Canadian version of the February/March copy of Applause and read along with me.

Each quarter, Mary Kay Cosmetics sends out a "Preferred Customer" mailing. It goes to 6 million women.  There are 700,000 U.S. consultants. That means that on average, each consultant has 8.5 customers on their preferred customer list.

And for most consultants, the people on those lists don't really represent true customers. About 1/3 of them are legitimate customers. About 1/3 of them are family and friends that either made pity purchases or that you wish would "support" you. And the other 1/3 are women who you would like to have as customers… they came to a class and bought nothing, they purchased something a couple of years ago and you're waiting for them to buy again, or they otherwise got put on your list in the hopes that they'd like something they see and someday become a customer.

If I'm right about this, each Mary Kay consultant averages less than 3 preferred customers each.

What great proof that no one's selling much Mary Kay!!!

More Mary Kay slogans… How many times will units hear about how things are “great in 2008” in Mary Kay? And how many times will consultants think they’re the only ones failing to get bookings and failing to sell products?

But here at Pink Truth they can have the truth. They, along with 1.1 million other women will suck wind in Mary Kay in 2008. They and 1.1 million other American women will lose money in Mary Kay. They and 1.1 million other American women will eventually quit Mary Kay, often with a closet full of inventory they have no hope of ever selling.