Something’s Coming at Mary Kay
Written by Parsons Green and Tracy
Mary Kay recently updated their beauty consultant agreement. Sales directors were surprised by some of the things in it. One of the key provisions we noticed at Pink Truth is that the company will require all consultant disputes to be settled through arbitration, rather than having the option of taking the company to court. Consultants have thirty days from the date of the announcement to opt out. Once this thirty days passes, consultants can no longer sue the company in court, either individually or through a class action suit with other consultants. The thirty day period ends shortly before Seminar 2026 begins.
If you’re familiar with the legalities, this is a pretty big deal. But most consultants will gloss over it, sign the form, and get on with things.
But there’s an even bigger deal buried in this agreement. Mary Kay is changing the language they use to refer to the consultants, calling them independent purchasers and resellers. The agreement has less to say about recruiting, and more to say about the consultant’s relationship to the company. It brings some attention to digital accounts, restricting the sharing of InTouch login credentials with assistants or apps.
If you only read the consultant agreement, you might not think twice about these things. But when you look at it next to developments over the last couple of years, you might see signs pointing toward an affiliate model of business, rather than MLM. (i.e. The hierarchy goes away and sales directors and national sales directors are no longer needed.)
National sales directors are being given minimum requirements to get or keep certain perks. The company is spending less on prizes and awards. Attendance at events has been falling rapidly. 20 years ago, there were more than 300 national sales directors in the United States, while today there are just over 100.
In December 2025, Mary Kay announced that they had selected a new advertising partner. This was part of the announcement: The partnership begins immediately and includes the development of a long-term integrated brand strategy and global advertising campaign set to launch in late 2026.
What is going to be part of this strategy? Why would the company update the consultant agreement right before seminar? Why is the company limiting the ability of consultants to pursue legal action?
Practically speaking, things are looking more and more like an affiliate model of business is likely. No more recruiting. No more paying commissions to sales directors and national sales directors. Just consultants who get a cut of sales directly from Mary Kay Inc. to consumers. They already have a new tiered discount structure with My Shop, so it seems possible that this was one big step in that direction. My Shop also lets the company control the website, payments, shipping, and fulfillment. Mary Kay can keep selling to customers with or without the consultants who may have spent years developing the customer base.
And then there is the issue of the suits…. Sales directors and national sales directors wear a suit (i.e. a uniform) that tells everyone their rank within the company. Years ago there was a new suit each year, and everyone was expected to buy a jacket, skirt, and blouse. Over the years it changed. Mary Kay started to do a new suit every other year. Then they started having members buy just a jacket, and wear whatever they wanted underneath.
There has not been a new nsd suit in 3 years. The sales director suit jacket is set to be replaced in January 2027, 2.5 years after the last one came out, even though the company said they’d get a new one every 2 years. Could Mary Kay be delaying the latest director suit because there is not going to be one at all…. since there won’t be directors?
Mary Kay was founded September 13, 1966. Some sort of announcement is likely to come around seminar and the company’s anniversary… announcing a “new era of Mary Kay.” It will be something about taking advantage of the online space and the trillions of dollars of e-commerce sales, and making Mary Kay better than ever before. I’m sure we’ll hear that Ryan Rodgers is “carrying on Mary Kay Ash’s legacy” and the standard talking points.
But you can count on the new era of Mary Kay to include:
- A severely reduced commission structure
- A cutback of the car program, likely eliminating all but the pink Cadillac
- Elimination of the national sales director level (or at the very least cutting it back significantly)
- Eventual elimination of sales directors
Can you imagine? Will the nsds get some sort of payout if they’re eliminated? Will there be any recruiting and any levels? (It’s plausible that one or two levels of recruiting could be retained to keep consultants doing the work of bringing in new blood.)
What will they call this new way of doing business?
And how spectacularly will this fail? We all know that the real Mary Kay customer is the consultant, and third party retail sales are only a small fraction of what is sold to consultants. If the company goes to a completely retail selling model of business, the lack of demand is going to show up very quickly.
It’s all so exciting!
Just like in West Side Story, something’s coming….
Could be!
Who knows?
There’s something due any day;
I will know right away,
Soon as it shows.
It may come cannonballing down through the sky,
Gleam in its eye,
Bright as a rose!
Who knows?
It’s only just out of reach,
Down the block, on a beach,
Under a tree.
I got a feeling there’s a miracle due,
Gonna come true,
Coming to me!
Could it be? Yes, it could.
Something’s coming, something good,
If I can wait!
Something’s coming, I don’t know what it is,
But it is
Gonna be great!
Visit the
Very nicely done you two!!! This has been on the horizon for years and the sinking ship isn’t going to make it to port. Thank you both for all of your hard work and for keeping us (and the kaybots who “stumble” onto this site) so well informed!
We have seen it happen in multiple companies, BeaitiControl, Rodan+Fields, Silpada and numerous others where they change to affiliate or close all together leaving those who depend on commissions with nothing. It’s only a matter of time before Mary Kay is added to that list. Can you imagine spending 10, 20, 30 or more years building a customer base and unit and depending on those commissions each month only to wake up one morning to an email telling you it’s over? Yes, it can really happen that way.
I see Ryan Rogers in the Angela Basset role … walking away from a pink Caddy piled high with NSD suits, red jackets and tawdry prizes, flipping a match behind him.
Who is the new advertising partner?
Grey New York. They only have two US locations – NYC and Cincinnati. Very much global.
I wonder whether the team at Grey has the Pink Truth site bookmarked for regular visits? They would be wise to do so.
Ha ha ha
This where I meant to laugh🤦🏻♀️
I think you are spot on that the announcement will be made to coincide with the 60th anniversary of MK on September 13th- and you are also correct that the marketplace isn’t clamoring for these overpriced, mediocre products. This continuing downward spiral is so entertaining!
If they did a classic line and a trendy line, who would the trendy line try to compete with? Fenty? Elf? The stuff that ends up at Walgreens? Or the Dollar Tree?
I’ve been thinking about this a lot, and after putting my brain in Evil Mode this is my theory:
Someone smarter than Ryan has been engineering a very neat little trap for quite a while, starting with things like “no more cars for consultants, only directors+,” tweaking the requirements for NSDs, not coming out with new suits, and cheaping out on prizes while simultaneously upping the numbers needed to “earn” these crumbs. I don’t doubt that cutting costs is at their heart, but it doesn’t take much effort to spin it into “These lazy loosers aren’t putting in the effort needed to earn these generous perks, so let’s get rid of them. Why do we need these ranks at all? They’re only costing us money and not making us any.”
Update the agreement now, and sneak in the nasty little arbitration agreement, while the XSDs are preoccupied with Seminar and the worker ants are exhausted from the June craziness, so no one will look too closely at it. On top of that, said worker ants have been conditioned to believe that everything Corporate does is for their benefit (which it isn’t and never has been) so just sign it and keep on keeping on, because they’ll be kicked out if they don’t sign.
Even for those who do opt out, and I wonder how many of those letters will be “lost in the mail” or “misfiled, can’t find it, oopsies!” taking legal action against a big corporation with its own legal department is expensive AF, time consuming AF, and even if the judgement is in your favor you’re going to come out far behind.
They’re trying to walk back overpurchasing of inventory, which they’ve tacitly encouraged, and willy-nilly recruitment (which loops back to eliminating XSD perks and ranks).
THE thing that sticks out furthest to me is MK stating that they can change the policy with 10 days’ notice.
I can’t not see this as laying the groundwork to yoink the rug out from under everyone, probably on September 13, 2026. Actually, that’s a Sunday, so probably the Friday before so that everyone can have a good panic over the weekend. Meanwhile Corporate will be closed for the weekend off and it nibbles two days off the 10 days notice, and thus two days less for the consultomers to act.
And Legal can sit back on its collective ass and say, “Well, it’s all your fault. You signed the new agreement that lets us do whatever the hell we want with 10 days’ notice. We told you not to buy more inventory than you can sell. The 90% buyback, as required by state law? You didn’t opt out of arbitration so you can’t sue us for that, so you’ll take whatever crumbs you get out of arbitration, if and when we get around to it, and those proceedings will be private so no one will ever know.
“Oh, and don’t go trying to sell your excess inventory anywhere, because signing the agreement also gives us the right to tell you what to do with your own property and if we catch you we will string you up like a chum salmon.”
Don’t sign the agreement, don’t give up your rights, get out now while there’s still a little time. I’d bet serious cash money that Dacia Weigant and the other retiring NSDs caught wind of this and jumped ship before the whole thing went down.
“Even for those who do opt out, and I wonder how many of those letters will be ‘lost in the mail’ or ‘misfiled, can’t find it, oopsies!’”
I think they’ll find some way to terminate the consultants that opt out. Mary Kay Corporate has turned a blind eye to a lot of misconduct, this will be their big chance to crack down and use misconduct as a reason to get rid of the troublemakers, and by troublemakers I mean the consultants that would be willing to publicly take them to court. Corporate has recently given Taylor Bero and supposedly Kristin Sharpe, Britany Jenks the stink eye, I think that’s only the tip of the iceberg.
If this bid to enter the conventional retail market fails, the restructuring will have set them up to be attractive to sell to a private equity firm that will scrap Mary Kay for parts.
The big announcement on a Friday? Makes sense. On true crime forums we call this Felony Friday as Fridays are often when big arrests and major announcements are made. Didn’t Grey New York say they have some big unveiling for Mary Kay this fall? September 13 is the anniversary. The Friday before is September 11, great timing!
Oh, jeez, the 9-11 aspect hadn’t occurred to me. It’s the 25th anniversary, too. The juxtaposition of the two would feel really ick-nasty to me, for reasons I can’t quite articulate.
It’s also the 25th anniversary of 9/11 that day so there should be plenty of news coverage of MLM huns doing their usual unhinged attempts to profit from the day.
The 10-day notice stood out to me. Can anyone who paid closer attention to the previous agreement say if this was already in there?
If we’re taking odds, I’m betting on an announcement to the sales force on 9/3, with a full marketing campaign blast to the general public on 9/13 about the all new and fabulous Mary Kay, sans any level of hierarchy. NSDs will get a moderate payout, scaled as required by their current contracts. Anyone below them will get nothing. They may let directors keep their cars to the end of the lease if they maintain requirements. Maybe.
My guess is that they’ll honor the 90% buyback. After all, it has a relatively short clock on it in the grand scheme of corporations. UNLESS! The announcement is that they’re being acquired or emerging as a new company. That may absolve them of the buyback requirement. At least, they’re going to argue that it does. And with no recourse to the courts, consultants will have a near impossible task to get any money back.
The arbitration agreement also states all cases brought to arbitration will be individual. Consultants cannot team up or file any class action petitions.
I think instead of a payout to nsds, they will instead be “allowed” to continue receiving commissions for a small period of time, maybe 90 days. This way the company has no real risk. Commissions are still based on orders, so if the sales force is mad and doesn’t order, OH WELL!
Mary Kay is thinking of selling its headquarters. Are they going to move to a different state that doesn’t have a mandatory buyback and other corporate-friendly perks, or are they doing a sell-leaseback of the property for a tax break?
I also wonder if Ryan reached a settlement with his stepmother and fake sister or if he still has ongoing legal problems.
I looked at the 2019 agreement Tracy has linked in the sideboard and the 10 day agreement was in there too.
If I were in charge of the affiliate model, I would:
– Eliminate all commissions and drop “wholesale” prices by 75-80% to allow competitive pricing with worthwhile mark-up margin
– Rebrand existing products under a “Mary Kay Classic” line
– Introduce a new line (or lines) with trendy products with fresh names
– Introduce the new lines with a large one-time national advertising campaign
– Eliminate front-loading requirements to significantly reduce reseller risk and enable 100% online selling without holding inventory
– Allow resellers to offer on Amazon and other marketplace platforms
Only the most ecommerce-savvy will survive. But done properly, the affiliate sellers and Mary Kay Corp could make real money selling realreal volume to real customers.
What a concept!
“…make real money selling real products in real volume to real customers.”
Not sure how that got goofed up!
Monday morning typo gremlins. They hide in your keyboard over the weekend and pop out as soon as you hit a key.
I think no matter what MK does, they’re going to fail. There is simply not enough real demand from third party customers. For 60+ years, the money has been made on frontloading, knowing that the vast majority of the product is NOT sold. I’d be surprised if even 25% of products ordered by consultants is actually sold. There is simply not enough retail demand, and I don’t believe any sort of rebrand will solve that problem.
Agreed. The only ladies buying MK products are the consultants. Nobody in the real world uses it or even recommends it- the demand does not exist.
Time to sell their stuff at Target/ CVS/Walgreens..
will this be a contract by new recruits or will already existing consultanta be required to sign it as well? This Ryan seems to want to destroy the business, which would probably be a good thing for the consultants in the long run, but would make it easier for Mary Kay to only be sold through stores or online.
Existing consultants have to sign it, too, if they want to stay in MK.
And based on the screen shots shown on the Discussion Board (thread titled “When will it be?”), the social pressure from directors to sign is very high. Units seem to be at stake over this, aside from the usual production requirements.
‘A diamond (pink Cadillac, junk jewelry, director coats, etc.) is a rough & hard thing to the touch.” Uncle Ben in Death of a Salesman (Death of an IBC/NSD, etc.???)
For other “mature ” people like me, you’ll likely remember the sad song, “The Party’s Over”, belted out by various singers on the Ed Sullivan show way back when.
-The Party’s Over-
“The party’s over
It’s time to call it a day
They’ve burst your pretty balloon
And taken the moon away
It’s time to wind up the masquerade
Just make your mind up the piper must be paid
The party’s over
The candles flicker and dim
You danced and dreamed through the night
It seemed to be right just being with him
Now you must wake up, all dreams must end
Take off your makeup, the party’s over
It’s all over, my friend.”
Sorry if I missed it, but what happens to the Family Security Plan for NSDs in this situation? I feel like there has to be some kind of binding agreement in place.
The ones that are already retired and getting a payout, nothing changes. The annuity was purchased through another company.
For the ones that would qualify for something if they quit today; if they’ve been an NSD for, say, 18 years would they just be automatically retired and the payouts to start? Or would they be SOL because they weren’t retired when NSD’s are shut down?
What happens to people like Jamie Taylor who has been an NSD for five years but isn’t 65, or the newly minted NSD Pam(?)
Was this an issue for anyone in AUS/NZ (did they have a retirement plan for them)?
My guess is that all bets are going to be off for the un-retired. The last thing MK would want is to have to purchase a whole bunch of annuities for retirees. They’ll have to just put an end to all things nsd and save the money!
Imagine the Speeches from Ryan at Seminar this year. Normally it’s all “This is the BEST year to be in Mary Kay! We added X number new consultants this year and X number of Sales Directors. Hahahaha. I’m sure he’s still going to say “This is best year to be in Mary Kay”. Even though he knows what’s coming and the only exciting Mary Kay growth is in other countries: Latin America and China.
Knowing Mary Kay, they’re going to say this new sales force agreement is better for you, the consultant.