Climbing the Pyramid with USANA

Ok, first off I'm not a Doberman when comes to sniffing out scams. I'm usually the crab in the boiling pot screaming to high heaven "I'm a crab and I'm being boiled alive in a HUGE FUCKING POT!" Nonetheless, today I had the opportunity of sitting in (not a pot) but a conference room where I was being recruited, or poached, by an associate of USANA.

Before I go any further I should start at the beginning. It was Monday October 18th, and I received a call from a gentleman who saw my resume on Monster.com. He noticed that I was a multimedia specialist and that I could be a great asset to his company. The conversation dilly-dallied and he mentioned things about "marketing," "health sciences," and "growth," I haven't hung up on him so I told him I was curious. He told me to appear "for an appointment" at 1pm the next day at the local community center but I should arrive at 12:30 to register. He then explained that with my background in Multimedia I'd be a great team member for a new team developing in the east bay area. So far I'm intrigued and it sounds like I'm going to become a part of something emerging and groundbreaking: it deals with new media medicine, I'd be at the beginning, and I sounds like an intimate one-on-one discussion with a "Director" from the company.

This is the part where I say "this sounds too good to be true," so I go do some research at USANA's website and find that their sponsored by Sony Erricson, they have many athletes and celebrities that endorse their products and their one of the top ranking corporations currently in the world above Pixar, and other companies I would love to work for. Silly me, I realized that I was an idiot to even doubt this monumental opportunity. I should feel priveleged to be on the inside, to be given a once in a lifetime opportunity like this one right? WRONG!

The day I show up to the presentation red flags are already sticking out of this craphouse.

First, everyone setting up for the "appointment" are at least 5-7 years younger than me. Two guys, 18 years old, were from Stockton and both were from low-income families and had no avenue to get to college. The recruiter was from the same home town as me, and tried to build to a conversational bridge using old high school teacher anecdotes that we could both appreciate. Another guy was from San Jose, was friendly, but said something that was quite off putting: "When you meet our director, she's going to open your eyes." The only other time I've heard that platitude is when someone was trying to convert me.

Second, the "director" was running late, and her "team" asked me to be sympathetic and respect her for driving all the way from San Jose to be here. Well....if you ask for respect you will only receive when it is reciprocated. By her showing up late she had indirectly wasted my time as well as the person next to me. I could see that they were trying to groom us so that we'll be less objectionable and more impressionable. My expectation of "the director" did not match the image in my mind at all. The "director" was a petite, nineteen, American Vietnamese girl from San Jose. She was extremely convincing in all of her arguments. She possessed an in-your-face sales persona that suited her well. She was extremely talented at using rhetoric and suggestive logic. However impromptu and natural her arguments felt, her tone was still very defensive. She went out of her way to belittle any and all goals I and the other person attending the presentation had in terms of going to college and finding a great job. But to top it off, the guys who were setting up strategically sat on the ends of both aisles where we were sitting so that we would be less inclined to leave early. Moreover, these guys began to testify while "the director" was speaking by yelling "That's true!" or "That's right!" every time she brought up a new point. It was like an evangelical meeting. When I or the other person didn't answer her rhetorical questions she would get upset and say "I want participation! I don't want this to be like a classroom where I just talk to myself!" This girl was a wolf, and the other guys were her pack.

Finally, I was purposely misled to believe this was an intimate setting where I would be discussing job opportunities. All of the chairs were facing forward. There was a projector and boombox. "Holy shit..." I thought. This isn't a job interview, this is entrapment! Finally at the end of the presentation, which was only me because the other person had to leave early (lucky), I asked "the director" if she could get down to brass tactics and what is was she wanted from me and how facilitation could occur. She then explained that the way the program works is by buying the products (from her) and then referring the products to the people around me. Great. A pyramid scheme. "But wait!" she says. Then she walked over to the white board and began to draw a pyramid. On this pyramid she wrote the acronym J.O.B. she then called it "Journey of the Broke." Funny. She then drew at the top C.E.O, then a line slightly below it, President, then another line, Vice President, and so on and so on until she diagrammed the corporate ladder in the form of a pyramid. Ah!... she what she did there? I told you she's a wolf. She then drew a dot at the very bottom of the pyramid and said that's you, and that's how small and insignificant you are to this whole company.

Now folks, at this point I deserve all of the punishment I received for being so gullible. However I find it utterly ridiculous for her to claim that her company is not a pyramid scheme when in fact USANA is inc., which means it is also a corporation, which means by her logic she is admitting that USANA is also a pyramid scheme. More importantly, the way the service works is EXACTLY LIKE A PYRAMID SCHEME! Here is their business model straight from wikipedia.org:

"USANA, a multilevel marketing company, sells its products primarily via non-employee distributors known as sales "associates" as well as via the Internet. Associates may be eligible to receive commissions based on their own product sales as well as through sales made by any new distributors they recruit (referred to in multilevel marketing parlance as a "downline").^[5] USANA uses a binary infinite compensation plan which awards commissionable 'points' for sales volume. 

When the points reach a pre-determined number, the associate is paid. If the points do not reach the payment threshold, they accumulate towards the next week. USANA requires that associates must purchase a minimum of 100 volume of products (equivalent to approximately $110–$130) every four weeks in order to remain eligible to receive compensation. If this minimum requirement is not maintained, the distributor will lose the points that have accumulated but not yet been paid on.^[40] According to documentation from USANA corporate 87% of associates fail to make enough off of commissions to recover the cost of their qualifying purchases with 67% of all associates making no commission; 72.2% of the company's commissions are earned by the top 2.31% of associates.^[41]

According to a 2011 article published by the Salt Lake City Tribune, USANA's FY09 income disclosure statement indicated that the average yearly income of the company's 165,710 associates, which includes those just starting out, was $617, while the "top-of-the-pyramid distributors earn an average of $857,865 annually".^[42]"

Basically I had to feign interest in order to avoid further persuasion and existential criticism. My advice to anyone job searching is to remain skeptical of people calling after they found your resume on a job board. If the ask you to attend an "appointment," or "offer," or anything other than the word INTERVIEW, ask more questions and if it isn't an interview or they keep shoveling vague answers down your throat--respectfully decline.


Oh! By the way. At one time USANA was being investigated by the FFC and FBI. 'Nuff said.

Job Search Drama

I, like many other 20-somethings, am still actively searching for opportunities in employment. With the job market remaining stagnant and with the unemployment rate now at  around 9.1%, things are looking quite bleak. Jennifer Lee posted an article in the New York Times last month (link below)
and noted that many people in our age range are stuck in limbo--"generation limbo"she called us. I've met many individuals that share this sense of futility; like Laura from Humboldt county. I met her on my way to a photo shoot in Morro Bay. Laura was a graduate from UC Berkeley with a major in Environmental Engineering (or something to that effect), yet she told me she made more money painting houses. She then proceeded to propagate the now acceptable mantra of: "Why did I even go to college in the first place?"

The only defense against her solid argument was that it was she had invested time and energy into something that would yield long-term profit instead of instant gratification. Naturally I had to submit to her claim that the popular myth of "go to college-get a degree-get a great job" is exactly that...a myth. Instead, I asserted that the economy is forcing a lot of us to think creatively about what we want to do with our futures in order to prevent from sinking. Some of my colleagues collaborated and formed companies, (appsynthmedia.com) others took their individual talents and set up metaphorical kiosks in order to market themselves (selinahu.com). Hence, the fate of an individual is up his or her will to succeed and depth of skills.

(http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/01/fashion/recent-college-graduates-wait-for-their-real-careers-to-begin.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=generation%20limbo&st=cse)