IBOAI Stakes Greg Duncan in All In Challenge
WWDB Triple Diamond Greg Duncan has had a string of bad beats lately. Just this week, Amquix is claiming that several of his properties in Montana are in pre-foreclosure!1 Last month, he was more or less accused of violating Quixtar’s Non-Compete Clause with the news that he’s the co-owner of All In Energy, an energy drink similar to the Amway/Quixtar exclusive XS. Duncan, as many people know, is also the part-owner of XS.
The IBOAI has a new blog post today explaining that Duncan is not violating Rule 6.5 of the Quixtar Rules of Conduct. I want to comment specifically on one section from the post:
The fact is, XS Energy Drinks are marketed to Quixtar for sale exclusively by IBOs and All In Energy Drink is marketed to an entirely different market not in competition with Quixtar or IBOs. The manufacture and sale of All In Energy Drink does not violate either the letter or the spirit of the Rules of Conduct.
Yes, we all know that poker players would never think of becoming independent business owners, and that IBOs would never, ever, gamble their money away. Ask Phil Hellmuth to calculate his chances of becoming a Diamond versus winning another WSOP bracelet, and I bet he’ll be sticking with his day job!
All In Energy Drink, owned by Triple Diamond Greg Duncan of WWDB and XS
All kidding aside, let’s take a closer look at the cards held by these two target markets. According to the following survey conducted by the American Gaming Association, poker was a popular activity in 2007, with 13% of adults playing poker during the year. The total US population of people age 21 or older is over 217 million, so that translates to 28 million people. 25 percent of the US adult population visited a casino in 2007 and the average trip per gambler was 6.9 trips. 48 percent of adults also purchased at least one lottery ticket.
And the market for XS? In the United States alone, that’s probably around a million people. Now take out those IBOs who don’t gamble nor play poker. Looks to me that Duncan should go all in himself with marketing All In Energy over XS! After all, his target market is much larger with All In Energy! He better watch out, however, because it appears that consumers might be getting tired of energy drinks altogether.
Cut through all the IBOAI BS, and the simple fact of the matter is that All In Energy and XS are competitors. They might say they are targeting different niches, but at the end of the day, they are still competitors. The IBOAI here is not conducting rumor control, it’s playing damage control.
Since I’m no longer an IBO, I quite frankly don’t care if Duncan is the owner of both XS and All In Energy. I won’t be buying his sugar-free water anytime soon. Were I an IBO, however, I would pay particularly close attention to the products that he promotes on stage. I would wager that a good percentage of them will be things that he has a direct financial interest in separate from the Amway corporation, such as tapes, CDs, functions, XS, KATE, and websites. Duncan might appear to be in the business of helping people build their own Amway Global business, but I think he’s really in the business of selling his products to IBOs. Others might not think so — and that is their right2 — but to me, that’s a huge conflict of interest.
1 Scott Larsen from Amquix.info has updated his post saying that Duncan’s properties are in pre-foreclosure, not foreclosure. Please read the original article for more details on the differences between the two.
2 Read an opposing point of view (and the comments) on ibofightback’s website.
AMTHRAX 
Good post. Well, technically, if IBOs don’t sell XS to anyone and don’t drink “All In”, then they are not competing with each other. If Greg is using his Amway function stage as a means to promote All In, I could see that as competition.
I’m curious, but I guess we’ll never know what circumstances led up to the home foreclosures. What happened to personal responsibility and buying homes in cash?
Amthrax – the whole point is that they are not competitors as competition is defined in the Quixtar rules
When you’re talking about whether a rule has been broken or not, it’s important to actually look at how those rules define things, and “compete” is explictly defined as something different to “normal” usage.
Sorry, adding one more thought. Does the IBOAI have the authority for issuing the interpretation of the rule? Wouldn’t the Quixtar corporation issue a ruling on whether the rule was violated or not?
Competing against self consumers by retailing? Hmmmm? There are two completely different markets here!
The market for Quixtar crap are within the self consumption pyramid while market for All In energy drinks are outside of the pointy structure. I have to agree with the IBOAI. Hmmmm? Never thought I’d say that.
If an IBO ever were to become a successful professional poker player, would they be sponsored by XS or All In Energy in the next World Series of Poker tournament?
If Amway can sponsor athletes, why can’t XS sponsor poker players too? If so, would that constitute a conflict of interest? Would that mean they are competing with one another?
Look, Duncan can sell his drinks to whoever he wants. He’s stupid not to do that. But don’t insult my intelligence by saying these are completely different and separate markets. Tell it like it is, Duncan is in the beverage industry and wants to expand his business beyond the realm of IBOs.
Two things. I understand IBOFB’s explanation, however, as I said, why is the IBOAI issuing the statement and not quixtar?
Secondly, if Greg promotes All In drinks over XS at a quixtar function, does that change anything?
Amthrax…
Aren’t IBOs supposed to be loyal to their brand? What a man invests his own money in is his business I guess even if it does seem like a conflict of interest. Beverages must be something he is comfortable with. Do Quixtar products really compete against other manufacturer products? The market for Quixtar drinks are the distributors themselves almost exclusively save for the reported 3.4 percent that miraculously get sold to someone else aren’t they. Aren’t IBOs supposed to avoid negative products like I avoid cleaning the cat box?
Amthrax, I’m not arguing that the XS and All in Energy are not competing with each other as the word is normally used – clearly they are – but the Quixtar rules quite specifically define what “compete” means for the purpose of those rules. The definition is very clear, no interpretation needed. Nevertheless, the IBOAI blog post is poorly written.
ibofightback – I’m not arguing that he’s legally violating the Quixtar Non-Compete clause. If they say he’s legally in the clear, fine with me.
Spirit of the rule… now there I think I have some valid arguments.
At the end of the day, Duncan should be allowed to sell his products to other people. But don’t hide behind all this two separate markets PR nonsense.
Amthrax – totally agree. When I read the article, I found it comical when they mentioned semantics and the spirit of the rule because clearly, selling another energy drink is in direct competition with an approved quixtar product.
To my reading “the spirit” of the rule is no competing within the direct selling industry. I don’t see a problem with it.
Again, why is the IBOAI issuing this clarification instead of Quixtar? I’m pretty sure Mr. Duncan has some influence with the IBOAI.
One might also wonder why someone would invest in an energy drink company when they are already a part owner of the
“best” energy drink company already.
“One of my greatest pet peeves is that when they think have a better deal so they go to some real-estate seminar and pay $3,000 bucks to just hear about it. And my attitude is if the dang real-estate seminar is so good and it works why don’t they charge enough at the door to cover the cost of the function and then they can make a percentage off the real-estate profits. I’ll tell you why. Because, the average person who attends a real-estate seminar loses $5,000 bucks, $3,000 just from the initiation fee just to get in the stupid thing.” Double Diamond-Greg Duncan-tape: “EDC Attitude” RP419
I’m certain there’s plenty of great quotes to mine from listening to old tapes and CDs. That said, I’m glad that I threw all of my away when I left the business.
Unless XS and All In Energy are owned by the same parent company, ala how Coca-Cola owns Coke, Sprite, etc.
I actually agree completely with IBOFB – is this a first? Hell must have frozen over ;-)….
Greg Duncan is in compliance with letter AND spirit of the rule.
The intent of the rule is to prevent IBOs from being a salesman for ANOTHER MLM company, WHILE they are STILL a Quixtar IBO.
Having said that – I agree with the general tenor of your post. Greg Duncan is a complete HYPOCRITE – he is one hell of a shyster. You are right, his PRIMARY interest is in selling stuff like XS, CDs, Tapes, Kate etc. rather than the Amway Business.
Amthrax – I suspect they are.
Re the “foreclosures”, Larsen has an update with an explanation from a “real estate expert” that they’re not foreclosures, it’s a “preforeclosure” (which is actually clearly stated at the top of the docs) and apparently it’s just a first step “shot across the bow” type of thing that can occur if there’s a dispute. His analysis was that the info provided suggested it was highly unlikely to go to foreclosure.
Thank you for the clarification. I have updated the text in the article to state that the properties are in pre-foreclosure as opposed to foreclosure.
perceptive – another unstated goal of the site to provide a forum in which critics and supporters can talk reasonably about the business and even find some common ground!
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