MonaVie Emv (Energy) to Compete with XS Gold

I had it all backwards when I wrote that XS Gold was going to be a competitor to MonaVie. It turns out MonaVie has been readying its own entry in the energy drink marketplace, MonaVie Energy.

According to the corporation, an independent blind taste¹ taste rated it numero uno against other energy drinks on the market.

And so, here we go again. Let the wild claims about benefits to this new elixir begin, as the drink doesn’t go on sale for another two months. I wonder how much it will cost for one can of MV Energy. The folks at LazyMan will no doubt be breaking down the price difference between MonaVie Energy and other competing energy drinks, including XS Gold. I would expect MonaVie to charge a premium for the drink, as they do today with their purple grape juice concentrate. My bet, however, is that they charge a multiple less (i.e. instead of 10x, how about 2x?), and pass it off as part of the MonaVie Economic Stimulus Plan.

---

¹ I bet their blind taste test involved 50 Diamonds and above (and their children). After several years of chugging da juice, their taste buds have now been trained to pick up even the most microscopic presence of the magical acai berry in MonaVie and MonaVie Energy.

The Six Cardinal Rules of BWW

While doing some research on BWW Spring Leaderships, I came across the Six Cardinal Rules of the Shah organization within BWW:

Six Cardinal Rules

1. Never Do Anything for the First Time, without Checking Upline
2. Never Pass Negative Downline or Cross-line
3. Never Embarrass or De-edify Your Upline or Downline
4. Never mess with anyone’s Money
5. Never mess with anyone’s Ego
6. Never mess with anyone’s Spouse

What happens if you break one of these rules? Are you banned from the business and shunned by those in your organization? What if you are a Diamond? Are you exempt from following the cardinal rules?

Later on, I found this on Twitter:

Marriage tip from Paul Miller for men. For a good night, show affection during the day. #bwwsl09

Judging from the date of the tweet (April 5, 2009), Crown Ambassador Paul Miller said this during the BWW Spring Leadership in Richmond, Virginia. Paul Miller is listed on Amquix’s Divorces web page:

Paul & Debbie Miller — Numerous site visitors reported Debbie Miller with Emerald, Ann Eatmon’s son, Blake Thompson. The Britt web site now lists Paul as a single. Debbie’s name has been stricken from the record. Site visitors also report that Paul had an affair with his secretary Leslie Randolph for 14 years. She was married. He is not allowed to get on a Britt stage for a year, and then it will be reviewed. Paul is now married to Leslie.

and this on IBOFB’s AmwayWiki page on Paul Miller:

Together with his former wife Debbie, Paul qualified Diamond in 1979, Double Diamond in 1987, Triple Diamond in 1992, and Crown in 1993. They attended the first Diamond club in the 1970s, along with John & Jennie Belle Crowe. In 1999, they also qualified for FAA Personal Perks, which required 25+ FAA credits. Paul and Debbie have since divorced and he is now married to Leslie, his former secretary. Their upline Diamond is Bill Britt.

Furthermore, I’ve read Mr. BWW Bill Britt himself has had extramarital activity himself.

Back to the Sixth Cardinal Rule:

6. Never mess with anyone’s Spouse

Does this mean that two of the highest pins in the BWW organization violated one of the sacred Cardinal Rules? What other rules might they have ignored? Perhaps one of the perks of being a Diamond and above is that you can skirt these rules whenever you see fit!

That’s just not right.

Six Cardinal Rules for Diamonds and Above

1. As a walking, talking, can-do-no-wrong demi-god to your IBOs, you don’t really have to answer to anyone in your group.
2. You can talk smack backstage about other people.
3. You can embarass and de-edify those in your group who decide to leave the business by calling them losers and quitters.
4. You can take people’s money by selling overcharged tools.
5. You can humiliate and look down upon people who have jobs.
6. You can, like Paul Miller and Bill Britt, have affairs.

I once made the mistake of putting my Diamond leaders on pedestals of virtue and honesty. I won’t make the same mistake twice and current IBOs should be wary of an upline who is overly edified. As human beings, not demi-gods, they will invariably disappoint you.

---

Joecool has some thoughts on this subject.

BWW Spring Leadership 2009 in San Jose

In the nearly ten years since I quit, I have yet to be prospected by an Amway IBO. This weekend, however, I knew exactly where they were going to be! I was in San Jose on Friday evening when I saw “BWW Spring Leadership April 18-19″ adorning a sign next to the San Jose Civic Auditorium. My former System, INA, frequently held opens at the Civic Auditorium. I could not pass up this opportunity to do some more investigation.

BWW planned four Spring Leaderships in the month of April: Richmond, VA, London, Canada, San Jose, CA, and Dallas, TX. I wonder how the economic downturn in the United States is affecting attendance at these Spring Leaderships. Tickets for Leadership started at $100 ($105 at the door) per person¹. Looking at the line, there were a sizable number of people in attendance, but I don’t think they filled the Civic Auditorium (max 3,000) to capacity. I would estimate an attendance of about 1000 people over the weekend.

The biggest surprise was the racial demographic of the crowd. The vast majority of IBOs — at least 80% — were of Southeast Asian descent. While I know that that BWW group in the Bay Area has several Indian Diamonds, I was still unprepared to see such a large percentage of Southeast Asians in the crowd. This was not the case with INA ten years ago, where Caucasians made up the majority of IBOs. Finally, by my estimate, most of the IBOs were also in their twenties or early thirties. Young and impressionable, just like I was!

This weekend was very hot in the Bay Area, and I bet it was uncomfortable to be in those suits and business dresses. I know it’s called “business attire,” but here in the Bay Area, it’s a bit overkill.

I did speak to one IBO. He never mentioned the Amway or Quixtar name to me. He just said that this was the annual Spring Leadership for people who run their own businesses. What struck me as odd, however, was that he emphasized that everyone attending the meeting was management level and up! I wanted to ask him more questions, but decided against doing so. He exuded the typical excited IBO air, and I didn’t want to poo-poo his attitude and “steal his dream.”

Click on the images to see the larger versions. Click again to see the original photo.

---

¹ I don’t know if prospects got into the conference for free or if they had to pay $100 to attend.

What Happens at a Open Meeting Today?

What happens at an Open Meeting these days for Amway and MonaVie? Do the speakers at these meetings go through the standard criticism of a typical job and career? Do they talk about residual and passive income that these businesses purportedly offer? Do they focus heavily on material wealth? Do they push the importance of the System and tools, books, CDs, and major functions? Do the distributors hang out after the presentation for their weekly Nite Owl session? Is everyone still wearing suits and dresses to these meetings? What’s the ratio of prospects to distributors?

What about the prospects? Are they in general more open to the idea of MLMs, given the poor state of the economy or more dismissive, given the amount of critical analysis and opinions available on the Internet?

Sometimes, when I’m lying in bed, I wonder what happens at these meetings. According to the Team Schedule, there were several meetings in the Bay Area this evening. In fact, I bet they are still at the hotel, strategizing, plotting, and teaching how to recruit more people to TEAM, MonaVie, and Orrin Woodward’s flock. The long drive back home still awaits them. I hope no one falls asleep at the wheel.

I’m so thankful that I’ve had my evenings back for nearly 10 years. Time for bed!

Orrin Woodward’s Priceless New Book and Tweets

This just in today from the Supreme TEAM Leader’s Twitter stream:

Have you read Chris Brady and my new book? http://tinyurl.com/cfu4cg

Following the link above brings one to a Team shopping page for their new book, Leadership: Tidbits And Treasures. The book is described as offering a priceless education for $17.95¹. Without even reading it, I bet all the book is simply a collection of quotes from famous people over the years. After all, isn’t that what Orrin does best? Taking other people’s quotes and articles and using them to server his purpose? One thing about Orrin is certain; he is a master of copy and paste.

TEAM members no doubt don’t care what I write; they’ll happily purchase Leadership: Tidbits And Treasures for $17.95. I’m not sure how many TEAM members are left after the great split, but figure 10,000 would bring in $180,000 to Orrin’s coffers. This time, I don’t see any talk about donating the profits of this book to his charity, All Grace Outreach.

It’s pretty clear what I’m getting at. Orrin is milking his flock of all of their money, and the sad thing is, they enjoy having him do it. For all his attacks on the economy and our now “socialist government”, Orrin is acting like quite the totalitariat by not allowing much in the way of dissenting comments on his site.

Bad advice is free & available, good advice is rare & priceless. Pursue the priceless, not the free, for you pay once rather than for life.

Visit his website, and you’ll get plenty of free advice from the Supreme TEAM Leader. Want the good, priceless stuff? Well then, you’ve got to pay up each month for his wisdom: books, CDs, and meetings!

---

¹ Why not save the environment and make an e-book out of Leadership: Tidbits And Treasures and pass the savings onto your customers. What, concerned about piracy? Don’t you trust your TEAM followers not to electronically distribute your PDF book? Where’s the TEAM Economic Stimulus Plan?

MonaVie Waives Renewal and Enrollment Fees… Keeps Everything Else the Same

I read this recently on the MonaVie On the Move website:

MonaVie Waives Annual Renewal Fee for 2009

The MonaVie Stimulus Package is continually proving that no other company cares for its distributors quite like MonaVie. And now, we are excited to announce yet another element to the package.

Until further notice, MonaVie is waiving the annual US$20 renewal fee!

During these increasingly difficult economic times, MonaVie is committed to doing whatever we can to help you share the MonaVie opportunity with as many people as possible. We look forward to your continued success as we work together to grow MonaVie.

Furthermore, they are waiving the $39 enrollment fees for all newly signed distributors for 2009.

Let me get this straight; MonaVie is waiving a $20 annual fee but still requiring its distributors to have 100PV in volume (i.e. a case a month for $120) in order to receive a bonus? Sure it’s $20 (or $39 to sign up), but that doesn’t really sound like much of a deal to me if you still have to buy $120 worth of product each month.

But wait, there’s more in MonaVie Stimulus Plan:

MonaVie Coming to You. Rather than asking you to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on travel, we’re coming to you in 2009 with increased City and Regional Meetings. We’d rather you spend that travel money on your tasting parties!

Okay, so instead of giving money to your online travel agent and favorite airline, you give more money to MonaVie for bottles of juice for your tasting parties? Don’t forget the $25 entrance fee to attend your now-local Regional Seminar! Well, there goes that $20 you saved by having the annual distributor fee waived!

Black Diamond and above Qualification. We are rolling back the requirements to reach Black, Royal, Presidential, Imperial, and Crowne Black Diamond to meeting the individual rank requirements for four consecutive weeks, rather than six and eight weeks. It’s now more attainable!

So, the people at the very top — Woodward, Hart, and company — can reach higher levels more easily? Gee, so is that like “the rich get richer?”

Here’s another quote from Dallin Larsen about the stimulus plan:

This world is starving for bold, principle-based leadership, and we’re going to continue answering the call! Here’s a secret to success: Find out what the masses are doing and do just the opposite. It’s time for people to stand up and say to a world that is heading south that we’re heading north, and to jump on this train because there’s more room. It’s time for MonaVie to step up and step out. It’s time for us to do, be, give, and become MORE!

I think Orrin Woodward is secretly Dallin’s scriptwriter. He sures sound a lot like him!

How about reducing the price of your product as part of the MonaVie Stimulus Plan? What you say? You can’t do that? Oh, I forgot, that’s because your Mid-Year 2009 Income Disclosure Statement would show a whopper of a decline in the business.

If you want more analysis on the MonaVie “opportunity”, visit Lazy Man’s blog.

P.S. I hear there’s a new magic berry drink coming out called Avia. The Maqui berry has a higher ORAC value than your precious Acai!

The Cycle of the Sith in Amway and MonaVie Systems

In Star Wars, there is a Rule of Two governing the number of Sith Lords. There are only two Sith Lords operating at any one point in time, a master and an apprentice. At first, the master teaches the apprentice the ways of the Dark Side of the Force, until one day, the apprentice’s ego and ambition rise to such a point where s/he will try to overthrow the master. Sometimes the apprentice fails, and the master finds a new apprentice. Sometimes, the apprentice succeeds and becomes the master.

I see this same cycle happening within Amway/Quixtar/MonaVie Motivational Organizations. Leaders underneath the kingpins decide they want to be the kingpin of their own systems and subsequently break away. We’ve seen this happen time and time again with InterNet, BWW, INA, LTD, TOD, N21 and who knows how many more organizations (and acronyms). Now, we’re witnessing this unfold with Orrin Woodward’s very own TEAM. The Haugens, Smiths, Crawfords, and Wilsons have all decided that they do not want to play second fiddle to Master Woodward and have struck out on their own with the Legacy Business Group Professional Development Program.

Give them a few years and we’ll see what happens to those leaders and those that come up after them. Will Legacy’s up and coming leaders grow big enough and decide to leave for their own share of the System pie? We shall see!

What goes around, comes around. Orrin Woodward is experiencing that for himself right now. How’s that for Karma?

Attitude is an April Fool’s Joke

This just in from Orrin’s website, a translation of his latest post on how attitude is a choice. For background information, please read this post about recent high-level Team leader defections.

Here is a super article on the power of choice in the attitude you take to each situation. A big thank you to Ann Clous for sending it to me.

Translation: Things are really tough right now, so I’ll quote something written by someone else instead of coming up with an original thought today.

I am blessed to be surrounded by the best group of leaders and attitudes in the country.

Translation: I am especially blessed now that I don’t have Mark and Tami Crawford, Randy and Val Haugen, Don Wilson, and Lance Smith to bug me every day their cut of the Team tools profits. Their negative attitudes, despite all those positive things that I said of them on my blog here and here and here and here, were really moving my cheese.