The “Direct Sales = Better Products and Service” Myth
How many times have you heard that Mary Kay products are so much better because of the superior ingredients and personalized service?
Lots of MLMs promote the belief that somehow their products are better because they aren’t available in stores. Because you get personal service that you don’t get in retail environments.
And that direct sales is THE way to go when it comes to marketing products. In fact, it’s the wave of the future.
But I find it all hard to swallow.
The REAL thing that direct sales is good for is getting a bunch of people to hawk your products without having to pay them a salary or benefits.
People have been buying facial cleansers for years and somehow managed to figure out how to wash their face without having to invite a bunch of friends over to their house for two hours .
Just a thought on this Saturday… 
DiDi on 
L J on 
Jackie on 
nadezhda on 
So true LJ! There are equal and better products on the shelves at WalMart or your local grocery store. I find the “service” there just fine – in fact, more convenient. It is a place I would already be going anyhow, so I don’t have to schedule anything extra to get what I want. Reading the ingredients list on an item tells me all I need to know to figure out if it’s a good fit for me or not. Consumers don’t have to rely on sales assistants or cosmetics reps to be informed. Information is everywhere nowdays and someone can simply google each ingredient and find loads of info. It’s quite nice that I can return home and not be bothered with phonecalls and emails afterwards, trying to get me to buy more.
Most department store brands accept returns, even of used products. They don’t want dissatisfied customers, either. I can vouch for Estee Lauder on this.
The quality of MK products leaves alot to be desired. They are not anything special, and certainly not the best. The brainwashing they do at meetings to make consultants think this is interesting. To keep women believing this, they instruct them to not shop in beauty aisles at stores or sample things at department store cosmetic counters. Maybe if they tried other brands some of them would find things that are better!
JMHO
I think that MK cosmetics would flop in the regular retail market. The products don’t stack up and the prices are ridiculously high. Also a lot of their stuff causes adverse reactions. I’ve had more problems with MK products than all other brands I’ve tried put together. So they require consultants to talk you into believing that you are buying good stuff, whereas if you went out and did an unbiased comparison, you’d find out differently.
i think the reason i keep posting after reading posts is the fact that so many that post here post their opinions as fact. try saying that 10 times fast. rethinkingpink says that mary kay’s quality leaves alot to be desired – in her opinion. she says that mary kay is not special and certainly not the best – in her opinion. i recently had 2 of my customers purchase lip glosses and lipsticks, again, from me because they tried other brands and didn’t like whatever it was they tried for one reason or another. both, independent of each other, said they couldn’t find a quality lip gloss/stick that had the quality packaging (the lip wand itself) and staying power (without an ink) that mary kay had. so for these 2 gals (and i’m sure thousands more), there is something special and “best” about mary kay. i have posted myself that i have tried other products (at least 10 top companies) and have found nothing that compares to my satisfaction with mary kay. i know this is an anti-mary kay site, but it just bothers me that several posters that were consultants/directors continue to say that all mary kay products are bad/inferior/too-high priced, etc. you’ve got your cheaper-end products at stores like wal-mart, walgreens, target, k-mart, etc., and then there’s even higher-priced products like lancome, este lauder, etc., so mary kay is in between. i’m all for everyone finding what they like, what they can afford and what works for them; it’s just seems odd to me to hear all these stories of how mary kay products suck and everyone’s broken out or had a reaction to them, and yet in my 28 years of selling, i’ve only had one incident of someone saying their skin broke out and i changed her product and everything was fine. just my opinion
Lisa, I understand completely what you’re saying. Sure, everyone likes different things.
But I think the bigger point, and one of the things that made me start this site, is that MK tries to convince you that the products ARE superior to others. They try to convince you that their products are SIGNIFICANTLY better than others, and that simply isn’t true. I haven’t found ANY evidence to support this. It needs to be quantitative.
Mary Kay always talks about how they’re in between drugstore and dept store cosmetics, as you have also talked about. But I think that statement is only addressing price. Furthermore, I don’t think it’s even accurate. It’s simply a way, once again, to “overcome objections” to the, I believe, ridiculous price of their products. And no, they aren’t the only company peddling products I think are overpriced for what you get. Far from it.
There are products in the drugstores that are better for your skin and your pocketbook than Mary Kay. That’s a statement I feel comfortable making which I suppose is, yet again, another opinion. But I feel pretty confident stating it. There are products that have been around a long time that are mild and recommended by dermatologist for decades.
And besides opinion, you’re also describing experience Lisa, when you talk about only having one person who told you their skin broke out using the product. Well, I hate to tell you, but most women DON’T return products that don’t work, they simply throw them out and never buy them again. Even though consultants tell you that there is a return policy, most don’t want to hassle with it for various reasons. Many don’t want to deal with that consultant again…on and on. I know some drugstores started taking back cosmetic returns as well but I can’t remember ever taking advantage of it.
L J – First, Mary Kay doesn’t “claim” to be superior to other products. Our business is to let people try the product and decide for themselves. If they like the product, they buy it. If they don’t, they won’t. One thing I can tell you – products found in drugstores are not Premium Products. Many of them are not hypo-allergenic, do not contain FILLERS, fragrance free, non-comedogenic, or FDA approved. Premium Products, like Lancome, Arbonne, Este Lauder, Clinique, Mary Kay, etc., are all of the above. My question to you would be: …it’s obvious you don’t like Mary Kay, but why are you wasting your time creating a whole website about it? Have you not more constructive and positive things to do with your time? There are things that I don’t necessarily care for that I just simply don’t spend my money on and that is that… I don’t feel the need to take up my valuable time creating a website bashing products/things that I determine sub-par.
Just something to think about.
Jena, if you read further in the Forum or just on this page, you would see that LJ provides a valuable service and a place where women can get the facts on MK from other women who have already been in MK .
There are many women , myself included, who are very happy we found Pinklighthouse and found a place of healing and acceptance after a bad MK experience. Please don’t knock something you know nothing about. Pinklighthouse is a labor of love for LJ and the women who stay to help others.
Read more before you judge!