PinkLighthouse.com

Singer/Songwriter Jewel is the spokesperson for Mary Kay’s “Kiss For Country” campaign this year.

The second annual event enlists celebrities to make their lipstick-coated lip print on a card to be auctioned off, with proceeds benefiting the Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation to benefit women affected by domestic violence.  Martina McBride was recruited as spokesperson for last year’s inaugural event.

To kick off the event, Jewel joined a group of 25 Mary Kay Consultants to help clean up the backyard of a women’s shelter in the Nashville area.

This is a great cause.

So why does the cynical side of me worry about the women in shelters being subjected to a recruiting pitch by those MK Consultants?

We’ve often heard the response from active Mary Kay consultants that bad experiences in Mary Kay can be blamed on a few “bad” directors or consultants in the company.

I finally realized that there’s a communication problem here.

The women who have had unpleasant experiences in Mary Kay aren’t saying that the directors and other consultants they encountered are necessarily bad people. It’s their behavior, the required Mary Kay speak and attitude, that is horrible.

There are more than “just a few bad apples” in Mary Kay, and they share many of the following behaviors:

• pushing consultants to spend more on inventory, Seminar and other events than they wanted to
• asking consultants to give up a Saturday morning with their family for a recruiting brunch

One of the ways that Mary Kay Consultants are encouraged to find new customers is by “warm chattering.”

The consultant spies a woman in the cosmetic department of the local Wal-Mart, for instance, and casually comments on her lovely skin. The consultant then tries to get the woman’s name and phone number so that she can set up an appointment with her to “try Mary Kay products” or be a “face model” at a girls’ night out, which is really a Mary Kay sales meeting.

I don’t know many consultants who were ever really good at this. Most tried it a few times and gave up because of the negative responses they received. Many people couldn’t stand approaching people in a way that they, themselves, would find irritating and offensive. (Hmmm…sounds like the Golden Rule to me!)

A reader named Mary contacted me with this interesting question:

After reading info about the talc in Mary Kay and the dangers of it, will Mary Kay take my used products back and give me a refund? I’ve only see the product replacement online. I just ordered several of the new “mineral” eye colors and have been using them. Will they take them back? Where on Mary Kay In Touch do I request a refund?

I thought this was a good question. After all, Mary Kay Consultants are customers of the Company too. Its biggest customer, in fact.