Miss Gullible

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You may have heard Andy Willoughby’s radio ads, “Well how in the world are you anyway?” and are wondering what it is all about. Well Andy Willoughby’s 3 step program is essentially a pyramid scheme that promotes a product called Xango juice. Now I haven’t tasted the juice, but apparently it is quite nice and healthy too, but so is a lot of the juice you can buy at the supermarket.

Anyway the main aim of Andy Willoughby’s plan is to make money, so I guess it’s not really about the juice. This is often the case with MLM schemes, even GDI, which is working quite well for me shares this trait. (GDI is not so much about the domain names as the money making scheme).

Buy my question is this, Can you really make money promoting Xango juice?

Well, it seems like it is a hard thing to do. First of all you call and talk to a distributor about the opportunity and listen to a presentation. You then pay approx $35 to become a distributor yourself. This enables you to buy a case of Xango juice for around $100 (4 x 25 ounce bottles per case). You are required to buy at least one case per month to remain a distributor. Can you see how you might end up losing money on this?

The aim is to sell each bottle for $38, which is $13 profit. Wow, that sounds ridiculous to me. I don’t care how good the stuff tastes. I mean, sure it’s meant to be good for you, but so is orange juice and you can get that for a dollar!

Where are you meant to find these affluent Xango juice buyers, who have money to throw your way? Especially with the current credit crunch. If you wanted to make a full time income of $30,000 you would need to sell 50 bottles of Xango per week. At those prices, surely that’s near impossible?

But this is MLM after all and like all pyramid schemes, it is in referring others that the money comes. You get 5% of your downlines sales. That doesn’t seem like a lot to me, but remember each distributor has to buy one case every month, so that is how you make your revenue.

I doubt many people are selling a whole lot of juice. Instead I think this is basically a pyramid scheme with a product as a veil. As with most MLM schemes, the market is rather over-saturated with Xango distributors already, as you will have noticed if you surf traffic exchanges or safelists.

If you don’t want to find leads yourself you can pay Xango around $500/month to get leads for you from their rather irritating radio ads. If you do this perhaps you will have some success, but you would have to talk to people and that definitely involves selling, you will be the distributor that they first speak to. I have to warn you that I was involved in something similar called PAS, where I paid them to get leads for me from a TV commercial amongst other things and I had zero success. PAS was eventually investigated and shut down and I lost my money. Just a warning.

If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.

People have had success with Xango, so it is not an out and out scam, but it is certainly not for me. The cost of the juice is ridiculously high and there is high competition. No matter what they say there will be plenty of selling involved and you need a fair amount of money to get started if you want to buy leads from Xango. To get your own leads, I imagine would be rather hard for this kind of business.

I guess, if you find a very supportive upline it could work out, but it is certainly not as easy as Andy would have you believe. You would need a lot of training to make, even a part time income.

This business is often advertised on Christian radio stations and forums and that really annoys me. It is promoted as a Christian business and to me, that makes it sound like a scam. Almost like they are saying that a good Christian would join Xango. Something about using religion to make money seems dodgy to me.

I really think there are better ways to make money from home. Don’t waste your money. I’m sure you already know how hard it is to build an active downline, but for an expensive product like Xango it is near impossible.

I always like to browse scam forums to see what is going on and it seems that currently many people are receiving emails and letters from a kids clothing company called Magic Kids Inc. These letters are usually titled, “Get Rich With No Work”. Now I can understand the appeal of that, but it sets alarm bells ringing straight away. We all know that simply isn’t possible, but it seems to be working to lure people into this MLM company.

I have done a lot of research on people’s experiences with Magic Kids Inc and let’s just say they are not happy. Magic Kids Inc is rated F with the Better Business Bureau, that is the worst rating. This is because they have a lot of unresolved complaints that many times they have not even responded to.

Of course, the sales letter is filled with testimonials of how new distributors followed the plan and made thousands in their first day. The company suggest waiting 2 months to make $3000. This figure is absurd based on the many reviews I have read. People are lucky to make their joining fee back.

The fee for a starter pack is $147 -plus $28 shipping. With this you would receive a handful of leaflets and business cards. You give them your credit card info or a postdated cheque and are charged a month later. The packs take about 2 weeks to arrive.

The main complaint with the company is that no matter how much work people put in and how much money they spend, they do not make any orders, or very few. One lady on Scam.com writes of her experience:

When I first received the 16 page letter detailing the opportunity to become a dealer it all sounded wonderful and very doable. The letter said you must respond within 24 hours to get more free tools to start you off and they wouldn’t even charge you for a month in good faith. He also guaranteed that if after a month you weren’t pleased a full refund, and then went on to say give the business a good two months to make at least $3000 if not more and if you’re still not pleased after actually giving it a good shot for two months you could still have a full refund. My computer had crashed so I didn’t have a way at the time to look up the business but everything looked really great and doable. I should have found a computer somewhere and checked it out first, now I definitely wish I had!

So I ordered my kit for $147, it took a couple of weeks to arrive and came with a couple of flyers and about 10 business cards. I quickly gave those away. The kit also came with all kinds of perk reports on things to order to help perk up your business so I read intensely every report he had. They all said respond within 5-7 days to be able to get the great deal. I choose the perks I wanted–to receive 80% commission instead of the 50% every dealer gets, to be a dealer affiliate and receive $100 for every dealer I signed up, their clothing package to show to retail shops (that came with catalogs, envelopes and letterhead paper), to order their Directory that had retail shops, wholesalers, and non-profit organizations, and then off course ordered wholesaler postcards, dealer postcards, business cards, catalogs, and regular flyers to mail and hand out. It took another couple of weeks for everything to arrive that I needed to start advertising for the business. Meanwhile I had spent about $2500 on my credit card to get the business going with all of the perks. Their advertising reports have great marketing in them, if they would only follow through with what they said it still looks like a great business.

While I was waiting for more flyers, postcards and business cards to arrive I read and reread everything in their manual on how to advertise and succeed with the business. I was committed to giving my best and at least a full two months of work to try it and see how it worked. I received my first batch of flyers and business cards, wrote my ‘discount’ code on each one (this ties the customer to me and that is how I am supposed to receive commission) and then that weekend drove a 100 miles to the nearest mall and handed out 300 flyers and business cards to people with kids and buying items in clothing stores. That first weekend was August 8th (easy for me to remember since it is my birthday) and the next three weeks I proceeded to continue advertising for them with all of the ways they recommended in the manual. After 3 weeks my online account still showed 0 orders. I called the helpline and spoke with a coach, told her all of the work I had been doing and asked how come I didn’t have any orders? I asked her if their tracking system was not working? She seemed offended that I would ask that. She said I just wasn’t trying hard enough and that sometimes it takes a little while for people to order and that I needed to be more positive about it. I asked her how come all of these testomonials were saying they got orders in the first day or two from handing flyers out, doing mailings to wholesale companies, and the other things I was doing. She said because they had contacts of retail stores and they already knew those people. Funny, that wasn’t one of the several things mentioned in the manual was that you needed previous contacts in order to make money. In fact he had said you don’t have to bug your friends and neighbors like typical MLM to make money.

So anyway, I concluded every business takes a little time and I was committed to the two month mark so I kept advertising. By then I had received my computer back as well, so I even started advertising online in several forums I am a part of. After two months I had given out 300 flyers and business cards at the mall, mailed wholesale postcards to botiques and wholesalers from that list and then the non-profit flyers to the non-profit organazations (200 total addresses on the directory list), sent out messages to 43 yahoo groups that I was already a member of–mostly kids clothing and mom’s lists, advertised 359 posts on Mom’s forums (they keep track for me, that’s how I knew), mailed out postcards to home business seekers and put out ads for that side of the biz, signed up a local homeschool group of 120 families as a fundraiser for them and gave each family a catalog, handed out my remaining business cards and catalogs to folks around town and to retail stores, and then I also did two newspaper ads in two papers that each canvas 2/3 of the state.

By October 7th and all this time and work handing out, writing addresses and mailing it still showed 0 orders for my account. I just simply do not believe that is even possible. Their testomonials alone from mailing postcards to wholesalers were saying many wholesalers and botiques made $2000 and $3000 orders. I believe this company has made thousands of dollars off of my efforts but has not given me a dime of it.

I called the company October 7th, one day before the two months that I had actually been working the business, to request a refund since it was showing no orders for me. I told the lady all of the effort I had put in, everything I described above, thankfully I had kept fairly good records of what I had done. I told her how Isaac’s letter had said that even after a person had given the business a full two months good honest try and wasn’t satisfied they could request a full refund. But the lady told me that the two months included the date from when the kit was ordered, which is not at all what the letter said, and it took two weeks just to receive the kit and then another two weeks just to start receiving the materials needed to start advertising for them. I kept iterating that that is not what the letter said, but she just said that I did not qualify for a refund. I asked to speak to her supervisor so she put me on hold, when she came back she said that the supervisor was away from her desk but that she would call me back that afternoon. It’s been over 24 hours and I still have not received a call back. I am going to call again tomorrow and be a little stronger with them, if I do not receive a full refund of all charges made by them I will file with my credit card that they are simply a scam and I want the charges reversed. I am glad I used my credit card, and that is the only thing I am glad about. I’m sad that I wasted all of that time and energy trying to really give it my all. If they would have simply paid me for my efforts as they said they would I believe we would have both mutally benefited, I’m sure they received many many orders from the advertising that I did and I deserved to be paid the agreed amount for my efforts.

Caitlin
Cordell, Oklahoma
U.S.A.

I think Caitliin sums up what this “opportunity” is - a giant scam, that has squeezed a lot of money out of a lot of people. Please beware people on scam forums offering to try MagicKidsInc with no fee. They are just referring to the month trial, before your credit card gets charged.

If you have received the sales letter please do not fall for this very expensive scam. The clothes themselves are sourced from company liquidations and that is why they are cheap, but some people have had problems with refunds and have found the quality not to be up to scratch.

Remember Caitlin’s story is not a one off. Magic Kids Inc are responsible for scamming hundreds of people.

I am just wondering whether anyone has any experience with Your Travel Business (YTB)? I am reading mixed reviews about it on Scam.com, but nothing really incriminating.  I have checked out their sales website, but it doesn’t give loads of information. Has anyone had any luck selling travel? Or referring new travel agents? It is hard to research properly on the Internet, because many of the review pages are actually sales pages in disguise.  There is an option to sign up for free and just refer travel agents, or an option to pay $500 to actually become a travel agent and sell travel.

What do you guys think? Scam or not?

Personal Automated System (PAS). I am still trying to pay off the debt it left me in. It was like a much more expensive version of Lawn Chair Millionaire and I still can’t believe I fell for it. I should have known as soon as I saw the word Automated. No true business can be automated.

I filled in the “contact me” form and sure enough a few days later I got a call from an English guy. He tried to tell me what an amazing opportunity this was, but I wasn’t convinced.

A few days later someone else called me and told me of all the amazing changes that this could make to my life. I was in a low place, doing temping and being treated like scum. I fell for it. What a fool!

I didn’t have the $3000 it would take to make me “financially free”, so I got 2 credit cards to fund this new business that would set me free from temping and enable me to set up the animal sanctuary. I was willing to work hard and reap the rewards.

Waiting for the credit cards felt like an eternity, but eventually they came through. I transferred over $3000 to my referrer in the USA. I felt really excited, like this was the one that would finally work out. There was loads of buzz about PAS on the Internet , so I knew that I was not alone.

Once I was all registered I needed to get leads, so that the sales team could follow them up and make the sales for me (that was the automated bit). PAS was affiliated with another company that sold leads especially for PAS. I bought $700 worth of fully qualified leads and waited for them to be loaded into the system and for the sales calls to start.

A couple of weeks passed and the leads had not been loaded. My support ticket had gone unanswered. I was getting worried.

On the forums I found out that PAS was being investigated by the SEC. Nothing happened for a long time. All my efforts to make this work, such as buying leads from other sources and calling them up myself (nerve wracking) came to nothing and my leads from PAS were never delivered. Some time later I received this email:
“Not much news to report, but here is the latest….

The SEC investigation continues. I supplied them with another
6 inches of paper this last week. Until they are finished, PAS
is in limbo. After they make their ruling, we will know the future
of PAS. It now looks like this is likely to happen sometime in
December.”

My leads were never delivered and I lost all my money. The PAS founders held a conference call that said they were setting up another similar business, but as you can imagine, I wanted nothing to do with it. I didn’t want to be part of luring poor people in and stealing their money.

So now PAS are well and truly gone along with all my money and a lot of other peoples’ money. I am still paying off the debt and my husband still doesn’t know what I did. I am too ashamed to tell him. I love him so much and I don’t want to hurt him.

Now I am in debt, I am always looking for ways to get out of debt and change my life, which means I am more susceptible to scams. This blog is a way to make myself think more carefully about these scams, before I enter into them.

Lawn Chair Millionaire seems to be going a similar way to PAS, which makes me very angry at myself that I fell for it. At least I don’t have much money tied up in it. I hate to think of all the other people that were ripped off by PAS and are currently being ripped off by LCM.