Is Melaleuca a Scam? No But…

Now when it comes to MLM business opportunities the thing most people wonder about is if the opportunity is legit. So, that raises the question about Melaleuca. Is Melaleuca a scam?

Well, let me answer that right now. No, Melaleuca is not a scam. But with that said, it’s not the best business opportunity either.

And that’s what I’m going to get into today. Talking about Melaleuca’s business opportunity. So, I’m not here to talk about the quality of their products.

I’m just here to give you my personal opinion of the Melaleuca business opportunity. And point out the good and the bad that I see with this opportunity.

So, of course, after reading my review if you decide to join Melaleuca or not that’s up to you.

Alright, let’s see what Melaleuca is all about.

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Quick Overview

Product Name: Melaleuca

Website: Melaleuca.com

Price: $19 one-time membership + $19.00/year renewal fees + monthly product purchases

Founder: Frank L. Vandersloot

Type Of Product: MLM wellness company

Overall Rating: 1/5

Recommended: Not as a business opportunity

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So, What Is Melaleuca?

Melaleuca is an MLM health and wellness company. It was founded by Frank Vandersloot in Idaho in 1985. And does over $2 billion in sales each year and currently operates in over 20 countries.

Melaleuca has over 400 products which consist of nutritional, personal care, home cleaning and cosmetics.

The way Melaleuca is set up is pretty unique. They’re set up as an online shopping club. And then if you want to take it one step further beyond just being a customer. You can participate in their business opportunity.

Now, in order to sign up whether you’re just buying products or wanting to dive into the business opportunity, you first have to create an account at their website.

But it’s not just as simple as going to the website and signing up. Because this is an MLM company and the company is focused on referral marketing.

If you don’t know anybody that’s already a member of Melaleuca (sponsor). You’re going to need to give them a call to get your account going before you can start shopping or working the business.

And when you call, they will assign you under an existing distributor. I’ll explain the different costs of joining in a moment.

How Do You Make Money With Melaleuca?

Now like all MLM compensation plans they tend to be very complicated.

So, I’m not going to go into all the details of this compensation plan. I’m just going to give you a quick overview of how you can make money through Melaleuca.

If you want the complete details of their compensation plan you can find that PDF by clicking here.

Okay, so there are two ways you can make money.

First, you can earn commissions from customers who were enrolled by you and enrolled by others.

Product Introduction Commissions

When you enroll a new customer, you will receive 50% of the Product Points on purchases in the customer’s first month.

Personal Customer Commissions

From the customer’s second month onward, you will receive a commission on purchases by all the customers you personally enrolled.

And the monthly commissions that you will receive will depend on how many active personally enrolled customers you have during that month.

Customers Enrolled By Others

You’ll receive 7% of Product Points on purchases by customers who are enrolled by your referrals. And depending on your rank you can get paid down 2 – 7 generations.

Presentation Point Commissions

These commissions are paid when you reach the level of Director 5 and above. So, at this level, you earn $5 for every presentation you make after you reach 10 Presentation Points in any given month.

Bonuses

• Advancement Bonus
• Pacesetter Bonus
• Mentoring bonus
• Core Mentoring Bonus
• Double Core Mentoring Bonus
• Car Bonus
• 20/20 Bonus

Of course, each one of these bonuses comes with certain requirements. And those requirements include getting to certain ranks within Melaleuca.

Below is a screenshot of the ranking structure within Melaleuca. And as you can see there are more and more requirements to fulfill as you climb the ranks.

As with all new enrollees, the focus is going to be on enrolling personal customers that will be buying from you. This is how most people going to start making money.

Then the next step is to start recruiting new marketing executives so you can build your organization. And as you can see by the ranking structure this is going to take a lot of skill and hard work.  Something a lot of people are not cut out to do.

Is Melaleuca A Pyramid Scheme?

Many times, people relate MLM companies to pyramid schemes. And many times, that’s not the case.

And it’s understandable why people can confuse an MLM with a pyramid scheme because of the payment structure that MLM companies use.

First, let me just get it out there, Melaleuca is NOT a pyramid scheme it’s a 100% legitimate business opportunity.

But like I said it’s the commission structure that may confuse people into thinking they’re getting involved in a pyramid scheme because the basis of their business-building model is based on the more people that you recruit the more money that you can make.

And then whenever someone in your downline recruits somebody you can get a percentage of those sales from those recruits as well as the sales made by their downline. And so on and so on depending on how the company has it set up in regards to how many levels down you can make money.

But here’s the difference when it comes to a pyramid scheme and an MLM. In a pyramid scheme, the only way you can make money is by recruiting people.

That means you have no product, service, or anything to offer people other than the business opportunity itself which is recruiting people.

However, with Melaleuca you’re not stuck just recruiting people. If you choose not to recruit people that’s fine you can still make money by retailing their products.

And this is why Melaleuca is NOT a pyramid scheme.

What’s The Price?

The cost with Melaleuca depends on what level you unroll at.

Regular Member

As a regular member, you’ll pay the regular price for all their products and there is no fee to join and no minimum monthly commitments to purchase products. However, as a regular member, you do have limited access to their marketplace.

Preferred Member

The cost to become a preferred member is $19. And the annual renewal fee is $19.00. And as a preferred member you’ll receive 30% to 50% off the regular price of their products.

However, to be eligible to receive the 30% to 50% off the price of their products you need to commit to an auto shipment of 35 or 75 product points each month. Which is equivalent to a minimum of about $80 per month.

Independent Marketing Executive

As an independent marketer for Melaleuca, the cost is the same as a preferred member. $19 to join and then $19 per year.

And to become an independent marketing executive you simply submit the “Independent Marketing Executive Agreement” along with your preferred customer membership application.

And once your application is been processed you now have the opportunity to build a business through Melaleuca’s compensation plan.

Who Is Melaleuca For?

If you like constantly selling, networking, and recruiting people in order for your business to grow Melaleuca will work for you.

But if you’re like most people and you don’t like being sold to and you don’t like being a salesperson. This is not the business for you.

What I Like About Melaleuca

#1) Good BBB Rating

Melaleuca has an A+ better business bureau rating. And they’ve been accredited since 1987.

Now having an A+ rating doesn’t mean your company is perfect. But it does mean that you interact well with your customers and you are proactive when it comes to solving customer complaints.

#2) Been Around For A Long Time

The company has been around since 1985. And whether you like them or not that’s very impressive. Most MLM companies are lucky to last five years.

So, from a customer and business opportunity standpoint, you know that the company will be around.

What I Didn’t Like About Melaleuca

#1) The MLM Business Model Sucks

MLM is one of the worst business models that anyone can fall into. This business model is fantastic for the MLM company itself. But it’s absolutely horrible for any distributor.

There has been study after study that proves that the majority of people and I’m talking about 99% of the people get involved with MLM. Will lose money.

And not only do they lose money most people who leave MLM companies are in more debt than they were before they got involved with the company.

And the reason why people get sucked into these MLM business opportunities is that whoever is pitching you the opportunity is not giving the real statistics of the success rate of people in the business.

And it makes no difference which MLM opportunity you’re being pitched. They’re always selling you the same dream. They talk about the freedom you’re going to have and how your life is going to change once you make all this money.

And they have to sell the dream because if they told you the truth of the dismal success rate in MLM no one would get involved.

Now are there people that are making money with Melaleuca? Sure, but it’s certainly not life-changing money.

Below is Melaleuca’s income stats for a director in Melaleuca which is 89% of the people in business with Melaleuca. The average annual income is a whopping $2101.00 . That’s $175.08 per month!!

There are far better ways to make money online.

#2) You’re Forced To Make Monthly Product Purchases

If you’re just a regular customer you’re not forced into minimum purchases every month.

But if your preferred member you’re going to be forced into having what’s known as an auto-ship every month so you can be eligible for that 30% to 50% discount on their products.

And then if you’re an independent distributor you’re forced into that auto-ship as well so you can your 30 to 50% discount. But it’s so you’re eligible for any commissions or bonuses that are available.

So you’re forced into paying them so you can be eligible for any commissions and bonuses that you’ve earned.

Now people confuse that with the price of doing business, but that’s absolutely ridiculous. I’m an online affiliate marketer and I’m not forced into paying someone each month so I can get paid.

My business expenses go to things that actually help me run my business. Such as website hosting, marketing strategies, and so on.

#3) I Hope You Like Recruiting

You’re getting into a referral marketing business. And that means you have to wake up every single day and recruit people if you want to grow your business.

I really want you to think about that. Think about having to pitch your business every single day in order to grow your business. That means constantly recruiting people.

And like most MLM companies they’re going to tell you to go to your family and friends first. And why is that?

Because that’s considered your warm market. Because in a warm market are people that you know, so approaching them is a little easier. But it doesn’t mean that people are going to be receptive to your business opportunity.

You’ll find when people find out that you’re pitching them an MLM business opportunity. The majority of them are going tell you no thank you.

So, you’re going to have to be thick-skinned and get used to hearing the word no.

My Final Opinion Of Melaleuca

Look I’m not a fan of MLM because the business model favors the company, not you. The failure rate for people that get involved in MLM is through the roof. And that’s been proven time and time again. Remember 99% of people lose money in MLM.

I know it may sound fantastic when someone approaches you because they’re selling you that dream of being independent and being in business for yourself. Which is fantastic.

But the MLM business model is not the route that I would recommend anybody take. And that includes you.

Now like I said at the beginning of my review this is my personal opinion. However, if you think you can beat the odds when it comes to building a business within Melaleuca. Then by all means jump in and I wish you nothing but success.

But, if the thought of having to become a salesperson and having to constantly recruit people in order to build your business doesn’t excite you. You’re not alone.

There is a better way of making money online that doesn’t involve becoming a salesperson or recruiting anybody to make your business grow.

And that’s with Affiliate Marketing. This is how I make a full-time online income.

Now the great thing about affiliate marketing is unlike MLM you can build your business around your hobby or your passion.

So, if you love remote control cars you can build your business around that. If you love cooking you can build your business around that.

If you love hiking, biking, kite flying, drones, quilting, scrapbooking, and carpentry, I could literally go on and on. My point is. it doesn’t matter what your hobby or passion is you can build a full-time business around it with affiliate marketing.

Now maybe you’ve heard of affiliate marketing and maybe you haven’t. Either way, you have access to the #1 resource that has all the information, training, tools, resources, and one-on-one support you’ll ever need while building your business.

And that resource is Wealthy Affiliate.

Now maybe affiliate marketing it’s for you and maybe it’s not. I don’t know.

But I do know it makes sense to me to see how you can go about building an online business with affiliate marketing. And then compare that to building a business with Melaleuca (MLM).

And now you’ll be in a far better position to choose which path will work best for you. Because that’s the bottom line. You have to follow the path that’s going to work best for you. Regardless if that’s MLM, Affiliate Marketing or something else.

I hope you found this review helpful and I hope I answered any questions you may have had about Melaleuca.

So, do you have a personal experience that you would like to share about Melaleuca? If you do, I would love to hear about it. Your feedback is always welcome and it can help others make an informed decision about opportunities such as this one.

And if you did find this review helpful and enjoyed it please feel free to share it with your audience. And as always anytime you need a hand you can Email Me anytime.

I believe in you!!
Leo