Reading the Tea Leaves

If you read up on what is happening in Great Britain with Amway, you begin to notice quite a few parallels.

A couple weeks ago, Amway terminated several Diamond couples in the UK. On the Amway blog site (http://amwaynews.alticorblogs.com/2007/10/16/ibs-unplugged/#comments), Amway gives only very general reasons why these Diamonds were terminated.

The couples are fighting back (http://www.ibsnews.co.uk/index.htm,), claiming that what they have done for the last 20 years was approved, and that only within the last few months were their business building techniques inappropriate. Doesn't this sound familiar?

Apparently, the UK's DTI (Department of Trade and Industry) has been investigating Amway due to numerous complaints. In response to some of the complaints, the company suspended all recruitment, stopped all "systems," and eventually terminated several Diamonds who seemed cool to the new changes, new changes that Amway called their "transformation."

What changes? Well, it seems to me that Amway wants to run the tool business in the UK. It is changing IBO's to ABO's (Amway Business Owners). Again, doesn't this sound familiar?

Here's my take on it: Amway realizes that it IS an internal consumption pyramid. It KNOWS that people aren't retailing, and it knows that the government and the courts are going to come knocking soon (as in RIGHT NOW in the UK) because such an internal consumption model with overpriced products IS illegal.

It also knows that there have been complaints about the tool money. For that reason, Amway decides to attack the "systems" like TEAM in an effort to break them. Hopefully, all other "systems" will fall under Amway's control after taking down a few big "systems."

As for Amway, to get right with the law, it's newly implemented and controlled system will focus on retailing products, on retailing overpriced products, and on retailing really overpriced products.

Of course, they are in for a RUDE awakening when people try to retail these overpriced products, which is why Orrin and Chris wanted to break free. I think Orrin and Chris saw what was happening. They did not want Amway to be in control of their "system." The TEAM system has been incredibly popular, very profitable, and a tremendous difference-maker in our culture.

Plus, they did not want to try to retail overpriced products. Thus, they asked for a release, but Amway wouldn't let them go.

I will give Amway credit here. In what I believe was a calculated gamble, they are attacking TEAM and other groups to deflect attention from the real issues that are confronting them. Of course, they didn't expect almost ALL of Team from defecting. The weapons they are wielding are items, bogus items I might add, such as "depth building" and "tool profits," while the real problem is that nobody can retail the Amway/Quixtar products.

Now, they are working overtime to slam, ridicule, harass, and malign TEAM in an effort to look good to their other north American groups. They hope that the remaining IBO's (ABO's) will be focusing on the TEAM conflict while they make unpopular changes (again, without lowering prices much). Of course, there is also the fear, the great fear, that Woodward and Brady will create a new MLM. Amway realizes now that it must kill the baby snake before it becomes to powerful to slay (I borrowed that from "Julius Ceasar").

For those IBO's (oops, I mean ABO's) who are still a part of Amway, I suggest you do your research into what is happening in the UK. You will see your future.

For those who respond, I would like to hear what parallels you can draw between the events in the UK and the events in the US.

Here's another good link to get you started (http://www.jerryandmandy.co.uk/), and I suggest you read the Amway blog too.

Lastly, let me comment about the tool money issue. From day one that I was a part of TEAM, I knew that the tool money was considerable. In fact, I was encouraged to reach higher levels so that I would be a part of the profit sharing plan. In an effort to be transparent about tool money, Orrin and Chris wrote a chapter about the tool money in The Consumer Rebellion, but you won't be able to read it because Amway conveniently (convenient for them) wouldn't allow that chapter to be published.

How clever...Amway won't let the truth about tool money come out...and then they will assail groups over their tool money!!