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February 21, 2005
Monday Reader Mail: 32
By QBlog in Reader Mail
Another edition of Reader Mail. It must be Monday.
name: joesmoe
date: February 18, 2004
message: Your comparison of income to employments doesn't show one thing, how much time does the average person put into their job as an engineer, doctor, etc. and how much time does the average person put into quixtar. If people treated it the same as their real job then they might have different outcomes.
What "joesmoe" is referring to is my post on the Quixtar Average Income. In that post I make some income comparisons using Quixtar's own data. And joesmoe does make an excellent point and one that should be examined. How would Quixtar's income averages change if all IBOs worked it full-time?
Well, the first issue we encounter is lack of immediate revenue. I doubt anyone will claim that a brand new IBO should quit their day job and start working Quixtar full-time. Why not? Because there isn't a guaranteed salary for an IBO as there would be for "traditional jobs." If a new IBO puts in 40 hours he may not get a dime that week. It's hard to live off nothing. Of course, commissioned salesmen are in a similar situation but they generally begin their jobs with an enormous set of tools including solid leads (not friends and family) and extensive market analysis. Basically, Quixtar is designed to be a part-time job with part-time income, at least until a certain pin level. But Quixtar isn't usually pitched (or sold) as a part-time income. It's sold with phrases like "Freedom for your family" and "Flush that stinkin' JOB." The marketing of Quixtar by most of its IBOs is that it is a full-time income, and more.
Secondly, and perhaps most importantly, Quixtar makes no distinction between those IBOs who work "the business" 5 hours a week and 55 hours a week. The Quixtar Average Income data lumps everyone together. But guess what? All the other income averages do the same thing. I listed the Quixtar IBO averages along with Engineers, Farmers, Small Businesses, Physicians and College Grads. None of the other averages make a distinction between full-time and part-time work. One could make assumptions but there's no way to verify the accuracy of those assumptions.
And so we're right back where we started. Murky data leads to murky conclusions. Maybe Quixtar could provide some real meaty data? Give some solid, detailed numbers about all its IBOs. Why don't they do that? Are they hiding something?
Comments
I know a couple of Ambots here at work. One guy has been at it for 2+ years -- hitting it hard. Basically he has given up his free time (family, hobbies, etc.) in lieu of his "business".
I came to find out that he grossed $25k in his 2nd year. Gross! Take out expenses and taxes and you are looking at a number far less!
And this is the guy who is at every function, seminar, meeting, etc. The other guys do a lot, but not that much.
My point being, after all is said and done, he is better off working at the mall after his regular job. He would make more $$$ and work less hours.
df,
That guy is a lucky one. And fell in the category of 0.01 % of IBOs. Looks like he is a platinum.
I worked it for 12-13 years and almost everyday I would go out from 6pm till midnite, many times till 2am it there were a nite owl involved. I remembeer a time for 6 months driving 2500 miles a week. 2 trips to atlanta and a weekly trip to Indianapolis from Charlotte, NC.
I conusmed extra tapes, read a book a week and showed the plan 3-5 times a week.
I became a direct with 4 directs in one leg.
I lost 60K after it was all said and done.
So JOESMOE dont come here with your programmmed Rhetoric and say If we treated it as a job we would of made it...You are not making it now I bet.
By the way i pawned everything got evicted 2 times and had 3 car reposessions to get to functions. I was told by my upline to do whatever it took to get to the functions and that credit wouldnt matter when I was a diamond. THat I could pay cash for everything.
I quit 3-5 jobs that would not let me off for a function.
Gimme a break you idiot JOESMOE!!!
come back in 3 years and show us your net checks..
>
Hee Hee. Is that a real poncho or a Sears poncho... thought so.
Nonwithstanding the "aggressive" income claims of Quixtars' wholesale buying club, the income comparison is prima facie invalid- if people put as much time into A/Qas a "J.O.B.", they would be in conflict with the presentation that "all you need is 10-15 hours per week." Which is it- part time (to suck you in) or full time (after all, what do you expect if you only "part time" it- you need to drive the miles- be an Amawarrior)
Whoo boy, what a load of crap.
right on Keith!
They suck you in with the promise of "part time", then when you aren't making anything, tell you "what do you expect - part time income for part time effort"!!!
In college I had taken a class in critical thinking. I believe it helped me when I was subjected to all of the Quixtar speakers claims and other B.S. that they spouted at us from the stage. The people talked as if it was their life, (it was) and it was very annoying to me. I knew I wanted to go back to college and finish my degree and I couldn't imagine living my life that way. It reminded me of that line in Titanic when "Rose" said she saw her whole life as if she had already lived it, endless mindless chatter with narrow-minded people and parties and catillions with them", something to that effect. I just couldn't see spending the rest of my life in dark auditoriums and malls to prospect, let alone with the narrow-minded uplines.
"Maybe Quixtar could provide some real meaty data? Give some solid, detailed numbers about all its IBOs. Why don't they do that? Are they hiding something?" - QBlog
Solid, detailed numbers by Quixtar will be taken by all prospective as guarantee of those results and Quixtar will be sued left & right. See franchises in the early days when they made the mistake of provides solid, detailed financial number.
It would be nice if the FTC created the equivalent to the Franchise's Uniform Franchise Offering Circular for "business opportunity", which Quixtar is classified as. But the catch with the UFOC is that the franchisor normally only provide the UFOC after they had qualified; eg they don't provide it to prospect, they provide it only to new IBO (using Quixtarese). So a Quixtar UFOC would still be rather useless given that prospect won't see it until they're ready to sign up.
Jennybot:
You have a new fan. Congrats.
I am enthralled by your comment:
"Solid, detailed numbers by Quixtar will be taken by all prospective as guarantee of those results and Quixtar will be sued left & right. See franchises in the early days when they made the mistake of provides solid, detailed financial number."
Don't a lot of brokerage firms prospect clients but ad the caveat "Past performance is not indicitive of future returns"?
So, why don't you and your ilk hold yourself to that kind of standard? Be up front and tell the truth in the pitch.
The prospect may get excited for the big returns, but they may also have a better understanding of the risks/effort that will be required.
In reality, most of the people you prospect don't have a lick of business sense. They are people hanging out at the mall, or electronics store, or boat show (haha) that may be skilled in other areas, but not necessarily business.
In turn, they don't know what kind of questions to ask, and you don't have to answer any questions that aren't asked.
I doubt that you would go into the details of late nights and long drives, of pressuring friends/family, of risking debt and personal relationships -- all of which are inherent risks of working this biz.
But if you did tell them up front and they decided to go ahead anyway, then they have no one to blame but themselves.
But for the most part, people get sold a bill of goods and feel duped. Resulting in these sites and your new legion of critics!
I love df's comments that a person would be better off getting a second job at the mall instead of building a quixtar business or any business...give me a break...two sets of balls and chains???...why are you on this website if your mindset is to work for someone else forever and never do anything for yourself...sounds like a product of our great education/employee system in the US...by the way, don't you think that those who make great money in Quixtar and have been around for a long time might be doing something right as opposed to the loose cannons out there?
Wow... I have been to 3 different seminars over the years. someone always trying to sign me up... I glad there are blogs like this, to bring me back to reality. The internet has really changed peoples way of life. We can find a lot of info botht the bad and the good...
Mo' Qbot talk... I love it.
Poor ScottP- another wannabe Qbot broke hopeful. Ain't gonna happen in A/Q, baby- not 'lessen you get aholt of them tools thingies. You know the ones- what like ol' Dex babies' got his arms around. 'Cause 90% of ol' Dex's income be comin' from tapes, book 'n functions. Hail, most upwards of 60-70% of yer average good ol' boy Diamond Di-rect's money be comin' from system income.
Good luck sharing. They'll cut you out like a CANCER.
Bump
I sure don't want Jenny getting distracted by the deflections posted by ScottP.
Go ahead sweetie, you have a lot of explaining to do...........
Jennybot:
You have a new fan. Congrats.
I am enthralled by your comment:
"Solid, detailed numbers by Quixtar will be taken by all prospective as guarantee of those results and Quixtar will be sued left & right. See franchises in the early days when they made the mistake of provides solid, detailed financial number."
Don't a lot of brokerage firms prospect clients but ad the caveat "Past performance is not indicitive of future returns"?
So, why don't you and your ilk hold yourself to that kind of standard? Be up front and tell the truth in the pitch.
The prospect may get excited for the big returns, but they may also have a better understanding of the risks/effort that will be required.
In reality, most of the people you prospect don't have a lick of business sense. They are people hanging out at the mall, or electronics store, or boat show (haha) that may be skilled in other areas, but not necessarily business.
In turn, they don't know what kind of questions to ask, and you don't have to answer any questions that aren't asked.
I doubt that you would go into the details of late nights and long drives, of pressuring friends/family, of risking debt and personal relationships -- all of which are inherent risks of working this biz.
But if you did tell them up front and they decided to go ahead anyway, then they have no one to blame but themselves.
But for the most part, people get sold a bill of goods and feel duped. Resulting in these sites and your new legion of critics!
Not everyone wants to own their own business, ScottP, and many people make quite a good living as an employee. Sure the employer usually makes more money then the employee, but that is because the employer is taking much bigger risks, often putting up his own capital for business. In addition, the employer has way more responsibility then the employee, often having to work more hours because the buck stops at the employer. In the end, if the employee invests wisely, works hard and makes wise financial decisions, he can build quite a big nest egg, without ever owning a single business.
Also, df is right that the average Quixtar IBO can do much better with just a minimum wage job, working just 10 hours/week! Minimum is $5.25/hour (I think), and a 40 hour a month job would mean $210/month, minus taxes. Even at a 25% tax rate, that's a take home of $143.50.
Now compare that to the average IBO, who's check is just $115/month. Of course, this doesn't take into account taxes and expenses. Still doesn't matter, because even before a single deduction, a person working minimum wage for just 10 hours a week is doing better then your average IBO!
The reason you won't see the number is because the average yearly income for a Quixtar member is $1,400. That's the number documented in their own literature (fineprint I'm sure).
Thanks for weighing in, dmm & punch...
Also, I think the mall job is @ 10 hours a week where as the Ambot has to plug in more than 10 hours to see that $115.
My buddies are Platnum (in the $20-$25k range) and I KNOW that they work 12 hour days on the weekend. Driving out of state, STP, drivng back -- repeat. Not to mention the various mid-week meetings that keep you out into the early morning....
It doesn't add up to a regular human being, but apparently, it does compute for a lot of Ambots!
Uh-hm. Working at the mall you at least get paid for the time you worked your ass off than to prospect people with a faulty business plan and to live by the faulty business plan, as well. At least if a customer doesn't buy what you sell at the mall, you still get paid. At the mall, you have people who are usually trained by their companies and the companies usually, if not always pay for your training. These companies don't tell you that just because a customer doesn't buy what you sell that you need to invest in more tapes and books. The companies keep helping the employees and the employees don't have to be up until 3am either!!!!
Also, there are some loose cannons out there I hope I never have to deal with ever again and they are my Quixtar uplines or any other IBO!!!
"The reason you won't see the number is because the average yearly income for a Quixtar member is $1,400. That's the number documented in their own literature (fineprint I'm sure)." - Punch
The ave annual income is 4x font highlighted by a box and on every pages.
"At least if a customer doesn't buy what you sell at the mall, you still get paid." - Lisa
I love that attitude. You should read J Paul Getty (he was richer than Bill Gates) on that attitude.
jennybot
How about the gazillion questions that have been posed to you and others in these threads.
If you are gonna ignore the questions, we are gonna ignore YOU....
Come on love, just admit that you are "fired up" on the "the system" again because you are getting a cut of the tools!
Jenbot:
I suggest you read Michael Gerber's EMyth Revisited. As a perennial Best Seller, it is a book that should be considered for any "business owner".
In the book Gerber breaks it down, plain & simple. People start their own businesses for lots of reason--but there is one common reason for everyone.
To sell the business and live off the residuals.
You can fight it all you want, but this is what it comes down to.
You really can't sell off what you have to someone outside of the cult. It is the greater fool theory--you can only sell what you have to the greater fool.
However, you are limited to the fools in your little cult. And those fools are brainwashed into shooting past your position by themselves.
At the end of the day, the value of your biz is 0. That sucks. I'm sorry.
EMyth Revisited is one of my favourite books, but I'll have to read it again to see if that's what Gerber says - *everyone* who starts a business does it to sell and enjoy residuals? I doubt it! Still, would be quite a lot.
In any case, that book and others should at least make people aware of the basic logic flaw that's running through much of this discussion. When you own your own business, whether with Quixtar or anything else, a great deal of the time investment is not for immediate return, but an investment in future returns. A comparison of dollar for hours with a "job" simply isn't valid. Particular at lower levels (below Emerald at best) there is a certain percentage of work involved in Quixtar that is essentially management or maintenance. Just keeping things ticking over, replacing drop outs etc etc. The other work that is put in, I would suggest the majority, is for growth, and is thus an investment. As with most investments, they don't always work out and the majority of people don't have the patience to hang around for the returns. If you msut compare with a job, perhaps it's with unpaid overtime worked in hope of a future promotion or salary increase?
Is that a real job or is that a quixtar job?
Posted by: Dave S | February 21, 2005 1:43 PM