Nonsense
Pink Truth, in their strong conviction that their small club are the only people in the world with intelligence and taste, have struck a death blow to Mary Kay by defiantly posting information that is supposed to be kept quiet for another quarter.
*gasp*
They are so on top of it.
Hint to consultants that are using Pink Truth's advice to plan your Mary Kay business.
First of all, don't.
But, failing that, at least save yourself some energy and realize that there will ALWAYS be something else coming (next quarter, next month, next year, etc.) so you might as well never order at all.
Mary Kay's point, as I understand it, is, "Don't order product to win a prize, don't wait to order product to win a prize; Order product when you need it, and only when you need it." If Pink Truth, your director, or your recruiter (or anyone for that matter) tells you different, don't listen.
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I don't think it's wrong of them to check PT for upcoming product or suit changes. Honestly, how often does PT turn out to be incorrect about this stuff? So far they have been right on the money. If I were considering ordering inventory, I wouldn't want to do what actually did happen to me when I was in MK: Order what I thought were current products I could sell only to be told 2 weeks later: Oopsie! We are changing the formulation and the color names! That's a big RARRRR when you want to sell product at full retail price, because the customers aren't dumb. They know there's a change, and so they want a discount, and there goes your profit. :(
ReplyDelete"Order product when you need it, and only when you need it." If Pink Truth, your director, or your recruiter (or anyone for that matter) tells you different, don't listen."
ReplyDeleteThat's easy for you to say David. My experience in MK was not like that at all. It was all pressure, all the time, hurry, hurry, hurry. No you can't take it easy. The month is ending soon. Work with urgency. Reach for the stars (order level, that is)
I agree with Miranda, most of the time PT is spot on about upcoming changes.
Mary Kay has always announced upcoming changes. It is in the Applause Magazines, it is on intouch, it is on unitnet sites, it is announced at meetings and .... usually because directors are known for not being able to keep secrets earlier than the Company would like it to be. One has to take some responsibility for staying in the "know" in their occupation.
ReplyDeleteThere is a thing called inventory management. With proper lead time, we have plenty of time to move the products that are changing and then only have one or two on hand to gimp thru until the change. And then after the change up your level to what you normally like to have on available.
The key is to control and manage your inventory and not overstock - *** the exception to this explanation is when a new consultant is overstocked on an initial order with product that will be changing before she even has a chance to sell it. The director(s) is wrong for doing this. Has this happened, I am sure it has, but other directors tell the new ibc, this is changing next month so why don't we just skip it for now and we will get them after the change. (duh, what a notion??)
Now aside from that....
Why everyone thinks pt is that helpful is amusing... by the time it is posted on pt. It has been announced in the MK world.
What do people think - that pt has a bug in MK Corp and listens in on their conversations?? Almost every single "scoop" posting that I have seen on pt, has come from a psoting on a director's only blog (within a few hours of it being posted there)! For real, I will read it in one place and a few hours later, word for word, (typo for typo) copy and pasted...it is now on pt
So there must be an angry/disgruntled director (s) on a private board conversing with her sister directors that than goes a pulls a Benedict Arnold and copies the information and emails it to pt for posting.... and everyone is impressed.... pppooo pooo..speaks so highly of the individual or individuals that are on a private board - betraying the trust of the members to increase her "wow" factor with pt. Share info that makes pt look good and you are now going to be one of the "pets".
The lack of integrity and morale character of this individual would give me a good idea into knowing why they may not have been able to make MK work for them. We deal with people - both consultants and clients - if people can not trust us, why would they want to continue to do busienss with us.
My speculations is that the "one" that helps tc with "secret info" is now one of the "pets" and moves up on the kudos list... this person will be praised until she goofs up and doesn't get the info fast enough or disagrees with something and then she will be kicked to the curb or banned.
And it is mho, this very same need of wanting to be important and praised and recognized that got them in trouble by buying too much product in Mary Kay.
It is the nature of the individual. I also think it is very self destructive behavior because it leaves this individual open to be used and manipulated and then when they realize what happened to them, then they loose even more self esteem and the cycle continues.
RSF: Yes it is as easy as that... even the Drug compaign slogan...
to all consultants, if you don't need product, if you are being pressured and it is not going to be helpful for you...
JUST SAY NO! if we can expect kids to learn this sinple logic, I think it is reasonable to expect adult woman to learn it to...
Don't need. Not selling it.... Don't buy it.....
My unit is fully aware of any upcoming changes and we discuss how to move it and how to make it until the change without it impacting our business.
And if it is just the packaging, (i.e. boxes) changing, not once have I had a client complain because the item is not in the newest, latest, greatest, packaging - as they always say to me, hahaha, I just throw the box away anyway.
ReplyDeleteAnd just because I product changes, doesn't mean that everyone will want the new stuff, I am always on the hunt for discontinued product to keep clients happy. My goodness, the rosewood cream blush, Acapella, the former Sunless tanning, the former chestnut eyeliner, the sable eyeliner, the slate eyeliner, the charcoal eyeliner, blonde eyebrow pencils and the list goes on.... some clients just don't like change. I still have tons of classic basic
clients.... everyone has their own likes and desires, we will never please 100% of the people 100% of the time.
I wish all those sites had existed when I was in. I read the magazine but I mostly just saw fluff at the time. :/ I wish you could see the initial order my director placed for me. Who wears orange lipstick? I kid you not, though, my customers were like "hey this is old formula. I'll buy it if you sell it to me at a discount." Which I did end up doing to sell it...I had very few customers so yeah. There was this group of country girls who didn't want to drive an hour and a half to the mall, so they would just call reps for home party companies to bring them things. This group was probably 80% of my group of customers. But anyway, I think trusting my director's words like I did was not a good idea. Her advice didn't turn out to be very helpful. Then again, her classes never held either, so maybe it wasn't deliberate.
ReplyDeleteI was just reading blogs and I ran into this one.
ReplyDeleteI am a mary kay consultant. And I have to say that I'm not worried about new packaging. Maybe I'm too new to really understand.
I think some women are stingy with their business. Too many of them have dollar signs in their eyes. I've sold $250 dollars average a class. I have 8 classes a week. [I am a full time student, also.] That's over 1600 retail. It is so easy to make money when you care about the women first. I give away product and give discounts ALL the time. My business is growing so fast.
So, if your were to take even 10 off the Ult. Miracle Set with old packaging, you would have a happy customer and money in your pocket.
As for being pressured, I have never felt pressure to order, except the first time I ordered.
And that was because I didn't want to spend more than 1000. After getting my order of 1800, I realized that it wasn't as much as I needed and my director was trying to tell me that.
And I have to admit there were a lot of things my director ordered for me that I was like, "Wha?" But then I wrapped them up for my skin care classes as a gift for my hostess or as a prize for writing down 5 women the fastest on their profile card.
But after that, I have been given advice by a wonderful director and my recruiter. But I did what I wanted, I hold my classes the way i want to. And it's working really great for me.
Just as a side note really, I've read a few notes from PT and they seem really bitter. The one note I read was about the new red jackets. And how you can get that for $75, or whatever. While yeah that's true, what other business gives you prizes for doing your job? Seriously. The point is NOT to order more than you need, but to stimulate your business so that you need more. To me that seems obvious.