Dear whomever this may concern:
While I appreciate your drive to make money so that you can buy winter booties for your dog and another cardigan sweater from BCBG instead of paying down your debt, please stop cornering me at work, pretending you care about my life but secretly steering the conversation to a spiel about whatever craptastic product that you are slinging these days.
I’m sure that you “wouldn’t be promoting it unless it was a great product that you believed in”, and I’m confident that you felt the same about the $300/month life insurance package you were slinging last month too.
And while I’m sure the Acai juice that you are selling really did make you lose 4 lbs in a week, I could starve myself for free and lose 4 lbs in a week, and frankly I find your sudden interest in me buying this weight loss product slightly insulting.
I appreciate your enthusiasm for that skincare line that you are pushing, but when you force the $45 trial package on me and expect me to become “hooked” just because “you like it” (cough it makes the most commission cough), don’t be insulted when I mention the slightly unsettling texture of the aforementioned product or the fact that a $5 bottle of Nivea does the job much better and doesn’t make me break out.
I’m sure that the claims that MonaVie can cure diseases are sound and reliable, however, I do not have cancer (to my knowledge), nor do I have $50 to shell out for one bottle of over hyped grape juice. And while I trust that it did clear up your cough, I hear of these free things called doctors that you can go and see to do the exact same thing. But who knows, maybe doctors are a scam.
Really, thank you for the invite to the “passion party”, as you’ve cleverly dubbed it. You’re absolutely right, there’s nothing awkward at all about sitting in a circle with a whole bunch of women that you neither know nor like, learning all about the new…erm.. technology that is on the market these days in the.. ahhh.. “adult” industry.
Next time you try to sell something to me, I sincerely hope it’s Girl Guide cookies because I’ve got you covered for that one. Otherwise, I’ll pass on the overpriced catalogue jewelry that ends up looking like I bought it from Claires.
Smoochies,
Daisy
Passion parties? I’m either too old, too young or too much of a prude to have never previously heard of that one.
I am fortunate to have friends and family who don’t try and sell me products. It’s door to door salesmen that tend to find me. I don’t have carpet; why do they keep trying to sell me a vacuum?
Heheh..nice letter. I’m with you -unless it’s something awesomely tasty, please don’t try to sell it to me!
My additions – Don’t try and scam me by making me come in more often or calling payments that happen every 4 weeks “monthly”. Anyone that can divide knows that there are 12 months in a year, but 13 4-week long periods. So if you bill every 4 weeks and call it a month – (*cough* NYTimes…), you are scamming people out of an extra payment each year.
I’m lucky–this doesn’t happen to me that often. I will admit, I think going to a passion party would be great blog fodder and an awkwardly fun time. Love it when you get sassy on here, Daisy.
Amen there. The worst is when your really close friends decide to sell to you. Awkward as a passion party.
We know quite a few people that have various makeup and jewelry parties. They’re definitely not for us but it’s a great way for some families to earn a little extra income. Saying that, I try to avoid those parties or solicitations at all costs.
YES. I hate this so much. i don’t even feel guilty ignoring, perhaps I’m just a brat.
Did you change your font? It’s hard to read.
LMAO! I’m going to file this under “posts I love”.
Ha – this is great! And very creative. Do any of these count for those silly “Candle parties” or “Pure Romance parties”? My wife always gets asked to all that crap on Facebook, and we never go because we know its just to get us to buy more useless stuff.
I love this. My wife has a couple friends that are on Facebook trying to sell stuff all the time. They jump from one business to the next and swear that each new thing they’re selling is just amazing.
Daisy,
Thank you for brightening a rather rainy Monday here. I had to hold back an audible laugh throughout the entire post. That was awesome!
Now, on another note, have you heard about the latest straight to DVD workout regimine called The Club Thrifty Experience?!? It is the best way to rock your bod to a rockin’ bod. If you’re interested, just shoot me an email;)
I was totally going to use that joke. Beat me to it!
Aahahaha, you’re a jerk. I love it!
Haha…more power to people who do MLMs and are successful, but I don’t care for the format too much, either! If you could start out with a client base that was JUST your client base and not your friends and family, I’d consider it. The only passion party I ever went to was with a bunch of Mormon ladies who wouldn’t wear anything that exposed their shoulders. I FELT SOOOO FREAKING AWKWARD! They were so freaking open and frankly gross! (I grew was raised in the same religion…went to the party to try to make friends in the uber LDS populated area I lived in…not a good idea.)
Agree with all of the above except I really like Passion Parties haha
Girl Guide cookies? I think in the US we call those Girl Scout cookies. And yeah, sign me up. Always. For Thin Mints.
I’d additionally like to add to your letter a thank you for the Twitter Follows and interest that now hundreds of young ladies have apparently had for me. They all offer “live chats,” which is so very kind, but as it turns out, I’m okay with my wife and don’t require further attentions. Thanks anyway.
Haha… Love it. I also hate the auto-posts from ppl asking for money to their latest marathon, charity or fundraising drive. Unless it’s food for the food bank, I will generally ignore requests.
Preach it sister!
And you forgot the scented candles (that make my nose itch).
Haha I feel you girl! I once won a prize from this wedding fair of a free make up consultation, ya, little did I know it was just a ploy to get them to try to really sell me on all their products! Little did the lady know that I work in sales and you can bullshit and bullshiter! I did however get a free bottle of moisturizer so that kind of made it worth it.
I won the same thing at a wedding show! I got a little lip gloss with 3 little roller perfumes that could attach to the lipgloss out of the deal, and a free meal, so it was worth telling them no repeatedly! The little perfumes aren’t the scent I normally use, but they’re great for travelling 🙂
One of the reasons my ventures fail is because I don’t sell, because I don’t like being sold. I’m the guy who waives off the store clerks whenever they try to get near me.
Hahaha. I got 2 messages, from 2 different people, about weight loss shakes. I do NOT need to lose weight, in fact, I could probably stand to gain a few pounds. One girl included a message at the end about how even if you don’t want to lose weight, the shakes are healthy and make you feel great! Well, guess what…the food I buy at the grocery store is healther than the crap you’re trying to sell me, and it costs a whole lot less…
As a guy.. I am thankfully mostly exempt from this friendship harassment.. Well, my friends try to get me to play fantasy football.. But, I actually like that, so I don’t mind 🙂
My wife does get these invites pretty regularly to passion parties or candle parties and such.. And we did have a neighbor that tried to bring us into their magic juice pyramid scheme.. But we try to be “busy” whenever we can.. Most of our friends know about See Debt Run, so we just typically remind them that we are broke..
LOL – great letter, Daisy!
I’m ashamed to admit, I actually worked for one of these companies many years ago. I was terrible at it because I hated marketing to friends! I did love the products, but thought they were horribly overpriced. Not an easy sell!
As for Girl Guide cookies, I always buy a few boxes, thank goodness chocolate mint gives me heartburn, I give them to my hubby and manage ot to gain 5 pounds!
HAHAHA – That is all
How come us dudes never get invited to the passion party?
I always know when someone says they have a “business opportunity” but won’t tell me what it is, that I’m in huge trouble….
Candles. Ugly clothes. Normal clothes. Jewelry galore. Kids books. *sigh* I agree. My friend and I were just ranting about “relationship selling” aka “using your friends.”
Apparently it only gets way worse when you’ve got small children and a million stay at home moms looking for a little extra cash.
So, why haven’t you replied to my email about the tupperware party we’re going to throw at your place? If you buy the 12-piece set now, you can have this ship-in-a-bottle at no extra charge!
Daisy, the gray text hurts my eyes — and I hope that this is ONE person in your life, not 29!
We live in a military community and my wife gets invited to these sorts of things all the time and, to be honest, we end up buying things too. I really don’t like accumulating more “stuff,” but a large part of me also realizes that supporting these things is helping to support entrepreneurship in a community where women (primarily) often need these sorts of lifelines. I’m not sure that made complete sense, but I think sometimes these sorts of things are empowering.
Very well said!
First…”free things called doctors”? Where the heck are you going?
Second…aren’t you “selling things” yourself? I see a “Hire Me” ad in your sidebar, prompts to share your posts and sign up for emails, and a bunch of ads on your site. I’m not sure why you find your form of selling to be so superior. As a long-time entrepreneur (with interests in traditional services, retail products, online offerings, and network marketing), I find attitudes like yours to be off-putting and somewhat destructive.
Personally, I support individuals’ desires to go out and make something of themselves. I assume you yourself are an entrepreneur. If you want others to respect your efforts, you should start by respecting theirs and not diminishing their pursuits as frivolity and fluff.
Relax. Pushing juice and plastic containers on family members and friends and putting them in an awkward position is far, far different then having a retail store and people coming to you. This was meant to poke a little fun at pyramid schemes and things like that, not bash all businesses and entrepreneurs everywhere 🙂
Also, I live in Canada.
The people selling these products are more intelligent than the person buying. What else could it be? Here’s my humble advice. Even if you really love the product. ask yourself if the final cost after shipping “is worth it???” I haven’t graduated high school but I’m keeping my money. Why would someone pay for this stuff????? I cant imagine being afraid to say no. My advice to you (just say yes ill go…then don’t show up.)Then if the try and make you buy without a party say…omg I’m so broke!