Should I and my small business cancel our MLM contract?
Help Me Decide (MLM Small Business)
I am grateful for all my customers, all the wonderful new people who I’ve met. I have been considering cancelling my Independent Consultant role with Paparazzi Accessories. I am grateful to my uplines, my sidelines, the people in other small businesses who provide support to us: suppliers, events opportunities, local government that connect with us for ways to come back after the pandemic.
My experience with Paparazzi has not been negative. This is why it is so difficult for me to commit to cancelling my Independent Consultant Agreement with Paparazzi. I’m starting to think that I should spend my time as I did today.
I was not packaging orders. All of the orders for Valentine’s Day were packaged last weekend. Saturday was my day off and it has been a long time since Auntie’s had a day off! A real day off. I went to a barbeque. Up the street from the barbeque there is a church, and I was able to go by the church. I just thought, “I really like Saturdays. I forgot what Saturdays were like.” I created a list of pros and cons for being a Paparazzi Accessories Independent Consultant to share with you to help me decide whether or not to quit.
Pros
- I buy $5 jewelry at $2.75/piece +rewards & incentives (I think my needs for jewelry are covered for awhile);
- Comradery in our community, Elite, 600 people strong, 90% are Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander (NH/PI);
- Major asset for other cultures: Koreatown, Japantown, Chinatown, Black Chamber of Commerce, Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, etc
- There are not enough NH/PI in total numbers; we are only 0.5% of the population wherever we appear in the population;
- We won’t ever see (outside Hawai’i) the Samoan Chamber of Commerce, the Guamanian Chamber of Commerce, the NH/PI Chamber of Commerce;
- This is what makes the Paparazzi team experience special, that there is a community of businesses run by people who are like me;
- We can speak among ourselves the way people in our culture speak, our backgrounds and standards are common;
- The closest culture to NH/PI is the Black community, close by food, by worship experience, family structure, and music;
- It was a breath of fresh air to fit in effortlessly and I don’t let go of it easily;
- Made income during the pandemic:
- I started in October 2020 when I was working at the county hospital and we were facing a second, larger wave of Covid-19;
- Stores, libraries, churches, and schools were closed; the workforce was working from home except essential personnel like me, delivery drivers, some stores;
- I learned new skills:
- Ecommerce, integrations, sales & marketing channels, live streaming, and video editing;
- I built a brand that I am proud of; China cloned my website;
- Wrapping packages is an activity that I really enjoy.
Cons
- I’m contractually tied to the manufacturer: products and structure of compensation plan;
- If their reputation takes a hit, it will affect the brand reputation of Bling Auntie;
- If the manufacturer suffers supply chain issues or goes out of business, my business would be impacted severely;
- It costs money to unwind contracts with my suppliers and partners to Bling Auntie;
- Limited sales and marketing channels:
- Vendor events (flea market, farmers market, music festivals)
- We can sell on Paparazzi replicated website (paparazzi.com)We can sell on Shopify and through Shopify we can sell on:
- Google/Google Merchant Center;
- Yahoo!;
- Microsoft/Bing;
- Linktree;
- TikTok;
- Pinterst;
- Facebook Market Place/Instagram;
- Email Marketing lists
- warm market only;
- We are contractually not allowed to (prohibited from) sell on:
- Amazon;Ebay;
- Mercari;
- Etsy;
- Poshmark;
- Restricted from selling our own merchandise:
- Example: t-shirt or baseball hat with Bling Auntie’s logo;
- Restricted from selling or supporting troops selling Girl Scout Cookies:
- Cannot post about Girl Scout Cookies;
- Cannot share a post about GSC;
- Restricted from sharing a friend’s or customer’s sales and events information for:
- Avon;
- Mary Kay;
- Tupperware;
- Pampered Chef;
- Scentsy;
What are my options? I can send a letter of resignation, fizzle out and do nothing until I become disqualified and the consultant agreement is terminated because of my inactivity, or I could do something that would cause corrective action or dismissal through the compliance process at Paparazzi. I never like to break a contract and I never like to quit. I reeeeeaaaaaaalllly never like to get fired. Getting fired is really bad. When you’re working for yourself and have your own brand in small business, because it is me, it is my brand that I built, I don’t want to be canceled. I want it to end in a different way.
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