10 episodes

How did multi-level marketing become a $186B industry? What does it mean to lose your identity and find it somewhere else? Are distributors who build teams of hundreds underneath them victims? Or are they villains? Maybe the answer to these questions is somewhere in the middle. Who we are determines what motivates us, how we make decisions, and who we trust. This includes when someone we know or don’t know tells us we can have everything we’ve ever wanted…by joining their network marketing company. 
I invite us to take a look under the hood to find that these companies and their representatives are much more complicated than they appear. Each episode, I try to answer the question: Is this the opportunity of a lifetime? Or the illusion of one?

Opportunity Cost Jill | Bloww Studio

    • Society & Culture
    • 4.6 • 22 Ratings

How did multi-level marketing become a $186B industry? What does it mean to lose your identity and find it somewhere else? Are distributors who build teams of hundreds underneath them victims? Or are they villains? Maybe the answer to these questions is somewhere in the middle. Who we are determines what motivates us, how we make decisions, and who we trust. This includes when someone we know or don’t know tells us we can have everything we’ve ever wanted…by joining their network marketing company. 
I invite us to take a look under the hood to find that these companies and their representatives are much more complicated than they appear. Each episode, I try to answer the question: Is this the opportunity of a lifetime? Or the illusion of one?

    Arbonne ft. Julie Jo

    Arbonne ft. Julie Jo

    When Julie signed up as a distributor for Arbonne, she found early success and rapidly rose to the top of the ranks. What she didn't expect was her faith, finances, self-worth, and diet culture to be entangled with her business. When doubts began to creep in about her ability to stay in leadership at Arbonne, all it took was one thread for an entire belief system to unravel.Thanks for listening. Email us at bloww.studio@gmail.com and follow us at @oppcostpod on Instagram & TikTok.Bro...

    • 50 min
    Enagic ft. Anna

    Enagic ft. Anna

    Anna thought that she had found a home among the spiritually-minded community in Enagic and their Kangen ionizers, what she found instead were empty promises, debt and culty practices. I sit down with Anna 1:1 to talk about her experience in Enagic.Thanks for listening. Email us at bloww.studio@gmail.com and follow us at @oppcostpod on Instagram & TikTok.Brought to you by Bloww Studio. Scripted, hosted, and edited by Jill.

    • 54 min
    Amway ft. Chrystal

    Amway ft. Chrystal

    We kick off a round of bonus full interview episodes with the lovely Chrystal. When she joined Amway on an invitation from her coworker, Chrystal had no idea how much of her life would eventually be consumed by it. Through ever-growing fees paid and conferences attended, Chrystal never entirely lost her ability to see clearly through the merry-go-round of motivation pumped out by the organization and its leaders.Thanks for listening. Email us at bloww.studio@gmail.com and follow us at @oppcos...

    • 1 hr 2 min
    The Wolf of Main Street

    The Wolf of Main Street

    Insurance MLMs have given rise to a new wave of super bros, who are convinced that selling supplemental insurance is how they will make it big. American Income Life is famous among the MLM world, or maybe…infamous. American Income Life reached out to me to see if I would be interested in talking about their life-changing opportunity, so I took them up on it.Sources:2021 Agent contractor class-action lawsuitAIL BBBNo evidence that women using oral contraceptives have weaker preferences for mas...

    • 44 min
    A Symphony in Pink

    A Symphony in Pink

    Mary Kay Ash spun a tale of female empowerment, and today, is hailed as a feminist icon. Their cream, goop, and makeup has been a fixture in pop culture Americana for decades, but the model it uses to sell products and Mary Kay's culty corporate culture is worth a second glance.Sources: Mary KayMary Kay Income DisclosurePink TruthKRTV Mary Kay Ash, 1982Mary Kay Inc., CBS 60 MinutesThe case for and against multi-level marketing, Jon M. Taylor MBA, PhD, Consumer Awareness InstituteUnder Section...

    • 41 min
    Clean Conscience

    Clean Conscience

    Arbonne boasts that their products are vegan, non-GMO, and tout their B Corp certification as an extension of their clean ingredient mission. Consultants rave about Arbonne’s healthy living products - while toxic diet culture reigns supreme. I also sat down with Julie to talk about her climb up the ranks in Arbonne and what happened when her vantage from the top…did not look so pretty.Sources:ArbonneArbonne Income DisclosureThe Economic Cost of Devaluing “Women’s Work” by IMFThe State o...

    • 45 min

Customer Reviews

4.6 out of 5
22 Ratings

22 Ratings

FitnessPro6520 ,

Fantastic!

Quality research, entertaining edits and very informative!! Thank you for your work ✨

GiavonnaB ,

New find; new love!

I just found this podcast thanks to a tiktok and I cannot recommend it enough. The host does such an excellent job on diving into MLM research such as actually interviewing for positions. The people she’s interviewed that are ex-MLM employees are not only super informative but give you first hand experience from their time working in different companies. The host also does an excellent job interviewing by giving her guests space to talk and process their experiences in the MLM. I am absolutely going to recommend this to anyone who likes true crime and cult podcasts.

DeziM14 ,

Love this

Love the format, personal interviews, and spotlight on MLMs. I don’t know how this pod hasn’t blown up yet!

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