Nice Trailers Amway!

I've been watching with kind of a sick fascination on the goings on with the Amway Mobes.

The trailers were painted along with a tour bus to promote Artistry and Nutrilite. That's cool. Lots of companies do it.

Here's where I'm kinda lost, and I'll be the first to admit that I don't have a degree in marketing. If some guy or gal sees the Nutrilite trailer or tour bus, they may or may not like it. Fair enough. I doubt that Amway is stupid enough (but I'm not discounting it) to assume that people will automatically research to see where they can buy Artistry or Nutrilite.

So what are they doing? I would have to believe they are promoting awareness for their products, so that when someone is approached by an ABO about the products or the business, they will already have been exposed to the fine trailers and tour buses, AND maybe associate Tina Turner to it as well.

Looks like they're doing some stuff in the trailers, but I would think that realistically they're looking just to have planted a seed about Amway, Nutrilite, and Artistry.

That way, being associated with Tina Turner and having fancy trailers promoting their stuff might prevent people from dismissing the opportunity. I don't hate Tina Turner, but she doesn't really do it for me, you know? But I doubt most males in their early 30's are huge Tina Turner fans. It's Artistry makeup predominantly being promoted on the tour bus, so hey, that's likely for the gals.

Great! I think that's a forward thinking fantastic idea!

Unfortunately, that's where Amway's wisdom seems to end.

Picture someone being prospected for Amway a couple months later. They remember the nice trailers and the Tina Turner thing.

"Oh, yeah! Yeah! I remember them! Oh! You're with that! That's neat! Sure, I'll take a look!"

So the prospect takes a look, and what do they find?

Uh Oh - Lip colour for $17.55 as opposed to Target's price of 11.99.

Uh Oh - Water for almost 48.00 compared to Wal-Mart's almost 5.00 (Gotta pay for those fancy trailers somehow I suppose)

Uh-Oh - 10 Protein bars for 19.50 compared to Target's 9 for 17.99 (actually not too bad but I don't know how much protein is in the Amway one, Target's has 30 g. Doubt Amway's has that much)

Uh-Oh - Religious overtones. Amway had to tell people to tone down the politiucs and religion...at a business meeting? They had to make a statement to a bunch of adult business owners not to promote intolerance or a specific religion?

Uh-Oh - Looks like there's a question about the deceit and dishonesty in the business. Look at all these websites about what a crock Amway is!

Uh-Oh - Looks like there's been a bunch of internal strife and "successful" leaders have quit or got canned to join another MLM.

Uh-Oh - The UK government was on the verge of shutting Amway down over there because of deceptive business practices.

Uh-Oh - More people lose money than not!

Uh-Oh - Morons and people with no common sense seem to be defending it.

No Thanks.

Seriously, with all of the crap going on, it's good that Amway is trying to turn things around. They are the makers of their own misfortune which is why it makes me laugh when ABO's express righteous indignation over the rather obvious flaws in the Amway business.

I guess the point I'm trying to make it that in the 80's, this might have worked. Maybe even the early 90's. Not now. Great PR efforts, but the problems that are of concern to the corporation still exist.

Fix the damn problem. Deal with the issues and the people that are the problem.

Do it transparently.

Then it's not a wasted effort.

Special Thanks to Bridgett for having the product pricing online. It is appreciated.