Hey ladies! I'm not sure if this is the right place to post this, but here goes! I *just* signed up to start selling Mary Kay and didn't know if any of you have tried it, or are trying it...any tips or ideas?? Pro's and con's to the business would be great. It's looking like it's going to take a big initial investment (more than Avon which I've previously sold) and I'm somewhat nervous. I really want to be successful and do something that I feel good about doing and hey...why not make a little money doing it?!? I just don't want this to be a huge flop you know? And then I'd be out all this money...

Any thoughts?

hand out the books to all your neighbours with a little note telling them you are new and if they order by with in 2 weeks you will give them 10% off.  Once they get into the skin care line it gets easy they will call you and tell you what they need.  keep files on everyone so you can ask them at that time if their mascara is running low or anything else.

Good Luck!

Hi.  Good luck with your business!  My advice would be to sit down and figure out what your goals are, then make a plan to accomplish them.  DIrect Sales is a tricky biz.  I do Silpada jewelry, which is also a direct sales company.  There are many pros obviously: make your own schedule, very flexible, can be lucrative...  But there are cons too: IT IS A BUSINESS.  You have to set aside time to do it, which is really difficult with small kids.  I am STILL trying to figure out how to manage it.  If you treat it like a hobby, it pays like a hobby-then it ends up costing more to stay afloat!

I'm always staying connected to my upline, as well as reading "Positive" books about sales/leadership/etc.

It can be really easy to get discouraged.  Last night I had a party where 1 person bought something.  It was a 45 minute drive...  But, upwards and onwards.  It's totally a numbers game.  The more contacts you're making, the better your business will do.

I would just start out slow with as small an investment you can make. Mary Kay is a bit pricier than what you can find in stores. People are hurting for money right now so the more expensive extras like buying make-up might be on the back burner for now. My cousin sells Mary Kay and she has only sold 4 things in the last 6 months...but it is only an extremely part-time thing for her and she's not much of a saleswoman.

I hope it goes well for you. Good luck!

I tried selling it but it just wasn't my thing.  I spent 100 bucks for that kit and then I just used it myself

I also tried it when I was still dating dh and I was living with my parents.  I didn't have my own home or own life so maybe that was the difference.  I actually do use Mary Kay.  My girlfriend is a rep so I just buy my stuff from her but I decided selling it wasn't for me.

Hi, I just stopped selling it! I do not recommend you buy big kits. I bought the 2400.00 one and my director convinced me to do it and put it on my credit card. Well all she did is get me some debt. You can't buy all that stuff and expect it all to sell. So what happened is when i did start selling stuff it wasn't the stuff i bought. So then i would have to go in and place another order and before you know it my card was up to 3000.00!! Yes i did sell some stuff that i had bought. SHe recommend that i have a little of everything. Well around here nobody wanted lotions and sprays just makeup and that was what i had the least of. Also i am not a big party person. I did one and it was crazy hectic! If you are a party person thats great. Also remember that it is hard times right now for some people. When i first started selling i sold quiet a bit compared to 2 months ago. So i could tell people were having a harder time with money.

Oh and the website that they suggest you get. I had one for a year and never had 1 person order from my website. I guess when someone goes to find a mary kay representative and they click on the site it will pull up the ones first that have sold the most mary kay.

Also when they say they will buy back your products at 90% that means. You paid 50% when you bought it so they pay 90%of that. They also deduct anything they gave you for free so if your starter kit had 200.00 in free items they will deduct that from the check they would be sending back to you. Or if you won an item then they will deduct that if you decide to send your products back.

So with all that said i am sorry to give you some bad news. If you are a people person and like parties then this might be great for you. Just because it did not work out for me it can still work out for you! So good luck and let me know how it goes for you. Maybe you can get some ladies on here to buy stuff:)

p.s. let me know if you have any more questions

AH! Okay now I'm scared.... A close friend from college is selling it and she's the one who's helping me get my feet wet. I was told the same thing about buying the big inventory package because it's supposed to help with your selling and the college friend who's been selling for a few months says hers is almost completely payed off with her mk earnings (sounds too good to be true to me!). And some of you mentioned an issue that concerns me the most: ppl just don't have the money these days to go plunking it down on $40 creams and make-ups...especially the ppl in my immediate area. I DID do the website thing, but only because I have a LOT of family and friends that I keep in touch with regularly that would most likely buy from me online. I still haven't ordered the inventory...mulling it over and to be honest I'm scared to death to. I don't want to get into any more debt! So...we'll see how this goes. Thanks ladies for all the advice!

That sucks that it is a close friend. But she is doing her job to try and make her money. If she can recruit you and get you to buy a big inventory she will get money off of that. Also any earnings you make she gets a percent. If you plan on selling to close friends and family and they don't mind waiting i would not order the inventory and just place an order as they order. Or if you can get a couple orders together put them in at the same time. But they are gonna try and get you where they say well if you do that you will be paying shipping everytime. and your customers are gonna want there makeup now. It seems even though i had the big inventory i never had everything that my customers wanted. They are also always coming out with new and limited edition items. If you know what your people are interested in then you can always stock up on that. But it just sucks if you've got stuff that nobody uses. Also i ordered bunch of compacts and eyeshadow when i realized everyone liked it. Then MK went and changed it to the new sleek compact so i again had all this makeup and compacts that people couldnt use or didnt want. And some of my customers were mad that they now had a compact and MK discontinued the eyeshadow for it! That is annoying. As for the website if you've got friends and family that will use it thats great. I thought i would too but they all found it hard to find everything and would end up calling me instead. I hope you don't think i'm being mean or ruining it for you i just hate to see another person sucked into there scams!

I would steer clear of Mary Kay - I have a friend who got roped into that and never makes a dime, just ended up with huge credit card debt buying the starter kit and ordering more products, because just like Rhonda79 said, people end up wanting other items that you have to order that are not apart of the kit - she also always wanted to keep plenty of "inventory" on hand - all it does is sit around collecting dust in a cabinet. When she would sell products she would never take the actual "profit" to pay off any of the credit card debt - she would spend it getting her nails done or shopping - so all she did was rack up (and continues to rack up) high credit card bills buying this stuff, she has to drive all over the metroplex out to people's houses to host parties or do makeovers and facials - personally I don't like touching peoples oily funky skin and I don't like being in debt so none of this would be for me.

 This is "multi level marketing".  The average MLM person makes less then $200/year!!!  Where they make their money is through "internal consumption".  They hire you and get you to commit to buying products, this helps them with sales volume, thus cashflow.  80% of the money made is selling to the rep, who end up stockpiling the products in their basement!  Your family friends may buy once, to be nice, but over time they will avoid you like the plaque!  Its like you asking your coworkers to buy chocolate for your child's fundraising event... they will once, but if you ask them every week, they will tell you to get lost!

Similar companies like this are: Quixtar/Amway, ACN, Malaluca, Herbalife, Noni juice etc etc etc

Its all potions, lotions, hope & soap!