Herbalife Scam Revisited: How to Avoid Getting Ripped Off
For those of you who aren't familiar with my story, my first foray, long ago, into network marketing was with Herbalife.
Now Herbalife itself is a perfectly-reputable company, that has been around like 27 years and is publically-traded.
But it's the uplines and alleged 'coaches' that are the scam artists. Here is what they do:
The Herbalife Scam, How to Recognize it, And How to Avoid It
1) Sell you a $40 package that is going to 'teach you to work from home'...the package, of course, contains nothing but a bunch of hype and income claims from the top of the pyramid.
2) NOW they tell you that the company you are looking at is Herbalife...after you've shelled out 40 bux.
Next they sell you the business opportunity , claiming that if you are 'serious' you'll spend almost $400, so they can make some commissions selling you products at full price. The ACTUAL cost to become an Herbalife distributor is only $55, and any sponsor who says otherwise is full of BS. But if you knew that, you wouldn't buy the $400 of products full price...you'd just spend $55 to become a distributor, and then buy the Herbalife products YOU want at your 25% lifetime discount.
3) Tell you that if you 'are serious' you'll next buy $4000 worth of products!! This will make you a 'Supervisor', and you'll earn 50% on all sales and have a 50% discount...but what a RIPOFF this is! They ask you to shell out 3 grand when you haven't even made a DIME yet with Herbalife. Why? You might think it's so your sponsor can make a commission on it...which they do...but in reality, the ones making the money here are the folks higher up the pyramid. You know, the ones who talk at the hotel meetings, wearing the cheesy suits and pinky rings? Yep. They are getting a nice chunk of change on every one of those $4000 orders. So the more people in their organization who are being duped into shelling out that money, the fatter their monthly checks are going to be. The fact that some poor shmo now has a garage full of products they don't know how to sell and a big whopper of a credit card debt doesn't matter to them in the slightest.
4) If THAT wasn't bad enough, they THEN tell you that if you ever want to sell all those products you just filled up your garage with, you need to spend $1500 per month advertising on their 'Wheel Slots', to sign up new distributors who you will then inflict the same scam routine that you just suffered through! Yep, you'll need to dial up these people and try to sell them the distributorship along with the Herbalife products cluttering your garage.
And you know what the worst part is? It's not like you get told in the beginning, 'Ok, you are looking at an investment of $4400, with advertising expenses of about $1500 per month'
Because if you WERE told that, you could take it for what it is and evaluate it rationally. But no...in the beginning, you only know that it costs $40 for that package. You don't find out about the next expense until you've already forked over the money for the previous step.
Ok, so that's how the Herbalife Scam works...but before we turn our backs on Herbalife entirely, let's keep something in mind...
The Herbalife PRODUCTS themselves are AWESOME!
These are products that virtually everyone you know would benefit from...as well as you personally.
So how do we take advantage of that, but avoid all the crap and asshattery I just told you about above?
It doesn't cost $4000, I can tell you that! It doesn't even cost $400...no, in reality, the way to go about making some extra money with Herbalife is
With 10 customers, you'll be making about $250 per month. With 20, $500. By then, you'll have reached the Supervisor level without having spent the $4000...instead, you did $4000 in legitimate sales! So now you double your profits from $500 a month to $1000 a month, and can start recruiting distributors, to do exactly what you did...
Doesn't that sound a HELL of a lot better?

Just don't look at this as a full-time income opportunity. If you are looking for a legitimate home business that you CAN make a full-time income with, then I highly recommend you take a look at the 123 Power System.
I'm not going to get into the details of the 123 Power System here on this Squidoo lens, but if you go to the website above, you will get the entire story on the startup cost, marketing system, compensation, products and training.
I hope this was helpful to you in avoiding losing thousands and thousands of dollars, sweat and tears! :-)
Rob Hunter
The Weasel Awards!
Was this lens helpful to you in avoiding/evaluating the Herbalife Scam?
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bonaw
Feb 5, 2012 @ 8:58 pm | delete
- I agree with your about us page, the more people you help, the more you improve this world. It is a shame, though, that you feel that you have to put down other entrepreneurs who have chosen to work with a substantial company like Herbalife. You may have had a negative experience, I had a positive experience and I am enjoying every minute that I spend with this business and the people that I get to help lose weight and those that I get to mentor as new business owners.
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jose celio alba esqueda
Jan 31, 2012 @ 9:27 am | delete
- i think 80 contries canot be wrong .and for all of you that canot see the good business you donot have any business even trying it, nothing being whorth a while is free. if you are lazy and think money is going to come that easy .better donot try it. you will be blaming the sponsor.
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norma
Nov 16, 2011 @ 11:44 pm | delete
- Well first if all my name is Norma I'm a 17 year old student I have been selling and buying herbalife for almost 4 months I'm at my 42% off and so far everything has showed me the opposite u had just said. There might have been many different reasons why u think this way
1)there's alot of people out there selling this product without even knowing what they are doing.
2)I mean come on u need to be educated for everything so why not educate your self at selling your product and teaching how to buy and sell it.
3) u can really win money out of here.
any1 interested in actually talking to some1 that knows the product and knows how to explain it right my email is tonchis.nv@gmail.com
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Rach
Oct 28, 2011 @ 4:40 am | delete
- 17 years ago someone tried to rope me into buying Herbalife and then becoming a distributor. This person was rather pushy and put me totally off the product. So yes Bill I think it IS a scam.
It's good to hear that you think the product itself is good. It's sad that it's overshadowed by pushy sales people trying to up their life importance.
Anyway, thanks for the info.
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Bill
Sep 26, 2011 @ 11:41 pm | delete
- I am a supervisor. No one hit me up more than start up cost. Starting using the products like they should be used. Lost 50 lbs off my bp meds. Off my cholesterol meds and feeling good at 42. My wife lost 35 lbs. Scam I don't think so. You can rent a movie at the video store and the movie sucks. What do you do blame the video store for renting it to you. I agree that someone could have been mistreated by an individual. Don't blame the company.
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GoddessMother
Nov 21, 2011 @ 11:07 am | delete
- Did you even read the article? The incomfromhome.com is a scam, you pay $40 up front for this video that tells you nothing other than all these people are making tons of money on this, then you finally get told it is herbalife you will be selling and they hit you up for another $400, and it gets worse from there. A legitimate herbalife distributorship only costs $55 to start, and the article even states it is a good business and you can make a lot of money doing it. And the products are excellent. So please read before you go spouting off and sounding ignorant.
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Mary
Sep 7, 2011 @ 9:39 pm | delete
- Yes this report is very helpful. I responded to an ad from Home Based Business Network. After going through 4 online segments, receiving a workbook and DVD (which finally tells you it's Herbalife). Finally, your mentor calls....and your subjected to listening to a 3-way phone call with a tape recorded message. Then immediately they wanted a commitment of $55 or $199 (their cost for using this company's system).
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Visitor agreeing with Mary
Sep 29, 2011 @ 3:02 pm | delete
- My experience was exactly the same as Mary's. I also responded to the Home Based Business Network offer for $9.95. It sounded like I was purchasing a book or CD; however, the terms and conditions at the bottom of the page states that you will be billed 39.95 if you do not return their promotional information within a 14 day period.
You buy absolutely nothing for $9.95, except endless e-mails and hard pressure sales once you have contact with your "MENTOR".
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Kiaraholst
Aug 21, 2011 @ 11:06 pm | delete
- Ok so im new to this herbal life situation I spoke with my mentor today about the products and im a bit skeptical about this because prior to this i tried somethng off of the internet and it was indeed a scam and it cost me 238$ i guess the price have gone up because my mentor told me i had to pay 200$ and i heard that price i wanted to run! because i just lost 238$ a couple of months ago So now im doing the research and unfortunately with all the unpleasantly comments Im having a change of heart and a bit confused. If anyone has became successful please emal me at Kiaraholstatyahoodotcom for me to make a firm decision
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LanceLarkin
Aug 13, 2011 @ 9:30 pm | delete
- Boo Scams!! IDK much about Herbal life but I do know I'm part of the #1 Health / Weight Loss Challenge on the planet... Check it out on my Lens and get some free Facebook training while your there :O http://www.squidoo.com/Make-Money-Challenge
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ThomasNKlotz
Aug 11, 2011 @ 1:17 am | delete
- I just want to give you the reader, the straight facts about Herbalife so you can make up your own mind with regards to the Herbalife Scam. Â I should mention that I am not associated with.
Oakbrook Personal Injuy Law Firm
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Independent Herbalife Distributor
Aug 9, 2011 @ 2:31 pm | delete
- Herbalife is no scam at all, it's people like you that should be avoided!! Herbalife is one of the few companies that is allowed on the NYSE. No scam business would get that right!! Just because you are to darn useless to make something work, don't label it 'scam'. 6 million distributors around the world are doing extremely well in health, wealth and the one man who started Herbalife, watch his mother die from prescription drugs from a doctor and vowed that he would make a safe way for people to manage their weight and be very healthy. You agree that the products are great, well so is the business as millions of distributors will tell you. Rip-off nothing!! The only people who you might think have be 'had' by Herbalife, are the ones who were to lazy go get off there butts and WORK, nothing just falls in your lap, if that is what they hoped would happen. Get a life and stop wasting your energy printing a bunch of lies just because you can't get anything right yourself!!
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GoddessMother
Nov 21, 2011 @ 11:12 am | delete
- I would never buy from you because you are ignorant and illiterate! Read the article!! If you had you would see that he agrees with you, but become a distributor from Herbalife, not through the work at home scam webiste so it only costs you $55 to start instead of thousands!
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Dave
Jan 7, 2012 @ 9:07 pm | delete
- Do you know how Herbal life got onto the stock exchange you should look up court cases on that, that was a law suit against herbal life in the 1980's
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Dave
Jan 7, 2012 @ 9:07 pm | delete
- Do you know how Herbal life got onto the stock exchange you should look up court cases on that, that was a law suit against herbal life in the 1980's
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Ebay is a 'Graveyard of Herbalife Distributors'
by Wealth_Mentor
My name is Rob Hunter, a busy busy entrepenuer living in beautiful Savannah, Georgia. I run several different business ventures, including the highly-popular... more »
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