We don’t report much on The Sister Wives news, but it came out recently that Christine Brown, Kody Brown’s third wife, was leaving him. Apparently Kody spent most of his time in lockdown with his newest wife, Robin, and was neglecting his other wives and all their children. I watched the first couple of seasons of that show and gave up when they moved to Las Vegas. I’m surprised it’s still airing, although I guess these people have a lot of drama to go around. Meri, Kody’s first wife, left him earlier this year. That leaves just Janelle and Robin still with Kody. It makes me wonder how bad it is with that guy if these women are giving up reality show money, presumably, by leaving him. He sounds awful judging by some of the things he said to Christine about her body.
In Christine’s announcement that she was leaving Kody, her screen name was “Christine sells LuLaRoe” or something like that, although she’s since changed that. She also seems to be selling other MLM products, judging by Instagram posts she’s made about her weight loss and skincare. Meri is also really into LuLaRoe, even after the documentary came out exposing them. She went to their conference and posted about how great the company and founders are. Here’s some of what she wrote, thanks to US Weekly and it’s the caption to the post above where she’s posing with the scammy founders if you click through to that.
Standing her ground. Meri Brown‘s partnership with LuLaRoe has been called into question by her fans after the company was accused of being a pyramid scheme.
A Breakdown of Where Kody Brown Stands With His Sister Wives
The reality star, 50, showed her support for LuLaRoe on Thursday, November 4, writing via Instagram, “Two weeks ago, I was in Florida for LuLaRoe Leadership training. I had the privilege of rubbing shoulders with these two amazing humans, feeling their spirit and seeing first hand the love and compassion they have for their family of retailers.”Brown expressed her appreciation for LuLaRoe founders DeAnne Brady and Mark Stidham, who were recently the subjects of Amazon’s documentary LuLaRich.
“@deannelularoe and her husband Mark are literally a couple of the most giving people I know. They want success for me and my business for ME, not for them. The reason they got into this business was to help others,” the Sister Wives star continued. “That was their point back then, that is their purpose now. To know these people, to really know their hearts, is to love them.”
The California native explained that being part of the clothing company’s supportive network gave her a sense of purpose.
“The community they have created, this family of friends and retailers, this community of people lifting each other and wanting the best for others, that’s where it’s at, y’all. We have each other’s backs. We support each other. We watch each other grow and cheer each other on,” she added on Thursday. “This business isn’t just about selling clothes. It’s about service, gratitude, and joy. It’s about compassion and friendship. It’s about you and it’s about me. I’m loud and proud LuLaRoe!”
Is it surprising at all that these fundamentalist Mormons are shilling for MLM companies? They’re all forms of cults. Both of these women were raised in polygamist families and are susceptible to that. MLMs sell this instant family and togetherness lifestyle that Meri is raving about. Plus the founders, DeAnne Brady and Mark Stidham, are also Mormons.
I was watching a video podcast recently about MLMs. They talked about the fact that a lot of women don’t leave, even when they know it’s a scam, because they will lose their investment as well as women they consider their best friends. What’s more is that victims of MLMs have to become perpetrators if they want to make the money back that they sunk into the business. The woman who was being interviewed on that show, Tiffany Ferguson, said that there need to be more legitimate sales jobs people can do from home. These companies offer a quick solution for stay at home moms that ends up benefitting a few people at the expense of everyone else. It takes a real kind of obliviousness not to google these companies before investing in them and/or to disbelieve all the stories about how scammy they are. As we’ve seen lately, an unfortunate percentage of people have the ability to ignore reality.
Interestingly enough I found plenty of MLM content on Janelle, Meri and Christine’s Instagram accounts but Robin doesn’t seem to be on Instagram.
Both Christine and Janelle are also selling Plexus
LuLaRoe
Meri never officially left Kody. She’s just been doing her own thing for years. Christine is the first one to officially end the relationship. I hope the other non-Robin wives follow.
Apparently Meri is extremely successful with Lularoe. She’s high up the pyramid.
“…the other non-Robin…” I found that hysterically funny, also have a hard time remembering all their names!
That’s probably what Kody calls them. He has a Robin wife and the other ones he doesn’t care about are the non-Robin wives.
My understanding is that LuLaRoe is (or at least was) HUGE in the conservative Mormon and conservative Christian communities. First, you have a lot of women who stay home and so this seems (to them) like a great way to “help out” and “bring in some extra money” for their household, and the clothes themselves, especially initially, were designed to appeal to more conservative dressers – that’s something that isn’t touched on in the documentary really, but DeAnne and Mark are both Mormon I believe, and I seem to remember that LLR used to have clothes that were specifically marketed towards Mormons – but I did a quick search and can’t find anything about that.
And I think for other MLMs the same holds true – it gives women a way to make money from home without taking away from their families or any other ‘duties’ – that’s the sales pitch anyway, we all know that’s not how it actually works.
Yes, they’re Mormons. Mark was shown preaching at LuLaRoe events in the Amazon documentary.
MLM is also popular amongst military wives, while it has nothing to do with “duties” at home so much as your spouse is often gone for long periods of time and you don’t have family near by to help so finding anything that lets you make money while at home is important for some autonomy
I watched LuLaRich on Amazon and I was surprised to see some of the women were still with the company. These MLM companies are awful!
No not plexus too!!
LulaRich is on Amazon Prime, not Hulu – and you need to watch it if you haven’t. One of the women is local and I have friends who were sucked in to her specific team. She is painted in a very sympathetic light and did have some awful stuff happen, but she also destroyed people and then trotted right out to start her own MLM. (Which, of course, she doesn’t mention.)
Ooh! Is it the one who was pretty high up and then her world came crashing down and her husband left her? I felt like there was definitely more to her story.
The Dream is an excellent podcast on MLMs. They have been preying on housewives for about 50 years.
I was going to say the same thing. The Dream Podcast is amazing. I had no idea the deep political roots that allow MLMs to stay in business.
The part that gets me is the way MLM sales women tell me they “own their own business”. As a small business owner I find that notion so offensive.
Yeah, I know someone who is part of an MLM and she sent me a message saying “I find you intelligent and dynamic and well spoken and charismatic and that’s why I think you would be great as part of my team!”
I responded “Thank you, but all of those things are why I started my own business and am not available to join your team.”
These MLMs are horrible and have been around for too long. I just found out that Betsy DeVoe’s family owns Amway, which is not surprising considering how awful she is. That’s how they made all their money.
Wasn’t Robin trying to start her own jewelry selling business and trying to get the other wives to join in? Sounds like she was setting up her own MLM. That whole family is ewww.
Yep something like sisters closet and it was ugly overpriced jewelry.
They made a ton of overpriced product and then couldn’t move it. I think in the end it is as bad a money sink as coyote pass.
of course they are…
there are some youtubers who do excellent work on debunking their methods.
I also don’t understand why a legitimate business doesn’t get started with some home-based retail businesses that don’t rely on a pyramid to sell. Clearly women selling to women in homes is a model that works, so why doesn’t someone do a non-scammy version that doesn’t require women to lay out 5K in product that they get no say in?
I know a couple of people who sell for CABI. They do shows in their homes, invite friends and then have a rep bring the clothes and let people try them on and order what they like. I don’t think they have to sink any money into it, but I could be wrong. Their stuff is fairly conservative but not dowdy. I mean, they have sleeveless shirts and jeans, etc, in addition to dresses and jackets and such.
A regular clothing business needs marketing, distribution, customer service, retailers if they’re not direct, absorbs the loss of unsold merchandise, etc. This way they’re getting their salesforce to actually buy the merchandise upfront, be stuck selling it, recruit new “employees”, etc. They get their money fast, and then don’t give a crap what happens next.
@Betsy, because it doesn’t scale. Sooner or later Woman 1 runs out of friends and family to sell to from her home, and the options for growth are limited if you’re committed to the “women sell to women in homes” model.
As @lucy2 said, real businesses have overhead. Someone has to pay for those costs.
I might actually watch the show this season! Kody is a narcissist, although I think he got worse after his brother died suddenly a few years ago. He keeps moving them away from any support systems they had or formed, is a terrible dad and once the kids are old enough, they don’t deal with him.
He and Christine have one minor daughter, she has scoliosis and was in a lot of pain and he said she’d have to go on her own to get surgery, because he wasn’t going to do the quarantining from Robyn that going to this surgery would reQuite.
I hope they all leave him. Also, he and Janelle are step siblings in a way, her mom married his dad after Janelle and Kody got married. And Janelle was married to Meri’s brother before Kody, which these are useless facts that I can’t forget.
Wow… I had two major back operations as a child to correct my scoliosis. That’s a level of callousness I can’t comprehend. And it doesn’t bode well for the daughter because she might need things like physiotherapy in the future. I couldn’t walk properly for at least six months post op and my body was totally depleted of nutrients. I was lucky enough that my mama was incredibly supportive, found the best surgeon & had a good support network.
I hope the daughter and her mother has some stable adults to support them! I wouldn’t wish a father like that on anyone, especially a kid going through a hard time.
In my own experience of MLM’s, I have not been successful. I just want to buy, I don’t want to be going into my friends’ home and selling. I will also say that they are not all trash. My mom will flag a woman down if she see’s a Jafra sticker on her car. She absolutely loves their Almond Oil. She’s been using it since the 80’s. In addition, my mother sold Princess House Crystal my whole childhood. She rose up pretty high and had a pretty robust team. It was absolutely an essential second stream of income for my mother, and she worked her butt off. I’m sorry that there are some MLM’s that give the industry a bad name. I will still buy Doterra and Arbonne. I just won’t sell it. I guess I missed the LuLaRoe fad, I didn’t know it was a thing until the documentary. I don’t think I’m their target demographic anyway.
I like Do Terra and Arbonne products too. I own no LuluRoe, but see it daily because I work in a preschool. We had a teacher in the day care room selling it and she would bring it to work. I never even tried it on because the fabric is so cheap and sleazy looking even if some of the prints are fun. I see it a lot at other schools in general, but layered usually so every bulge or bump doesn’t show.
Amway and Mary Kay took over my parents’ lives for a long time. They both will tell you how much they regret it. Especially my mom. She won’t even get a Michael Kors bag now because the MK logo reminds her of the bad days. My sister is unfortunately in Rodan and Fields so the cycle continues.
I don’t know anyone who has been happy they did one. I have a few friends that have done some – one falls for EVERYTHING and is always thinks these are going to make her a lot of money, yet she doesn’t have a big circle to sell to at all. Another woman I know from high school is usually selling at least, no joke, 10 different things at once. Candles and makeup and jewelry and clothing and nail designs and who knows what else. I shudder to think of how much money she’s put out for all the stuff, and how little she’s probably earned back in return.
I understand why they were and are involved in MLMs (they’re the exact prey for these companies), but who’s doing LulaRoe in 2021?? Even without the documentary, no one was buying fugly leggings anymore.
Idk if links work here but this is a super interesting interview that contextualises the link between MLMs and Mormonism. I do think that there needs to be work from home jobs. But I also think we need to raise the minimum wage, have more salaries match the CPI & better social support networks. Not everyone can manage childcare, domestic labour, organising their husbands life & volunteering in the community plus doing paid work. In a lot of conservative communities womxn are expected to juggle all of that & more while the men take all the credit. It’s a part of why I left the church. (It was *not* a cult but very evangelical & conservative. I couldn’t cope with the ingrained sexism).
https://annehelen.substack.com/p/what-got-left-out-of-lularich
Oh my god that is a great link. That is layers upon layers of truth (with links at each layer!).
My mom used to sell Avon. Is that considered an MLM?
@Tootsie – Avon was direct sale for decades, but switched to the MLM business model in 2005.
MLMs are garbage. Many are headquartered in Utah because Mormans love MLM crap. Why not get a real job that doesn’t take advantage of your down line? These women have been in cults their whole lives and don’t know how to escape. Now it’s the pyramid scheme cults. Very sad.
I hate scammy MLMs…but I also get how hard it is for a woman to financially support herself with no education or work skills to fall back on, especially with young kids at home. There is so much pressure on Mormon women to marry and have kids, but it can leave them in a tough spot.
I do think these particular women could get a retail style job or something to bring in money. There are many available jobs and they’re old enough that all their kids are in school.
One of the wives on Big Love got sucked into an MLM, although I think she had to hide that she was a polygamist. That was when fake marriages were still illegal in Utah. (I’ve always thought that was so bizarre. Like, how can you outlaw fake marriages? I’m no fan of this cultish patriarchal BS but the first amendment and whatnot. let consenting adults have fake marriages.) I refuse to watch Sister Wives, though.
@bettyrose I miss Big Love and Bill Paxton so much. Such a good show! I didn’t like the ending though.
Sobbin Robyn probably doesn’t know how to get online. Not the sharpest, that one.
Me and a friend of mine had already been growing apart, but when she joined Lipsense/senegense that was what really broke it down. She would bring her “lip kit” to the events she attended and try to sell them, even brought them to a girl’s weekend I attended with her and tried to convince us to buy some. It was really icky. When I researched the company (mostly because I’m really interested in what ingredients people use), I found out about the shady business model.
I’ve never watched the show so this might be explained; I clicked on the link about Cody and Christine’s overnight road trip and how he was “grossed out” by her eating nachos (which led to him slowing down their relationship before proposing) – isn’t it frowned upon to do an overnight before marriage if they’re pretty religious?
I used to watch Sister Wives once in awhile but stopped the last few seasons because everyone, except Sobbin Robyn, seems so unhappy when Kody is around, and it was endless complaining, arguing, Kody either forcing moves to random places or pushing to build once giant house for everyone while tossing his stupid thinning hair around. Away from him, most of the wives seem pretty happy and doing their own thing. Christine seemed to want to have a relationship with Kody but think his attitude about the daughters surgery was what did it.
Anyway, was surprised to see Janelle pushing an MLM; she always seemed to be the independent, logical, methodical one that had it together, at least career wise.
I know someone who worked for Plexus corporate as an IT program manager. She said it was a shitshow and lasted 6 months.
I live next door to an Luluroe Exec in So Cal. He works from home, nice house, new cars, gardener, pool guy, food delivery, RV…you name it. It makes my blood boil that he lives like this while his company preys and scams women to hawk ugly leggings and build thier down-line and scam other women out of their money. All MLMs are predatory and most are based out of Utah. I really depise my neighbor and his complacent role in taking advantage of women.