About 6 months ago, I was working full-time in an office. I had been looking for a new job, something completely different than office work. I saw an ad for 'Skincare Consultants' and the ad said something like 'flexible hours, contract work'. It sounded interesting so I decided to give them a call and find out more about it.

It was Tuesday afternoon and I called and a man named Nick answered. I asked him about the position and he basically told me that you buy this machine (that checks the skin through fluorescent light to see impurities) for about $2000. You then go to people's houses for free facials with the intent of selling your skincare products. It sounded ok, but I was not convinced it was the right position for me especially with the cost.

He then asked me about my background. I explained that it had mainly been office and computer work. He told me that he had a friend who was looking for 2 people to help him with a new internet venture he was starting up. He asked if I might be interested in that type of role and I said yes of course. Nick said he would call his friend and find out if it was alright if I came to an information session about the position later that week or if it was already filled.

Nick called back a few hours later and said yes the session was still going ahead but that he would have to meet with me first for about 10 minutes to ascertain my suitability. I said ok and met him on Thursday around 5:30pm at a McDonald's near my house.

He was friendly enough but seemed like he was in a hurry. He didn't even buy me a coffee, we just used their tables and chairs. He had with him a hand held phone of some sort with a tiny presentation on it. He told me that I needed to 'relate' to at least 2 of the 4 concepts that he would show me. They all somehow related to making more money and most people would relate to them, so it wasn't a surprise when I did.

Nick said great and told me about the information session happening the following Monday at 8pm. He said he would call me back on Sunday to confirm the address. I got the call on Sunday but by that time I really didn't want to drive over an hour away by myself to meet with these people. He then asked if I wanted a ride with him and his wife who lived nearby. I relented and said ok.

In the car I was asking them about the business, but they wouldn't tell me anything and said I would find out when we got there. I was a bit confused because Nick has told me before they had been in the business for over 4 years. How can you do something for 4 years and not know anything about it??

When we arrived at the information session it was at a massive house that he told me was built on 3 lots. There were probably about 10 people there. We sat in their theater/entertaining room and listened to the presentation but I still had about a million questions. I found out later that the hosts Craig & Anna are Amway Double Diamonds.

When Craig mentioned they had been in 'the business' since 1989, I was confused since Nick had told me that this was Craig's 'new internet venture'. The presentation was about Quixtar which has been around since about 1999! Hardly new, and hardly Craig's!

We left soon after and Nick said he would go over the business with me in 2 days time at the same McDonald's we had originally met at. He left me a few CD's to listen to which I did. I agreed to meet him there a few days later. I did a quick check online for Craig and found he has a few other online businesses which was a bit fishy.

So when I met with Nick again (more out of curiosity than anything), he talked about what would be involved and drew on a scrap piece of paper. He explained that I would need to find other people who would also want to do this which was meeting with people in McDonald's and taking them to meetings to sign up. He said it would take approximately 10-15 hours a week. Three of those hours would be every Monday night at either Craig's or a hotel presentation. I would also need to attend a Saturday night rally in the city once a month.

When he started telling me that I needed to bring him the business cards of 100 people I knew by Monday's meeting I was shocked. I don't have any business cards and even if I did, I wouldn't want to subject those people to this until I fully understood was it was. He then said ok, 5 would be enough. I agreed to that, but I was still very very 'iffy' about the whole idea. I returned the CD's he had lent me on Monday and he gave me a few more to listen to and a video to watch. I watched the video at home and apparently it was about products I would now be forced to buy.

The problem was he made a fatal mistake with one of the audio CD's he gave me. The speaker was talking about recruiting people and exactly what to say to them. He instructed that the first introductory meeting should be swift (10 - 15 minutes max) and if the prospect wants to talk more you should make an excuse to go (which is exactly was Nick did). It was uncanny how the tape said everything Nick had just said to me within the last week. This tape was obviously for more 'indoctrinated people'. I know now this tape should never have been given to me since I hadn't even joined yet!

When Nick called a few days later I had to tell him to call me back in a months time because I didn't have the 10-15 hours extra a week at the moment. That was only a half truth because I wanted to do some more research.

What I have since found out about Amway/Quixtar is truly shocking!! I found this website Quixtar Amway Business Analysis and read a lot of it. It is an excellent site has some really good information about pyramid schemes and the like.

I also found this ebook titled 'Merchants of Deception' by Eric Scheibeler. I printed off the ebook for future reference, but had already decided it was not the business for me.

After sitting on my shelf for the past few months, this weekend I decided to read the ebook and could not put it down! Eric and his wife's story about their lives with Amway is shocking! I had my suspicions about Amway/Quixtar after my short experience, but this book nailed the head in the coffin. Basically, you can only make minimal money from actual product sales, the big money doesn't come until you hit the 'Diamond' level. And even then it's all a big scam of tool sales (ie. CD's and seminar tickets) where the big guns make their money (and lie to all the people below them). Sounds great!

After reading Eric Scheibeler's ebook and looking back at my own experience with Quixtar, I agree that it definitely is a cult-like organization and should be avoided at all costs. I'm just lucky I'm new to Australia and didn't have any contacts so decided it would be too hard for me to do. I feel sorry for people like Eric who had a huge network for friends and destroyed a lot of their lives.

This book could almost be a novel, but it is an honest autobiography. I highly recommend you read this book. It's absolutely free and Eric does not try to sell you anything!

Also, watch this dateline video that Eric takes part in! All I can say is it's SO wrong!

Quixtar Expose from webraw on Vimeo.

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