MLM History: DSA Killed a Bill in 2010 That Would Have Saved MLM

Network Marketing is in an identity crisis, and it had been for decades.

At the beginning MLM was really about selling stuff. It is in the past 3 decades that MLM had morphed into an industry no longer cares about retail. And their industry organization, Direct Selling Association (DSA) does not even bear the MLM or NM name.

(Frankly, DSA had existed LONG before existence of MLM, and was basically "taken over" by MLM companies. But that's a different story for another time. )

Previously I've addressed how DSA managed to condemn FHTM in 2012, a pyramid scheme, mainly by dissociating itself far from FHTM and claimed FHTM was denied membership 3 years in a row. My conclusion then is DSA is not making any efforts to clarify the differences between its members and a pyramid scheme, and it may not like how FTC will shape the industry in the future.

I've also addressed that DSA has basically ignored the existence of product-based pyramid scheme, and this action is clearly deliberate, because it needed to defend Herbalife in 2013 amidst Bill Ackman's long and epic short. DSA should instead lead the effort to stamp out product-based pyramid schemes and lead its members to strive for retail volume. But it won't.

Later, I discovered a DSA position paper where it basically denied the existence of legal precedents (i.e. just ignore it) and everybody can self-consume to their own riches. That, I predicted, will lead to the eventual destruction of MLM itself, if not by Ackman, then by the government.

But what surprised even me was the DSA's reluctance to even nail down the definition of "customer"... and how they killed a legislative bill in Tennessee back in 2009/2010 that attempted to separate a legitimate MLM from a product-based pyramid scheme. It wasn't launched by a "crusader" who's out to kill MLM. It was launched by a MLM insider.

And it went down in flames, killed by DSA lobbyists.