Multi-Level Marketing Realities - Part 1

In this multi-part series, I will be writing about as much detail as I can think of about our dietary supplement business.  Don't worry, it's not all I am going to write about from now on so hopefully I won't make you too bored.  Glory days stories are great -- for the person telling the story usually.  I am hoping that there is something of value to take from my stories though, so I'll do the telling and you can decide what's good, what's interesting, and what's boring you to tears.  Feel free to comment if you'd like.

I have been kicking around exactly when we started our business.  I really believe at this point that it was towards the end of 1997.  I had been working for J.D. Edwards for a few months as an IT consultant working on the JDE World software, and I was flying back and forth to Lexington, Kentucky to do modifications to World for Lexmark.  Lexmark is the printer company but they were originally a business unit of IBM and made typewriters.  With the advent of computers and printers, IBM spun off the division and Lexmark remade themselves into a printer company.

Lexington is a nice city and I stayed at the Marriott Griffin Gate, flying in on Sunday night and flying home on Thursday night or Friday morning.  Several JDE people were there, but I worked directly with other consultants from other companies, such as Richard Smith from Orlando, Florida.  I haven't talked with him in years, I think he had talked with Chris once since I left Lexmark.  Richard Smith is such a common name that it is impossible to find him anymore.  If you're reading this, feel free to drop me a line.

So I was flying back and forth, renting cars, staying in a nice hotel, missing my family, and working on software.  Most of us consultants had "status" so we got upgraded rooms at the hotel, flew first class, etc., and were generally treated like kings by the travel people we did business with.  I have to tell you, that's kind of cool.  Richard and I were staying in the same hotel and we would often hang around with each other, eat lunch together, go to dinner with the client, and he introduced me to writing web pages.  I would say HTML, but I really only created web pages with Microsoft's Front Page Express, then change the things I couldn't change with the editor.

Multi-Level Marketing Realities - Part 2