It Works! Review: Pyramid Scheme or Legit MLM?

Welcome to my It Works! review.

You probably came to this page because you wonder if It Works is legit or a scam.

No need to worry you’re in the right place.

Over the last years, I’ve been busy creating reviews about all kinds of online products.

Some turned out to be fake other were legit ways to make money online but in the process I learned how to spot scams. 

In this post, I’ll show you absolutely everything you need to know about It Works! and after reading it you’ll know exactly if you should give it a chance.

What is It Works!?

It Works! is an MLM company founded by Mark B. Pentecost and Cindy Pentecost in the year 2001. 

The company sells health and weight loss products with the help of MLM ( Multi-Level Marketing.) which means they sell their products to independent distributors who resell these products.

It Works! Its first product was the skinny wrap which is a body wrap that according to its website is: 

• An easy-to-use, fast-acting contouring wrap that helps define and refine your appearance
• Provides a tightening and toning effect for problem areas resistant to diet and exercise
• Enhances skin texture to appear firmer, smoother, and softly contoured
•  Delivers visible, reliable results that progress with continued use
• Offers a fresh, improved formula featuring Seaweed, Green Tea, and Guarana

The body wrap is their flagship product but over the years they’ve brought out all types of different products to support health and weight loss.

It works! Company information

It Works is active in a large part of Europe, Canada, and The US, and also has a headquarters in Seoul, South Korea.

It Works! headquarters is based in Palmetto, Florida.

It Works! has done over 200 Million dollars in sales and seems to still be growing at a rapid paste. It Works! has also won multiple awards while being in business.

In this review, I’m going to show you if It Works! is a legit MLM company or a pyramid scheme that is not worth your time.

What Makes It Works! different?

Most MLM companies even the new ones seem to be stuck in the 80’s when it comes to the distribution methods they encourage members to use. 

They seem to always resort to direct selling in your social circle and when it comes to expanding beyond your family and friends the tips get vaguer and vaguer.

It Works! seems to have noticed that social media can be an incredible method to bring in clients. While the social media training It Works! provide isn’t on the proper level at least they spent time incorporating it in their training.

How does It Works! work?

Itworks! is a company that distributes Health and Wellness products. Instead of directly selling it to consumers they have chosen to use the MLM model which gives you the choice to earn money by:

• Selling the products for a commission
• Recruiting people to earn bonuses.

What is MLM?

MLM (a.k.a network marketing or direct selling) stands for multi-level marketing.

According to Wikipedia, multi-level marketing is a marketing strategy for selling products or services where the revenue is derived from a non-salaried workforce.

As a part of this workforce, you sell the products from the company, and/or recruit people to do the same thing. This group of people you recruit will work under you and is referred to as your downline.

The bigger your downline is the more money you can earn passively (technically speaking) because you’re getting paid a percentage based on the performance of your downline.

This also means the person who recruited you, your upline, is making money based on your performance.

The act of recruiting turns an MLM company into a pyramid-shaped organization where the first people to join make the most and are on the top of the pyramid and those last to join are at the bottom.

Source: Wikipedia

MLMs have been around for a long time. There are Multi-level marketing companies active today that were founded in the 1950s. MLM has a lot in common with pyramid schemes, so scammers often use MLM to disguise their pyramid schemes.

Is it absolutely necessary to recruit people? No.

You can also stick to just selling products you can order at wholesale price and re-sell to make a profit.

This is easier said than done for multiple reasons which is why most members try to recruit others so they can earn more money.

How to join ItWorks?

There are 3 memberships at It Works! 

• Retail customers
•  Loyal customers
•  Distributors

1. Choose a distributor
If you were referred to It Works! by a distributor you can fill out their information. 

You can sign up without being referred on the It Works! website and the system will assign you a distributor to mentor you.

 2. Select a starterkit
There are 3 starter kits that you can choose from. 

• Business Builder Kit, $99
• Business Builder Kit + Skinny Pack, $149 -  20BV
• Business Builder Kit + Ultimate Wellness Kit, $249,00 -  80BV

All packs include a personalized IT WORKS! website, eSuite access, and full use of the IT WORKS! app which is free for the first month.

After the first month, you’ll have to pay $20 a month to keep these features + a 1-time $35,00 for a Virtual Kit. 

3. Select Monthly subscription (Optional)
You can subscribe to monthly purchases of products to fulfill the monthly quota. The money will automatically be deducted from your bank account and you’ll receive the products every month.

4. Add Information (Personal and Payment) and sign agreement
Fill in all your personal information and sign the distributor agreement that informs you of all the rules and guidelines you must follow.

5. Get training & start earning money
Get training and start recruiting and selling products. 

Things you should take into account before starting:

• You’re obligated to buy the $99 Business kit
• You’re obligated to get your website at It Works that have a monthly $20 fee
• You’ll have to pay a renewal fee of $35
• To be eligible for receiving commission you need to sell 400 units of a product monthly or subscribe to autoshipment for 80BV of product.

Who can benefit from It Works!?

Who would benefit from investing in It Works!:

• People that are exceptionally good in selling products and managing other recruits.
• People that have money to invest in the products

Who shouldn’t invest in It Works!:

• People that don’t like networking and meeting new people
• People that don’t like selling
• People that don’t have money to invest upfront
• People that are trying to earn a full-time or reasonable side-income.

Pros and Cons

It Works! Products

A lot has changed with It Works! during the last few years. They went from a handful of products to have a huge assortment that their distributors can resell.

Their products can be divided into 7 categories:

• Beauty & Personal Care 
• Nutrition
• Keto 
• Weight control
• Energy & Endurance
• Vegan
• Apparel and Accessories

The It Works! product line consists of:

• Coffee Brews
• Fab wraps
• Cleansing gels 
• Essential Oils
• Creams ( Eye, anti-aging)
• Energy drinks, shakes, and other supplements
• Facial toners

Do It Works! Products work?

As someone that might be interested in working as a distributor for It Works! I think it’s important to know if the product works and if you can stand behind it with certainty.

I’ll start this of with saying that none of the It Works! products are FDA-Approved

This is why I went and did some research to find out if these products are legit. To this day there aren’t any scientific articles online that validate that these products work. 

On the internet, there is no consensus about each product. Some say the products they used worked and others think it’s a flat out scam. 

Here are some user reviews bad and good from various rating websites. 

Here's a video review of a product they used.

It Works Coffee Brew Review

Is It Works! Compensation Plan

It Works! can be considered a traditional MLM when looking at its compensation plan.

You either sell their products for a commission or you can recruit people and receive residual income, climb up the ranks, and earn bonuses.

In total there are 9 ranks that all come with their benefits such as getting a higher commission percentage of all your sales.

• Distributor
• Executive
• Ruby
• Emerald
• Diamond
• Double diamond
• Triple diamond
• Presidential diamond
• Ambassador diamond

Here's a short explanation of the compensation plan.

Is It Works! Support and Training

The It Works! support and training is similar to that of most MLM companies. 

eSuite and Website 

The eSuite is the back office of your business. 

Through here you can monitor your personal and your team's performance, receive company news, download resources, and send out communications. 

Personal website 

You’ll get a clone website that is used as a store that people can order from. Very much like an affiliate website link when someone places an order the company knows it came from you. 

Distributor Training

You do get some basic training when it comes to pitching and approaching potential leads. The training is similar in the fact that they advise you to start with friends and family.

In 2023 and beyond, basic training like this won’t be enough to consistently get leads.

For quality training(without needing to resort to outside training) you’ll be reliant on your upline. 

So depending on who recruited you or who was assigned as your upline your success can vary. 

This is something in my opinion should change because it partially explains why distributors are mostly losing money.

How much does it cost to join It Works!?

To sign-up as a It Works! distributor you’re obligated to purchase a Business Kit. 

The cheapest Business Kit costs $99.

You’ll also have to buy a virtual kit for $35 with recurring payments of $20 every month.So just to join as a distributor you’ll have to pay $134. 

How to qualify for commissions as a It Works! distributor

Just because you joined as a distributor doesn’t mean you can immediately start earning money. You first need qualify for commissions.

When you purchase a Business Kit you’re qualified for commissions for that first month. 

but all the following months you’ll have to fulfill a quota. 

You can become commission eligible in 2 ways: 

• Accumulate minimum 80BV through autoshipment 
• Accumulate atleast 400 Personal Bonus Volume every month

You might be wondering why I’m using the word “accumulating”. 

This is because the volume doesn’t necessarily have to be sold after being purchased. At the very least, you need to purchase the volume.

Now let’s take a look at both conditions for qualifying for commissions. 

1. Qualify for commissions through autoshipment
As I said before, you need to accumulate 80 Bonus Volume which is roughly products between $110 and $140. If we go with the cheapest option, you’d have to invest $110x12 = $1320.

2. Qualify for commissions through personal sales
Accumulate 400 Personal Bonus Volume through personal sales which consist of products between $550 and $580.

If we go with the cheapest option, you’d have to invest $550x12 = $6600.

When it comes to personal sales quotas this is the highest quota for personal sales I’ve seen for a MLM in 5 years. Most MLM companies have a sales quota around 200 units of Volume. 

It seems to me by upholding this ridiculous quota that they’re pushing people to subscribe to autoshipment.

How much can you earn with It Works!?

There are a lot of things that you have to take into account when answering this question. 

In an ideal world, you could become a millionaire as a distributor of It Works! products but there are so many things that have to go right for this to happen.

This is why I think it’s smarter to look at what distributors are already earning and use this as a reference.

On the official It Works! website, they have an income disclosure with the average numbers distributors are doing based on their distributor rank.

These ranks are given based on their and their recruiter’s performance, how many products they have bought from It Works!, and how many products they have resold.

Here is the most recent income disclosure statement published.

Something that I do find disturbing about this disclosure is how more than 85,13% of the members are in the lowest ranks and making a monthly average of $87.

That's roughly $3 a day which is nowhere near US minimum income.

Looking at the minimum costs of joining It Works! as a distributor and qualify for commissions it is save to say that most distributors are losing money.

Why aren’t people earning decent money with MLM companies like It Works!?

I have summed up the reasons why it’s hard to make money with It Works! and MLM companies in general into 3 points. As an It Works! distributor, you’ll have to deal with the first 2 points mentioned below.

1. MLM companies are often associated with pyramid schemes
MLMs have a pyramid recruiting structure that you often have to join to be able to make decent money or at the very least not lose money. The problem is a lot of pyramid schemes disguise themselves as MLM programs making it difficult to differentiate the two.

This is the biggest problem why most distributors have a difficult time recruiting people. The moment people hear about how you can make money by recruiting people red flags appear in most people’s minds.

This isn’t good for your sales.

2. You have to consistently invest your money to earn commissions
You’re only eligible for bonuses and commissions if you buy their products. The bigger the bonuses, the more product you have to buy. You do get discounts but if you can’t sell the products I can see you easily fall into a financial deficit (which happens to the majority of distributors of MLM companies).

3. The price of the product often isn’t aligned with the market

It’s hard for a multi-level marketer to sell products because most MLM products tend to be a lot more expensive than similar products sold by non-MLM companies. This means even if you’re really good at recruiting your downline still needs to sell those same expensive products for you to make decent money.

You can see that translated in these statistics I found about Multi-level Marketing.

• Nearly half (47%) of MLM participants reported that they lost money.
• One in four (27%) MLM participants reported that they broke even (made no money).
• MLM participants are 7% more likely to declare bankruptcy during their lifetime.
• Direct sales have risen 79% in the last decade, but MLM participants continue to lose money.
• 90 – 99% of distributors in multilevel marketing only receive a couple of hundred dollars in commission per year.
• Out of the 33,000 interviewed, 90 people made enough money to cover the costs of building their businesses.
• 50% of the people who start a network marketing enterprise abandoned it in the first year.

Sources:
FTC
AARP
Jobsinmarketing.io

Most people either lose their money or not make money at all according to the statistics. 

Personally, I don’t think a form of marketing where the chance of me making money is that low is worth my time or my money.

This is why in 2018, I got into affiliate marketing which is a method to make money online without having to pay hundreds and sometimes thousands of dollars upfront and the chance of succeeding is very high for those that stick to the training.

Interested in learning more about how to get started?

Click here to sign-up for my Free step-by-step starters course containing task-based lessons that’ll help you with creating your own business and have you taking action immediately.

My Personal Take

After going through the entire MLM program I wanted to share with you some thing I like and don’t like about It Works!. These are the main things that formed my opinion about this MLM program.

What I like about It Works!

1. The company has been around since 2001
The company has been around for roughly 22 years which can be seen as a sign of resiliency. Through ecenomal crisises and an increase of competition every year It Works! has managed to keep its head above water.

2. The 30-day return policy
Their return policy is posted on their website which makes it easier to refer to in case there are problems with getting a refund. 

What I don’t like about It Works!

1. Low earning potential
It seems the majority of distributors (+85%) that have signed up in the past are making roughly $3 per day which nowhere near even a minimum income. 

It seems to be very uncommon for people to earn a decent side income let alone a full-time income with the It Works! MLM program. 

2. High financial risk
At first sight, it doesn’t look like you have to invest a lot of money into It Works! but to be able to qualify for commissions you monthly financial investment is vey high. 

The investment you make also doesn’t guarantee that you’ll earn money. In fact, when you look at the income disclosure its more likely that you’ll lose money. 

3. The reputation of the business model they use
The MLM busines model has been around for a long time and doesn’t have the greatest reputation. So before you even make your first sale, you already are starting from a non-favorable situation. 

As a distributor, you’ll have to succeed despite that which is hard especially if you have no previous experience with sales, recruiting, or MLM. 

4. The imbalance between the bonuses for sales and recruiting
The compensation plan contains a lot of bonuses you can get. The one thing that bothers me is that seems to be an imbalance between bonuses you get solely for personal products sales and those that involve recruiting.

While you aren’t personally recruiting people you do have to encourage your downline to recruit people and they’ve to do the same to reach maximum earning potential. 

It seems like it subtly created a cycle of recruiters recruiting more recruiters.

Is It Works! A Scam?

No. I can’t call It Works! a scam.

No false claims are made by the company itself so it’s hard to call it a scam. 

Their distributor agreement also mentions that they’d take immediate action if their distributors make false claims.

I do have a problem with how they push people to choose for autoshipment by making the other option extremely difficult to fulfil every month.

Technically, you can earn money with the It Works! MLM program but it more likely you’ll lose money.

Is It Works! A Pyramid Scheme?

To answer this question we need to know what a pyramid scheme is.

What is a pyramid scheme?

A pyramid scheme is a type of scam where people are promised money for joining the scheme and recruiting other people instead of selling products and services.

No selling of a product or service is involved whatsoever.

So you might be wondering where the money comes from.

The people who join are expected to pay a one-time or a monthly fee and in exchange for that, they get a percentage of the fee of everyone they recruit after.

The remaining money goes to the creators at the top of the pyramid.

The problem with this model is from a mathematical standpoint it’s impossible for everyone to make money because you simply run out of people.

Take a look at this picture below showing how it’s impossible for everyone to earn money.

Source: Wikipedia

As you can see, in this pyramid model it’s required to recruit 6 people. You’ll notice from the 12th level and further, that it’s not possible anymore for everyone to earn money.

The 2.2 Billion people on the 12th level need 13.1 billion recruits in total for them all to make money which is more people than there are currently on Earth.

When people can’t be recruited anymore, the pyramid collapses because not enough money is coming in to pay members and sustain the pyramid.

Looking at the description of what a pyramid scheme is, It Works! can’t be classified as a classic pyramid scheme from a legal perspective. It Works! products have given people a method to make money without recruiting people.

That being said, there are pyramid schemes that disguise themselves as MLM companies because MLMs also use a pyramid structure but sell products and services.

These pyramid schemes offer products that are almost impossible to sell with the goal of pushing you to recruit people because you supposedly can get higher commissions.

Red Flags of a pyramid scheme in disguise

Often arguments to counter pyramid scheme claims are the sustainability of a company and selling products.

Unfortunately, these aren’t good arguments because there are a lot of companies that have been running pyramid schemes for over a decade and have been closed down just recently.

These pyramid schemes get an influx of new money by expanding to new countries or introducing new products that are geared to different audiences and turning them into recruiters.

The influx of new money makes it possible for the pyramid scheme to sustain itself much longer.

The only thing that really indicates that a business is running an illegal pyramid scheme is if the majority of the customers are the business its representatives.

This is why it’s better to look at the following red flags.

1. There is an endless chain in which recruiters are encouraged to recruit other recruiters.
2. Advancement in ranks is based on recruiting rather than sales
3. The compensation plan pays out on 6 levels or more
4. Upline earns more than the person making the sale per sale
5. You have to pay-to-play
6. People aren’t earning money

So here’s what you need to ask yourself when you think you’re dealing with a pyramid scheme.

1. Is there an endless chain of recruiters recruiting other recruiters?

There’s no quota for continuously recruiting other brand partners but to rise the ranks it is required to recruit brand partners.

Another thing is that in order to reach maximal earning potential you’ll need to have them rise the ranks which requires them to recruit Brand Partners as well.

There does seem to be a bit of an imbalance between personal sales bonuses and the bonuses that require recruiting or getting others to recruit new recruiters.

2. Do you have to “pay to play”?

Yes.

It is literally impossible to start as a  Brand Partner without investing $99

After that, you also have minimum quotas every single month that require you to financially invest in their products.

3. Does the company pay commissions and/or bonuses to more than five levels of “distributors?

Yes, the company pays commissions to 10 levels according to their compensation plan. According to articles on the FTC website, it’s extremely hard to sustain an MLM with a compensation plan like that while paying out everyone.

4. Does the upline earn more than the person making the sale per sale?
There doesn’t seem to be any indication that this is the case when looking at the It Works! compensation plan.

4. Are most people losing money?
When you take a deep dive into the compensation plan and the income disclosure, you’ll notice that most members lose money, especially in the first year.

It seems to possess a lot of red flags that lead me to believe that something sketchy is going on but I can’t say that with 100% certainty.

At the very least I can say that the deck is stacked against you based on these red flags.

Are you interested in earning money without monthly quotas, recruiting, or selling products?

If yes, then I might have something for you. It’s the method I have been using since 2018 to earn money right from my laptop.

It’s called affiliate marketing.

I’ve tried a lot of different methods in the past, and I spent most of my days reviewing all types of “make money/Business” opportunities.

I can say without a doubt this is the best way to earn money without huge financial risk.

Affiliate marketing is similar to the method used in the business opportunity above but there are a few significant differences.

Unlike Multi-Level Marketing:

• There’s no need to recruit people (and possibly lose valuable relationships)
• You don’t have to sell products (and sound like sleazy salesmen to earn money)
• You don’t have quotas that require you to purchase products every month
• You don’t have an upline (that next to the company also takes a piece of the pie)

No previous experience in online marketing, no problem.

It’s by far the simplest method to earn meaningful money online and even turn it into a full-time income.

Thanks to this method acquired simple affiliate websites that can bring in +$100/day without me selling products or networking with possible recruits.

If you’re interested in learning how I did it take a look at this 100% Free Step-by-step Affiliate Marketing training

That’s all for today. If you have any questions or you just want to show some love don’t hesitate to leave a comment.

See you at my next post