TRAUMA RESILIENCE

MLM's & Commercial Cults

Resources & Featured Offerings

 

NOTE: This resource page is a walk-the-talk example of consent-based marketing. For anti-rape culture and trauma-sensitive reasons, I don't do email opt-ins or "freebies. You're welcome to consensually join our non-spammy newsletter anytime by [clicking here].

 

Page Shortcuts:

Emily Ann Peterson - photo by Rah Foard (2 of 69)

Dear Fellow MLM Survivor,

Deconstructing your "lipstick evangelism" might not be easy, but I've learned it to be so worth it. On this page are some of the self-hosted and outside resources that I frequently reference while working with business owners with experiences similar to yours. 

Everything on this page is freely available because:

  1. Organizational Trauma suuuuuuucks, doesn't it?! 
  2. You're my kinda people! (I'm a trauma survivor too.)
  3. I am always down to commiserate with clients when they need to vent with "I can't believe how  fill in the blank  that MLM was!" because, boy, do I get it. 

As the founding director of Peterson Resilience Consulting, I have a personal history with MLMs, commercial cults, and adverse religious experiences. They are firmly rooted in my business beginnings and entrepreneurial heritage (at least 3 generations deep, yikes!)

Peterson Resilience Consulting supports entrepreneurial survivors of multilevel marketing, commercial cults, and other high-control organizations, including religions. I don't do "sales calls," (yuck!) but if you ever want to schedule a coffee/tea chat, I'd absolutely be down for something like that, click here for the scheduling link.

~ Emily Ann Peterson

Founding Director

Peterson Resilience Consulting

PCG Logo Peterson Consulting Short Legs

PS - Feel free to share this page with whomever you'd like or connect with me on LinkedIn!

Online Resources

for survivors of MLMs & commercial cults

^ back to top ^

under construction! come back soon for more or send me an email if you see something missing!

The Federal Trade Commission says...

Tools, Trackers, & Templates

Forums & Organizations

Guides, Histories, & Infographics

News Articles & Blog Posts


MLM & Commercial Cult YouTube Playlist

Watch our favorites all in a row!

^ back to top ^

 


Documentaries & Movies

for survivors of MLM's & commercial cults

^ back to top ^

Trailer Playlist Descriptions

  • [Un]Well; Episode 1, Essential Oils (links to Netflix) — this docu-series takes a deep-dive into the lucrative wellness industry, which touts health and healing. But do the products live up to the promises? Essential oils were once fringe but are now at the center of billion-dollar multilevel marketing companies, plant extracts may help us cope with anxiety, but are they a remedy?
  • Money Explained; Episode 1, Get Rich Quick (links to Netflix) — We spend it, borrow it, and save it. Now let's talk about money and its many minefields. Why do people keep falling for financial scams? Dive into the history of con artists and how technology makes it easier for these schemes to flourish.
  • Betting on Zero — Writer/director Ted Braun ('Darfur Now') follows controversial hedge fund titan Bill Ackman as he puts a billion dollars on the line in his crusade to expose Herbalife as the largest pyramid scheme in history. The battle between Ackman and Herbalife plays out in the media, in board rooms, and on the streets in Braun's stirring picture of the American Dream gone wrong.
  • LulaRich (links to Amazon Prime)— a four-part docu-series that chronicles the unraveling of LuLaRoe. Known for their buttery soft leggings, the infamous multi-level marketing company went viral promising young mothers a work-from-home salvation. LuLaRoe's eccentric founders recruited an astonishing army of independent retailers to peddle its increasingly bizarre and defective clothing products...until it all went wrong.
  • Seduced: Inside The NXIVM Cult (links to Amazon Prime) —This four-part documentary series by STARZ chronicles the extraordinary and harrowing journey of India Oxenberg - the daughter of a Hollywood actress and a descendant of European royalty - who was seduced into the modern-day sex-slave cult NXIVM, where she spent seven years along with over 17,000 other people who all enrolled in NXIVM's "Executive Success Programs".
  • Secrets of the Multi-Level Millionaires: Ellie Undercover (links to BBC) — Journalist Ellie Flynn goes undercover to investigate a multibillion-pound online selling industry that mostly targets young women with the opportunity to earn big money. Ellie digs deeper into two companies, she uncovers a darker side behind these enticing Instagram posts and investigates accusations of illegal pyramid selling, systematic targeting of vulnerable people by recruiters and even brainwashing.

Podcast Episodes

My podcast, Bare Naked Bravery, featured some truly wonderful people from over the years. I've collected some of the archived episodes which I think folks like you might *particularly* enjoy. ;-)

^ back to top ^

Podcasts & Long-Form Stories

^ back to top ^

**VERY IMPORTANT TRIGGER WARNING** 

It can be extremely freeing and empowering to hear echoes of your own experience in others' stories. It can also be a minefield for triggers. Please carefully listen to your own needs while listening to the stories below. You're also free to send me an email if you'd like help in pre-vetting content. :-)


Scholarly Articles

for survivors of MLM's & commercial cults

^ back to top ^

Connect with Emily Ann Peterson on Academia.edu!

Prins, K. & Wellman, M. (2021, October). #FaithandFitnessCollide: Spreading the Word of Multilevel Marketing in Christian Women’s Fitness Instagram Posts. Paper presented at AoIR
2021: The 22nd Annual Conference of the Association of Internet Researchers. Virtual Event: AoIR.
DeLiema, M. Shadel, D. Nofziger, A. Pak, K. (2018) AARP Study of Multilevel Marketing: Profiling Participants and their Experiences in Direct Sales. AARP Research and Strategic Analysis.

Zain, O., Quraeshi, Z. A., & Idris, M. A. (2000). Direct Selling in Malaysia. Journal of Asia-Pacific Business, 2(4), 83–101. https://doi.org/10.1300/J098V02N04_06

Peterson, R., & Albaum, G. (2007). On the Ethicality of Internal Consumption in Multilevel Marketing. Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management, 27(4), 317–323. https://doi.org/10.2753/PSS0885-3134270403

Wensley, A. K. P., Cegarra-Navarro, J. G., Cepeda-Carrión, G., & Millán, A. G. L. (2011). How entrepreneurial actions transform customer capital through time: Exploring and exploiting knowledge in an open-mindedness context. International Journal of Manpower, 32(1), 132–150. https://doi.org/10.1108/01437721111121279

Wall, D. S. (2004). Digital Realism and the Governance of Spam as Cybercrime. European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research, 10(4), 309–335. https://doi.org/10.1007/S10610-005-0554-8

Harrison, Paul, Massi, Marta, & Chalmers, Kathryn. (2014). Beyond Door-to-Door: The Implications of Invited In-Home Selling. Journal of Consumer Affairs, 48(1), 195–221. https://doi.org/10.1111/JOCA.12027

Bosley, Stacie A. and McKeage, Kim, "Multilevel Marketing Diffusion and the Risk of Pyramid Scheme Activity: e Case of FortuneHi‐Tech Marketing in Montana" (2015). School of Business All Faculty ScholarshipPaper 2.

Carvajal, A., Monroe, H. K., Pattillo, C. A., Wynter, B., A. C., H. M., … B. W. (2009). Ponzi Schemes in the Caribbean. IMF Working Papers, 09(95), 1. https://doi.org/10.5089/9781451872422.001

Mulla, Z. R., & Krishnan, V. R. (2012). Transformational Leadership and Karma-Yoga: Enhancing Followers' Duty-orientation and Indifference to Rewards. Psychology & Developing Societies, 24(1), 85–117. https://doi.org/10.1177/097133361102400104

Dolan, C., & Johnstone-Louis, M. (2011). Re-siting corporate responsibility: The making of South Africa's Avon entrepreneurs. Focaal, 2011(60), 21–33. https://doi.org/10.3167/FCL.2011.600103 "The article suggests that while targeting the “bottom of the pyramid” may elide the distinction be-tween the maximization of profit and the imperatives of sustainable development, devolving corporate social responsibility (CSR) to the “entrepreneurial poor”raises questions about the implications of “making poverty business.”

Stocker, Georgia. (2019). An Examination into the Exploitative Nature of Multi-Level Marketing Companies. LLM Dissertation, School of Law, Queen's University Belfast. 

Szalay, G. The Impact of the Lack of Transparency on Corporate Governance: a Practical Example. Corporate Law & Governance Review, 1(2), 21–28. https://doi.org/10.22495/CLGRV1I2P2

Dolan, C., & Scott, L. (2009). Lipstick evangelism: Avon trading circles and gender empowerment in South Africa. Gender and Development, 17(2), 203–218. http://www.jstor.org/stable/27809224

Scott, L., Dolan, C., Johnstone-Louis, M., Sugden, K., & Wu, M. (2012). Enterprise and Inequality: A Study of Avon in South Africa. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 36(3), 543–568. https://doi.org/10.1111/J.1540-6520.2012.00507.X

Social Capital, Race, and Personal Fundraising in Evangelical Outreach Ministries, journal article by Perry, S.L. (2013) in Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 52: 159-178. 

Tourish, D., Collinson, D., & Barker, J. R. (2009). Manufacturing Conformity: Leadership Through Coercive Persuasion in Business Organisations. M@n@Gement, 12(5), 360. 

A Culture of Entitlement: Cult Indoctrination Tactics and Consent Violations in American Christianity thesis by Wilson, C. Chicago Theological Seminary, 2021

Selling Soap and Salvation’: Billy Graham’s Consumer Rhetoric in Germany and the United States in the 1950s journal article by by Uta Balbier in American Studies, vol. 59, no. 2, 2014, pp. 137–152

The Influence of Religiosity on Consumer Ethical Judgments and Responses Toward Sexual Appeals journal article by Sanjay Putrevu and Krist Swimberghek in Journal of Business Ethics, vol. 115, no. 2, 2013, pp. 351–365

Ritual Abuse and Mind Control book by Orit Badouk Epstein, Joseph Schwartz, and Rachel Wingfield Schwartz in book titled Ritual Abuse and Mind Control, 155–168, 2011

Minton, E. A. (2015). In Advertising We Trust: Religiosity's Influence on Marketplace and Relational Trust. Journal of Advertising, 44(4), 403–414. "Most religious consumers are more trusting of advertising than nonreligious consumers are. Advertisers need to seek a balance between targeting religious because of a heightened sense of trust yet not taking advantage of these more trusting consumers. In addition to advertising ethics, this research provides insight to advertisers in integrating belief cues into advertisements. Thus, advertisers need to understand the religious composition of their target market and be aware of the differential influence of belief cues on product evaluations for religious versus nonreligious consumers. Advertisers desiring to offer brand extensions to niche religious markets may be able to do so through use of subtle belief cues, which will likely not detract from a neutral religious stance of a brand as a whole."

How to Win Friends and Convert People: Onnie Jay Holy and the Sales Culture of American Evangelicalism journal article by Michael D. Odom in Flannery O’Connor Review, vol. 11, 2013, pp. 123–135

Why Evangelicals Like Wal-Mart: Education, Region, and Religious Group Identity journal article by Rebekah Peeples Massengill in Sociology of Religion, vol. 72, no. 1, 2011, pp. 50–77

Bigger, Better, Louder: The Prosperity Gospel’s Impact on Contemporary Christian Worship journal article by Kate Bowler and Reagan Wen in Religion and American Culture: A Journal of Interpretation, vol. 24, no. 2, 2014, pp. 186–230.

The Influence of Christian Religiosity on Managerial Decisions Concerning the Environment journal article by Cui, Jinhua, et al. in the Journal of Business Ethics, vol. 132, no. 1, 2015, pp. 203–231.

Saffer, A. (2021). Promoting the Faith: Examining Megachurches' Audience-Centric Advertising Strategies on Social Media. Journal of Advertising. "Advertisers looking to increase online engagement should focus their efforts on persuasive messages that include the object-audience engagement strategy."

McAlexander, J. H., Dufault, B. L., Martin, D. M., & Schouten, J. W. (2014). The Marketization of Religion: Field, Capital, and Consumer Identity. Journal of Consumer Research, 41(3), 858–875. "Consumers face severe crises of identity and the need to rebuild their self-understandings in an unfamiliar marketplace of identity resources. Unable to remain comfortably in the field of their primary socialization, they are nevertheless bound to it by investments in field specific capital. In negotiating this dilemma, they demonstrate the inseparability and co-constitutive nature of ideology and consumption."

McKinnon, A. M. (2013). Ideology and the Market Metaphor in Rational Choice Theory of Religion: A Rhetorical Critique of ‘Religious Economies.’ Critical Sociology, 39(4), 529–543. 

Ruhr, M., & Daniels, J. P. (2012). Subsidizing Religious Participation Through Groups: A Model of the “Megachurch” Strategy for Growth. Review of Religious Research, 53(4), 471–491

Tourish, D. (2005). Charismatic Leadership and Corporate Cultism at Enron: The Elimination of Dissent, the Promotion of Conformity and Organizational Collapse. Leadership, 1(4), 455–480

Tourish, D., & Pinnington, A. (2002). Transformational Leadership, Corporate Cultism and the Spirituality Paradigm: An Unholy Trinity in the Workplace? Human Relations, 55(2), 147–172.