I know that all over the country, there are women who have started their own home based businesses... selling Creative Memories, or Watkins, Mary Kay, Avon, Pampered Chef. There are people who love it... and do it and make tons of money. But it's not really my thing. I'm not good at selling things... especially not to my friends and acquaintances. I always feel like it will seem like I am trying to take advantage... I'm sure this isn't the case for everyone. I have a creative memories lady who never makes me feel obligated to spend money. She sends me emails occasionally, and when I want to buy something, I call her. It works. Yay for her. Still not my thing.
SO.... when I had another friend tell me that I needed to look in to a company called Melaleuca... I said, ummmmm, no. If you have to sign up, if you have to sell anything, I don't want to do it. Not my thing, remember? She talked about safety of cleaning supplies, health of my children, blah, blah, blah. I listened with one ear, thinking, that's great for her, but all the stuff I use is just fine. I like Clorox Wipes. I like Tide. I like Johnson and Johnson. And I don't like companies that make you sign up. So there.
Fast forward a month to another conversation with the same friend. My son Jordan has terrible eczema... has had it since birth. It had gotten worse. So bad that he was waking up bleeding in the middle of the night because he was scratching his arms in his sleep. We'd tried everything. Prescriptions, over the counter... nothing worked. I'd decided it was just something he was going to have to live with. My friend raced to her car, and brought back in a bottle of Renew. This stuff:
Then she told me I had to try it on Jordan's arms. IT WOULD WORK! 48 hours later, Jordan's arms were amazingly improved, and within a week, the eczema was totally gone. I used it on all my kids... all skin irritations suddenly seemed to vanish. How is this working? Thus my Melaleuca education began. My friend flooded my house with natural products... cleaning supplies, laundry detergent, soaps and shampoos, vitamins, all made by this company, Melaleuca. I learned that perhaps my kids irritated skin was a result of harsh, fiberglass filled laundry detergents and formaldehyde filled soaps. (As soon as I stopped using Johnson and Johnson's Baby Shampoo on Henry... his cradle cap of nearly three months finally went away).
I started cleaning my counters and floors with Tough and Tender, a cleaner totally safe... like lick your applesauce off the counter and don't worry about it safe. (or steal a bottle out of the cleaning supplies cabinet and suck on the end of it... it can't hurt you, safe... not that I would let that happen on purpose, but if it did, glad to know it can't hurt). I started using Solumel, a high powered cleaner and solvent (still safe, by the way) and was able to get stains out of clothes that I had never gotten out before. Ink out of pants, grease stains out of t-shirts... by this time I was nearly convinced. Then I started taking the vitamins, and really, honestly felt better... I could tell I had more energy when I remembered to take them. Almost every single product from Melaleuca seemed superior to the ones I was used to using... and they were natural and healthy and safer for my family.
But... you have to sign up (I complained).
Actually, you don't have to sign up. You can buy their stuff at regular prices. It's just really expensive. But, if you do sign up, you get preferred customer prices. You don't have to sell anything, you only commit to spend 35 product points a month (around $45-$60). But, your spending money on things that you would buy anyway, from other stores, and you are getting better products that are healthier and safer for your family.
If you want it to be a business, it can be. When you get others to sign up, you earn money back. It only takes a handful of people signed up under you before you get back enough money to pay for your own stuff every month. I didn't sign up to make money. I signed up because I absolutely saw an improvement in the overall health of my kids.
So, I tell you about it, not because I want to make money and want you to all sign up, (although, if you wanted to, I would be happy to help you) but because I am such a believer in their products. You can explore their product store here: Melaleuca, and you can read more about the Ecosense line of cleaning products here: Safer For Your Home.
