Lisa Wilberjust the end all and be all, because at the convenience store I earned so
little. I think I took in six thousand something for a year and when I
applied for the secretary job I was offered $15,000 a year to start with
fu ll benefits. That was just an unbelievable amount of money for me at
th at ti me—it was like hitting the lottery. I was so excited.
I worked that j ob for, I think it was, two and a half years, and then
my entire department was laid off. You might remember that in the
late ’8 0s, the country was also in a recession. I actual ly h ad been selling
Avon all that time but I had never met anybody who was doing it full-
time, I only knew people who were doing it for “pin money,”—playing
around money.
The reason I did full-time isn’t for a good reason—I didn’t set out to
do Avon full time, I actually did it out of desperation. I couldn’t find
anything else because of the recession. I couldn’t find another job and I
ev en went to a temp agency to try to get hired and, as a secretary, that ’s
like th e lowest place to go is a temp agency. They actually wouldn’t hire
me because I didn’t type fast enough.
So it was out of total desperation that I turned to Avon. I had
already been selling Avon and I said well, I guess this is it; I can’t find
anything else. So I actually chose it out of desperation. I wish I could
say it was some big dream, but it wasn’t.
WRIGHT
The direct selling association reports that o nly 8 percent of direct
sellers earn $50, 000 or more per year, why do you think you’ve beat the
odds?
WILBER
I think it was being naïve and a ctually I highly recommend it! If I
had thought more about my choice of doing it full-time or found out
how many people earned the higher money, I probably wouldn’t have
attempted it. At that time I was in my early twenties, I was driving a
Yugo, living in the trailer park, and eating macaroni every night
because that ’s all I could afford. My neighbors actual ly said, “You want
to do Avon full-time? Did you know that in those network marketing
businesses, only 5 percent of the people really make a lot of money?” I