Interesting piece on Lyle Macwilliam's report

Am I Going to Have to Eat my Hat....? The “Dreamstealer” Strikes Again!

Last May I wrote a piece about the perils and weasel ways of Multi Level Marketing (MLM) in which I offered not only to eat my hat, but to sign-up under them if any of my friends had found a good MLM company, selling anything I would consider remotely worthwhile.
As I mentioned here a couple of weeks back, I was taken up on this by my friend Raylene Radiance in Hong Kong, who accused me (Moi?!) of being a cynic and took me to task for negativity in general and having it in for MLM in particular.
“ I know what you think about MLM, and I know there are some bad apples, BUT..... I am working with this great company with the most marvelous product that is REALLY REALLY different.....”, she said. “If you check it out, I just know you will be convinced. I’ve booked my ticket and I’ll be coming to Bali in six weeks time and I ‘m really looking forward to seeing you eat your hat and to signing you up. I’m not sure which I’ll enjoy more”, she added maliciously.
Now as I’ve already shared, my friend Raylene Radiance is no New Age airhead, as her assumed name might have some of you out there thinking, and I normally have a lot of time for what she has to say. So as a man of my word and in the hopes I would be spared eating my best Panama or DKNY cap as well as being swallowed up in the maw of Raylene’s downline, I mumble something about looking into it.
“ Wot’s it called ‘ven?”, I says.
“ USANA”, Ta-Da! she says “they produce the best ever supplements, including a TURRIFIC multi. Doctors all over the world are raving about it. Research shows it’s the No.1. I know you’re going to thank me for this!”, she gushes.
“ Oh yer? Awlright, ‘spose I’ll ‘ave to look into it ‘ven, won’I?”, I manage.
Looking for my “Budget Roller”The thing about this is, over a period of time I’ve already heard about USANA from a number of people I know who are into supplements and MLM and they were saying the same thing. Not only that, I was interested in sourcing another good multi. Now I and my best beloved already use what I am convinced, after 8 years of research and evaluation, is the best multi available anywhere. The Rolls Royce of multis, you might say. But, while it is excellent comparative value in view of its comprehensive nature and formulation, in actual dollar terms it is quite expensive, so it ain’t exactly for dabblers in optimum health. I now wanted to see what else was out there as I knew there were some which, though they may not be as comprehensive, were still very good. The best “budget” multi, as it were. I sourced about half-a-dozen of these matching my criteria. They were all practitioner-only formulations from the US from manufacturers whom I knew were both cutting-edge and totally reliable. They provided the basic vitamins, minerals and phytonutrients for antiaging and disease prevention.
So in the spirit of honest inquiry and to protect my millinery, my stomach, not to mention avoiding a career in MLM, I added USANA to the mix to see how it shaped up.
The Need to Know......I first went to USANA’s website. Not as easy as you might suppose. As with most MLM companies you find yourself batting about between the websites of hundreds of independent distributors all competing to sell the company’s products and/or sign you up. USANA has about 300,000 such distributors worldwide and, as is usual with MLM, it is not easy to get hard data. After slogging away I was able to establish that USANA offered a little over 20 nutritional supplements, including something called USANA Essentials comprising two formulations, an antioxidant and a multi mineral. This was sold together in the US at a combined cost of US$53.30. What I was really looking for was one single formulation, but it seemed this would have to be the basis of any comparison.
I was initially impressed to find that Essentials was formulated by Dr Michael Colgan, who was hired as a consultant by USANA for the purpose and is highly regarded in the US in the fields of nutrition, exercise and antiaging. I also learned there was an “independent” comparative survey of the top 200 multis which said the No.1 was USANA’s Essentials. At this point I actually started to think this might not be a complete waste of time after all and began to get interested. Even if I had to eat my hat and be a soldier in Raylene Radiance’s downline, I might be on the track of my “budget” Roller.
Alas, it was not to be! The more I looked into it the more USANA looked like any other MLM company pulling the usual dubious stunts to promote itself and offering a range of average and over-priced products, when properly compared to the best that’s out there.
First up, I obtained a copy of the “Comparative Guide to Nutritional Supplements” researched and written by self-styled Canadian author, educator and consultant Lyle MacWilliam, who had “trained” as a biochemist and kinesiologist. This was a much slimmer and less impressive document that I had at first imagined and was being sold by MacWilliams’ company at US$15.95 a pop. In it Mr MacWilliam was at pains to point out that there was no corporate connection between his company and USANA. The report evaluated some 400 nutritional products and came up with a final list of 125 comparing them to USANA Essentials and a nutritional “standard”. And, blow me down with a feather, guess what? USANA Essentials was found to be No.1.
So why don’t I buy it? First off, the survey compared two products to one of all the others. This makes a complete nonsense of the methodology and result from the outset, which is patently skewed to favour the USANA product. The only thing valid about this document is that most of the best multis are in the top 20 products.
No Financial Interest....?Next, despite the disclaimer Mr. MacWilliams’ connection with USANA is not at all clear. He admits he is a long term user of their products but does not say, so far as I can see, whether he is a USANA distributor or merely a consumer. Even if he is not a distributor he may well have a vested interest in the company. Any member of his family or one of his employees can be running a USANA distributorship. USANA is a public company and he might be a shareholder. More to the point, USANA has over 300,000 independent distributors. The MacWilliams study says USANA Essentials is the best thing since sliced bread and makes a business out of selling the report or anyone who wants to buy copies at US$15.95 a shot and by the sale of membership giving access to comparative data on competitive products. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to see that this amounts to a $million business. Just go to one of the major meetings of any MLM company attended by thousands of the faithful. You will soon see there are always a number companies present, all doing a thriving business selling sales and other promotional aids to the throngs of avid MLM’ers there assembled.
Borrowed ClothesSince the name of Dr. Michael Colgan and others are used a lot in promoting the bona fides of both the formulation and the research I next contacted Dr. Colgan and spoke with his wife. What she said was illuminating. Dr. Colgan was indeed retained as a consultant by the company to put together the original formulation. However, as the company grew the company’s sales and management “resented” Dr. Colgan’s continued input on the formulation and dispensed with his services a number of years ago. Part of the termination agreement was that Dr. Colgan’s name would not be used to promote the company. Mrs Colgan was very interested and not at all pleased to hear her husband’s name was being used in this way. In other words having used the reputation of Dr Colgan to establish the product, the company dispensed with his services so they need no longer maintain similar standards. Regrettably, not an unknown practice with MLM or other companies attempting to enter a new market.
Now for the formulation itself.As stated, Essentials comprises two products each containing 84 tablets which at a dosage of 3 tabs per day of each makes a month’s supply at a retail cost of US$53.30. Put the two together and you have a perfectly respectable product. But, I can buy something just as good from a really reputable supplier for about US$30. Now here comes the weasel. Included in the formulation are 15mg of Alpha Lipoic Acid and 12mg of CoQ10. These are indeed important supplements, but they are quite expensive. For them to do you any good you need to take minimum dosages of 250 - 500mg and 60 - 200mg respectively. It is one of the oldest tricks in the book to shove in a tiny and ineffective amount of an expensive ingredient and make a big song and dance about it. Most people aren’t going to spot the scam. Quite apart from that, they are best taken separately and CoQ10 is most bio-available in an oil-based form combined with tocotrienols, a form of Vitamin E. You can’t put oil in a capsule of powder. Any good formulator knows that.
USANA goes on to make much of the fact that their products are pharmaceutical-grade not food-grade and are tested to be bio-available, whatever they mean by that. Well I would hope so! Any product from a reputable manufacturer is also. Yes, thousands of inferior products are on sale everywhere and are neither pharmaceutical-grade nor bio-available, but I’m afraid it is up to you to buy smart and make sure you’re not being stiffed.
There was one more interesting thing I found out along the way about Essentials. What you bought in the US for $53.30 was considerably more expensive if you bought it in Australia or Asia. USANA doesn’t operate in Indonesia but I’m told it is sold here at a cost of Rp 622,000 (US$69.25). Not only that, it is a lesser product and does not contain certain key minerals such as molybdenum, vanadium, boron and smaller amounts of selenium because it is formulated for the Australian market and the Australian government regulates the inclusion of these substances in a multi nutritional supplement. I would be pleasantly surprised if that were something customers in the region were ever made aware of.
An Old TrickGoing through the USANA list I spotted another nasty. They have a product called Gingko-PS costing around US$45.00. These are substances commonly used as cognition enhancers. Taken in sufficient dosages they can do wonders for your short term memory and mental acuity. PS stands for phosphatidylserine and is quite an expensive substance. Ginkgo is an herb. This formulation actually contains 7.5mg of the active ingredient of ginkgo and 125mg of Lecithin. When I tell you that to do any good you need at least 120 mg of ginkgo delivering 42mg of active ingredient and 100mg of PS you may start to get an idea of what a puny formulation this is. And when I tell you that this product doesn’t actually have any PS in it at all, despite the label, but 125mg of Lecithin delivering 0.4% of PS or 0.5mg you may start to get an inkling of how this game is played. I actually queried this with USANA’s management in the US to see if I was right about this and all they could say was “Yes, but trust us, there is PS in it”. And they’re right, all 0.5mg of it! So why don’t they call it Ginkgo-Lecithin then?
So Sorry Raylene!To put it in a nutshell, I don’t think I’m going to have to eat my hat after all and, God be praised, I’m not about to be launched on a new MLM career. It is not that the USANA multi is a bad product, but it is an over-hyped, over-priced, and very average one. No way in the world is it anywhere near the top 50, let alone No.1. I’m even prepared to accept that USANA is one of the better MLM companies, so far as that goes. But in my book, that’s not very far. What this research has confirmed for me yet again is that MLM is an unattractive form of marketing open to all sorts of abuse and misrepresentation, peddling average products at best and appealing to the credulity and financial aspirations of perfectly nice people who should know better.