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Costs of a new business

Any investment requires an input of money. We have all heard the saying: "In order to make money, you need money." Usually you need significant amounts of money to generate even a small income. Lets look at an example. Lets say, for example, that you decided to purchase a pizza shop. Seems like a realistic business opportunity. How much do you think this shop will cost? Well after you lease the premises, purchase the ovens, establish a telephone system, hire employee's, purchase essential ingredients, and advertise your product in your area, you will probably have spent between $50,000 and $100,000. Now, most pizza operators probably generate a 30% return on their initial investment every year. In other words, if the pizza shop cost $50,000 the owner would receive about $15,000 profit per year. After expenses, that is not so bad. If the owner also managed the business he would also be paid a wage, however, he would have to sacrifice his ability to work elsewhere.

Now lets have a look at Usana. The total startup cost to join the Usana network is $50. Let me repeat this in case you misread- $50 US. For this you will get sent a mountain of material including colour brochures, video's, cassettes, and a great file-o-fax. By joining you will have to sign a contract that states that you can pull out at any time with written notice to the company. You are not contracted to purchase any minimum amounts at all. You simply have the opportunity to purchase the product at wholesale prices. Now, obviously this is not the entire deal. Otherwise this company would have gone belly up a long time ago. In order to generate an income you must accumulate points. To accumulate points you must sponsor at least 2 people under you (as mentioned HERE.) You gain points by purchasing product. Not just your own product, but points are gained for any product purchased by any person underneath you within your organisation. These points accumulate and when they reach a certain level you get paid a cheque. Any unused points after this cheque is paid get rolled over to the next week. You never lose point that you have accumulated.

In order to accumulate points you must have purchased a minimal amount of the product during a one month period. The standard purchase procedure is usually refered to as "autoship". This autoship automatically sends $105US of product to your doorstep each month. This amount is enough to place 2 people on enough vitamins and minerals to keep them very healthy. If you live by yourself, you can sell part of this product to a third party at recommended retail prices and recoup more than the product actually cost you in the first place. Otherwise you can purchase anything from their entire range of products. Nevertheless, in order to generate points during a calander month this minimum amount must first be purchased.

The only other expense that most people encounter is the intial startup cost. During the first month as a new distributor, you will need to spend $170US (totally on wholesale product) before you will start to accumulate points. This is usually spent on the first order, however you just need to spend $170 before you start accumulating points.

Should you be unable to generate this initial startup (ie $50 + 170) then you can always become a distributor ($50) and after generating a downline, purchase the $270 worth of product and start accumulating the points. Its not the best way, but its better than nothing. For those true skeptics out there, until you start to generate an income the most you will be able to lose is $50. What other network marketing company (or pyramid scam for you skeptics) would offer such a cheap opportunity?

Now lets compare the Usana plan to the pizza example above.

In the pizza example, the total outlay was $50,000. This requires a downpayment at one time of $50,000. As most people don't have this as spare cash they will have to take a loan. This loan has startup costs and interest payments. The business itself has significant overheads from dough to electricity and wages to rental expenses. At the end of a working month, the owner could legitimately spend thousands of dollars on overheads for a one or two thousand dollar profit.

In the Usana example, the total outlay was $220 ($50 + 170). The monthly overhead was $105. No wages, no rent, no pizza dough. The distributor can work from home and spend whatever hours they want to. They can even continue a normal job (even in a pizza shop), without affecting their Usana income. The risk is very small, but the profits can be phenominal. One person in my upline is generating $9000 US per week income plus $2000 US per week distributor bonus. Thats $11,000 per week for the rest of her life. She can quite happily retire after working in Usana for only four years. When I first heard this I didn't beleive it. After this lady came all the way from America and visited my house in Perth, Western Australia she changed my mind. The profits are there, you just have to be willing to grab them.

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