Robert Kiyosaki, Rich Dad, Poor Dad, MLMs, and MonaVie |
10 Comments |
MonaVie distributors love to claim that famous top-selling business author, Robert Kiyosaki is a supporter of MonaVie. They’ll tell you to go read Rich Dad, Poor Dad – his most famous book. What they don’t tell you is that the book clearly and directly against MonaVie. On page 61 of my paperback version, there’s a description of liabilities. For those unfamiliar with the business term, it can roughly be described as a recurring expense. A cable bill could be considered a liability since it’s likely to drain money from your bank account. MonaVie is another example of a liability since MonaVie’s policy of building the business requires the recurring expense of buying product.
Beyond that it’s important to note that Robert Kiyosaki has not made any money from multilevel network marketing. I do not believe he is a MonaVie distributor, which should speak volumes right there. (I could be wrong about the previous two sentences and I welcome anyone willing to provide evidence to the contrary).
Kiyosaki’s book Rich Dad, Poor Dad got its start from being featured in Amway — see The Section of Creature of Amway… so it’s little surprise that he might be paying it back to the MLM organizations. Of course that doesn’t mean he really believe in MLMs or MonaVie. He doesn’t put his money where his mouth his and actually build an MLM business (see previous paragraph).
Furthermore, many personal finance people critique Robert Kiyosaki as not delivering sound financial advice. These include The Simple Dollar, and Generation X Finance (note the title of him being “off his rocker again”). ABC’s 20/20 put his advice to the test by giving three people $1000 and giving them the goal of making a return on it in 20 days. Kiyosaki coached them personally. It was pretty much a resounding failure with all contestants saying, Kiyosaki never gave concrete advice. “All [Kiyosaki] does is, I guess, is open your mind to the possibility. He doesn’t tell you how to do it.”
The last point is consistent with reviews that say, “The book is more of a motivational book to get readers thinking about money, rather than a step by step guide to wealth. Rich Dad, Poor Dad is written in an entertaining anecdotal manner that makes a topic that many avoid (finances), interesting.”
It is worth noting that Kiyosaki admits that Rich Dad and Poor Dad never existed. It’s a fictional story. I don’t really view that as an overly negative thing, except that it is never disclosed as such in the book itself. It’s more evidence that the book is about entertaining more than it is about teaching sound personal finance principles.
It is quite possible that Kiyosaki is scamming people himself. This investigative report shows that Kiyosaki has free seminars designed to get people pay more for expensive training (classes that cost up to $45,000). Part of that training included asking people to raise their credit card limits, which Kiyosaki admitted was poor advice. It is probably wise to listen to people like Jean Chatzky, Suze Orman, Dave Ramsey, or David Bach. I’m not a fan of all these people, but they give much more sound personal finance advice than Kiyosak… and they don’t try to charge you $45,000 for training. (Thanks for the link, Anonymous Aussie.)
Originally posted 2010-06-30 07:02:04.
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Rich Dad Poor Dad, Robert Kiyosaki
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June 30th, 2010 at 11:40 am
Nice move scam Take every rebuttal from Monavie supports and make a post about it and pass your opinion off as fact! Nice strategy. However you are truly the big deciever here as you truly act of of blindness when in fact you have 0 face to face and 0 experience with any representative of money in person. You judge without knowing anything. Your hatred and cronies have egged you on and now you can’t stop the hate. You will stop at nothing to be proven right. It’s obvious with all these new topics. Also nice strategy using the editors note under Tom’s quotes and putting them in bold so they standout more. Use a level playing field.
June 30th, 2010 at 1:26 pm
I’m not exactly sure where my opinion came into the above article. I presented facts about Kiyosaki, his reputation, and his teachings. All the information in these facts were well-cited. I didn’t invent any new information that wasn’t already out there.
I create new topics because I hate to address the old ones over and over again. I have addressed the Kiyosaki point a number of times. It’s time that the information got surfaced where everyone with questions about MonaVie and Kiyosaki can find them.
Most people correctly judge a number of things without experience. Think about crystal meth, Russian roulette, etc. It is a sign of intelligence to realize that it’s a scam without actually being scammed. Would you say to a mouse, you judge that mouse trap without any experience.
I continually show that I know more about the product than high-ranking distributors like Mitch Biggs and he’s allowed to distribute juice and tell lies about it. See: Mitch Biggs Claims MonaVie Prevents Swine Flu and Mitch Biggs Claims MonaVie is Organic (and Other Lies).
I use the Editor’s Note because I want to make sure people realize that we are different people. I don’t respond in the post as i did with you because he’ll make 100 points in one comment. I want to make sure he knows that I’m addressing each one so he can’t cry and chest-thump that he beat me if I miss one.
July 1st, 2010 at 9:13 am
Whats your motivation anyway.
Your kind of funny on one hand you use the credibility and words from a book written by Robert Kiyosaki then you proceed in your next paragraph to discredit the very man you just used.
That’s hilarious
July 1st, 2010 at 9:43 am
My motivation is help people not be scammed into buying or selling $45 juice (or even $30 juice).
Thanks for the compliment on being funny. I guess it happens to come out even when I’m not trying.
The idea was to point out that Kiyosaki does not recommend MonaVie as most MonaVie distributors suggest. Then I took it a step further so that if MonaVie pays him some money to recommend MonaVie (which is definitely in the realm of possibility), everyone will see that others have completely discredited already. (That fire needs no kindling from me.)
July 1st, 2010 at 3:40 pm
Nobody said Kiyosaki recommends MV. You stated almost as a fact – that he specifically would not recommend MV – which is not true. [Editor's Note: There are plenty of websites that do say Kiyosaki recommends MonaVie. I'll give one example: Robert Kiyosaki : Is Mona·Vie The Perfect Business? The title alone says it all.]
However, Robert Kiyosaki does recommend network marketing (MLMs) as a way to get rich.
He would not not discredit MV for its auto-ship policy – because it does not have to be anybody’s liability – nobody who is distributor at MV is required to be on auto-ship, even though you misinformed people on this subject – if someone has two preferred customers buying 4 cases a month – this is enough to fulfill the distributor’s purchase requirement to keep his or her activity going for next 4 week-period without need to purchase anything. [Editor's Note: It is indeed true that Kiyosaki would not recommend MonaVie. He says to avoid liabilities quite clearly. The fact that you mentioned "fulfill the distributor’s purchase requirement to keep his or her activity going" proves that it's a liability. I especially ask that you focus on your words of "purchase requirement." That's very much a liability.]
The fact Kiyosaki made his money not in network marketing makes his stand and positive opinion on MLMs even stronger. [Editor's Note: The fact that Kiyosaki has chosen to not do any MLM business makes his opinion much weaker. There's an old saying... put your money where your mouth is. He clearly isn't doing that. If MLMs and MonaVie are so great he should be a black diamond by now.]
I told you MonaVie scam that you are losing this battle – go and find these 50 other MLM companies offering acai and start hating them too. I said your tactics are horrific – shifting topics so that you can delete comments that do not fit your style, censoring your opponents, group-think persuasion tactics etc. [Editor's Note: It's great that you tell me that I'm losing the battle, but it's clearly not the case. I don't delete any comments as long as they are on topic. I delete ones that are just meant to be bickering noise. There's no censorship here or I would have banned you from commenting long ago.]
I do not want to scare you, but you’ll see the MV is the best one out there among all different MLM opportunities. [Editor's Note: The best of a really bad group is not all that good.]
Personally, I am grateful for MV products and the fact the company is distributing its products the way it does. It allowed me and my family to purchase this great juice for less than $5 a bottle (with all the commissions I received and expenses I incurred). So, MonaVie Scam thank you for your kind concern for me as a customer – I am not subject to any scam – I made my own decision to get involved in MV to be able to buy their products cheaper than one could imagine it is possible. [Editor's Note: That's fine for you, but as you know it's a pyramid scam... Is everyone in your downline doing the same? MonaVie isn't in the business of giving $5 juice - you only get it cheap because a group of others is subsidizing you. You'd all do better to quit and agree to keep the money for yourself.]
Thank you for your great concern – maybe now you can shift your motivation to help others do what I do – buy this juice cheaper. [Editor's Note: It's extremely selfish of you to focus on getting your juice cheap when you know that its on the backs of everyone you "share" the juice with.]
July 6th, 2010 at 2:04 pm
Thanks for quoting my site. Love ya!
The title of the post is a question. You have your answer. I have mine.
July 6th, 2010 at 2:45 pm
OOOh thanks for the friendly reminder about the MonaVie Independent Distributor Number. Yea. I am proud distributor #2507321
July 6th, 2010 at 6:49 pm
The title of the post is not a question.
August 31st, 2010 at 10:58 pm
This is an article on Robert Kiyosaki I hadn’t seen previously – thought I’d share.
http://www.cbc.ca/marketplace/2010/road_to_rich_dad/main.html
September 1st, 2010 at 7:48 am
That’s an awesome link Aussie. I included it in the article itself.