Arbonne Review – Is Arbonne A Scam?

Arbonne is an old MLM company with traditional promoting methods, and I guess you want to know “Is Arbonne a scam?” Right?

The purpose of my website is to chase the dream of becoming a digital nomad. Meaning I could work anytime & anywhere if I get the internet connection.

I like to share all my findings on the way to achieve my goal, so you can trust my words. Those are 100% honest feedback from my experience.

I also want to give you a big hug since you reach out to my blog to make sure Arbonne isn’t a scam, so I guess you might check my ways to avoid online scams HERE.

Shall we dive deep now?

Disclaimer: As the owner of Smileaffiliatesuccess.com, I have tracked down special deals for products, tools, and services mentioned herein. When you click my affiliate links on this page to make a purchase, I may get a small commission, and you will definitely get a great bargain. This is a win-win advantage for both of us.

What is Arbonne?

-Summary of Arbonne-

Product Name: Arbonne
Founders: Petter Mørck in 1980
Product Type: MLM(Health & Beauty products)
Price: $59 registration fee + $35/yearly fee + Monthly Order Placement
Rating: 30 / 100
Recommend: No

As a traditional & legitimate MLM company, Arbonne has its health & beauty products. It’s possible to make a few bucks through its compensation plan, but it is just another MLM company that requires you to recruit more people into the system.

Arbonne mentioned they are the #1 global brand for healthy living inside & out in 2017, and this is from Direct Selling News Global.

Its ex-holding company – Natural Products Group LLC filed for bankruptcy protection in order to reduce company debts in 2010, and this is the ugly truth that I found in the history of Arbonne.

Besides the USA market, they have expanded their businesses in 6 foreign countries that including Canada, Australia, UK, Poland, New Zealand, and Taiwan.

Arbonne Product Line

Arbonne operates more than 40 years, so it must have real products and both customers & distributors do make money by it.

Arbonne describes the formulation philosophy of its product lines: pure, safe, beneficial. Arbonne maintains a list online of ingredients that it won’t use in products, you may check HERE before your purchase.

There are so many products by Arbonne, I would only talk about things that I am interested in or I found quite special.

  • Skincare: soap, cleanser, sunscreen, facial mask, herbal tea, or a whole set of restorative combo
  • Bath & Body: hand wash, body wash, lotion, pure essential oils( similar to Young Living & doTERRA)
  • Makeup: makeup primer, mascara, eyeliner, concealer, mattifying powder, etc.
  • Nutrition: health capsule, protein shake, detox tea, snack bars, etc.
  • Hair: shampoo & conditioner, hair mousse, hair spray, etc.

I must say Arbonne’s products are no different than other famous MLM companies at the moment, and they are very common.

Is Arbonne A Scam? - Arbonne Welcome Kit $49

How Does Arbonne Work?

There are always two ways to earn money from any MLM company. If you have ever joined in the past, you should be able to know these two basic rules.

  1. Sell Arbonne’s products to earn commissions
  2. Recruit people to be your downlines and you earn bonuses from them

But, each MLM has its own unique ways or bonuses to attract more people to join. Arbonne does have some special bonuses in this case.

How To Make Money With Arbonne?

First of all, you have to pay a $59 registration fee to become one of Arbonne’s independent consultants. Also, there is $35 recurring fee for annual renewal.

On top of this, you need to purchase your own Arbonne products and promote them to your customers. The costs of Arbonne’s value packs are $75 to $266.

Arbonne Compensation Plan

There are four ways to make money with Arbonne:

  • Commissions: This is the retail commission if you sell Arbonne’s products to your clients. You get 35% from normal clients & 15% from preferred clients.
  • Overrides: Your earnings from product sales by your team(downlines). The more volume of your team sell, the more earning you will get.
  • Mercedes-Benz Cash Bonus Program: If you reach the level of vice president or above, Arbonne will offer a one-year lease of Mercedes-Benz as a bonus. This is a bit wired to me while other MLM companies provide a very nice car as rewards.
  • Cash Bonuses: Your bonus at every level of management based on sales by your team.

Who Is Arbonne For?

If you read the product lines carefully in the above, it’s easy to find out that Arbonne is aimed to attract women’s attention. But, the truth is that there are also men do succeed by Arbonne too.

So, if you care about health & beauty products and you also get strong presentation skill, excellent at recruiting, and good at promoting, you are the one should give Arbonne a try.

What I Liked About Arbonne

TOP#1 It Runs Over 40 Years

For a company that runs 40 years, I think they must have something that solves people’s problems or help people’s lives. If it’s a scam, how come they can survive this long without being challenged or sued?

So, stopping thinking it’s a scam since there is no scam can last for over 40 years. Right? If there is, please leave me a comment with the name. I would love to check its business and write an article of all my findings.

TOP#2 It’s Possible To Succeed!

Although people do have negative thoughts on all MLM companies, there are still people made their way through Arbonne to earn lots of money home, especially for stay-at-home moms.

There are so many successful women who made a way up to the national vice president, but I want to share Bassamba Sao’s story. He joined Arbonne when he was a student, and he made it up to Executive Regional Vice President.

He met his leader one day when he felt “Nothing to lose why not give it a chance?”, so he followed the system and didn’t give up for his goal.

So, it’s possible that people make a living by Arbonne. For more successful stories, please check HERE.

TOP#3 A+ Rating on BBB

BBB stands for Better Business Bureau. Before you join any online program or purchase products & services, I suggest you check this page to know better.

Arbonne got A PLUS rating on BBB that only shows they are doing good for Arbonne’s products and customer services.

They got BBB accredited for 35 years now, but there are only 13 complaints during these 35 years. I think it’s quite amazing, right?

TOP#4 Arbonne Pure Pay

Arbonne Pure Pay is designed to provide you with fast, convenient and reliable access to your commissions to all independent consultants. Arbonne advanced with technology, and it’s really easy to check your earnings.

Arbonne pays its US and Canadian Independent Consultants, their Client, and Preferred Client commissions weekly, and their overrides and bonuses monthly based on the Arbonne SuccessPlan.

But, if you choose to wire the payment to PayPal, prepaid debit card, or check, there will be some charges as below.

Is Arbonne A Scam? - Arbonne Pure Pay

Ugly Truth About Arbonne

TOP#1 Low Income Potential

Here comes the crucial part of Arbonne. The average annual earning for all independent consultants is around $839, and it’s $70 per month.

I understand you might say you could get more once you climb levels up to become a national vice president, but the ugly truth is that there is only 1% who achieve this goal.

You think you will be the 1% or the rest 99%? The average time to become a national vice president takes about 57 months. Meaning it takes about 5 years!

I didn’t it’s impossible! Most people failed and cannot commit themselves to achieve this goal. If you are the kind of person who has super strong faith for Arbonne, please go head to make it work!

Is Arbonne A Scam? - Low Income Potential

TOP#2 Recruiting, Recruiting, Still Recruiting

It seems impossible to avoid recruiting people in the MLM industry, and Arbonne is no exception. Once you start your journey with Arbonne, you will soon discover you need to recruit people into the system to maximize your earning.

The power of recruiting is that you could earn extra bonuses and overrides from downlines, and that’s the secret we all know for any MLM companies.

But, when you first start your direct selling business, your friends & family might be your first target. Don’t push them too hard for buying the products you have or forcing them to join Arbonne too. Many people might become no friends left in the end.

TOP#3 Monthly Order Placement(Autoship)

Arbonne Autoship is a consistent ordering program that ships every 30 or 60 days to ensure you never run out of your favorite Arbonne products.

This is from Arboone directly that sounds really ideal, but, yes, there is a but! You will find out that you place orders more than you need for the promotion, and it costs you a lot.

Is Arbonne A Scam?

No, definitely no! Arbonne is a typical and traditional MLM company that has decent health & beauty products. Every independent consultant could sell real products to make commissions or recruit more people to become downlines.

I want to give you another hug since you read till the end, and you just showed me how much you like to succeed online, right?

Before you join Arbonne, I hope you think again for all the things I don’t like it so much.

  • Low income potential: you might only earn $70 per month by Arbonne, and it takes longer than you think until you make an enough earning by Arbonne.
  • Recruit, recruit, and still recruit: you might end up feeling like all the friends and family leave you away since you try to sell them Arbonne products and convince them to join too.
  • Monthly order placement: you need to have products at hand in order to promote them, I understand! But, you could spend more purchasing the products and find out that you cannot sell them as quick as possible.

My Alternative Way to Make Money Online

But, it might take longer than you think. My alternative to make extra money online is through Affiliate Marketing. The best part of affiliate marketing is you don’t even need to buy the real products and sell to someone you know.

You only need to create a website or YouTube channel with quality content and make people trust you then purchase the products you are promoting through your links.

The Process of Affiliate Marketing

The platform I am using right now is Wealthy Affiliate. I chose it is for its training courses, every Friday night LIVE training courses, 24/7 sitesupport, and the most friendly community.


>>>Try Wealthy Affiliate Before Bed<<<


Wealthy Affiliate Income Proof

Here are some of the most active members from Wealthy Affiliate. Each of them did succeed in generating a sustainable income to replace their 9-5 jobs. You are more than welcome to check their stories HERE.

I hope you enjoy this review and you are more than welcome to share ideas or leave your comments below. I will reply as soon as I can, thanks.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Matt is a 30ish guy who has a corporate job and chases the dream to become a digital nomad with a laptop lifestyle. He is passionate about making money online and will keep creating quality content to find his online success.

6 thoughts on “Arbonne Review – Is Arbonne A Scam?”

  1. Hi Matt,

    Informative article.

    Nicely written.

    Lots of substance.

    One thing wanted to clarify as a arbonne consultant are not required to purchase their own products in order to promote them.

    And yes you’re right more people you recruit and they make sales your income potential increases.

    I cover a different angle in my Arbonne review, perhaps you’re readers might be intrigued 🙂

    Reply
  2. Hi Matt, wow thank you for doing such a detailed review on Arbonne. I looked into this last year and spoke to one of the Managers who had given up her job to concentrate on it. It seemed to work really well for her. But I wasn’t entirely convinced. There seemed to be so many people doing it around my area.

    One of her agents gave me the anti-ageing range of facial creams to try and unfortunately I had a bad reaction to it and the next day my face felt like I’d put acid on it. It was so sore and scabby. I do not have sensitive skin. This made my decision to not go any further with the products or the business.

    I’m sure some of their products must be good, I’ve heard good comments about their nutritional range.

    Reply
    • Hi Alex,

      Thanks for stopping by and leaving your honest feedback. Yes, Arbonne runs more than 4 decades so far, I believe they do have some high-quality products to survive through time.

      But, I am just like you, not entirely convinced. Based on this, I think we are on the same boat. 🙂

      If you ever tried Arbonne Products, I think you might be interested in SeneGence, Shaklee, Mary Kay, Younique, and Avon, let me know your thoughts and I will try my best to feedback too.

      Cheers,
      Matt

      Reply
    • Hi Andreas,
      Thanks for stopping by and leaving your honest feedback! Arbonne is an old MLM company that runs more than 40 years now, so I agree it’s not very modern.

      If you are looking for a modern way to make money online, I suggest you take time to read my review for this alternative! I can’t wait to see your feedback on this too.

      Cheers,
      Matt

      Reply

Leave a Comment