World Wide Dream Builders is presented as an amazing business opportunity, but is it really as good as they say? After all, the people who are recruiting others in are making money doing so.
Is World Wide Dream Builders a scam? Is it worth it?
I recently stumbled across this business opportunity and I'm guessing the same has happened to you... or maybe you were approached by a recruiter who was trying to get you to join.
After finding a mix of very negative and some positive reviews about WWDB, I decided to dig a little deeper and find out more.
One thing about this place is that it was difficult to get good information about their operations. They aren't very transparent, which is a major red-flag right from the start, and it took me quite a bit of digging around (research) to put this review together... so I hope you enjoy.
What Is World Wide Dream Builders?
- Name: World Wide Dream Builders (WWDB)
- Company: World Wide Group (WWG)
- Website: https://www.wwdb.com
- Founder: Ron & Georgia Lee Puryear
- What They Provide: Training for business opportunity
- Cost to Join: Unclear, but a lot... as you will see
In a nutshell, Word Wide Group (WWG), which is the company behind World Wide Dream Builders (WWDB), is a business that was created to help train people to become successful Independent Business Owners (IBOs) for Amway, and as you can see they are an "approved provider of Amway training and education"...
Amway is a MLM (multi-level marketing) company that sells health, beauty, and home-care products. They don't sell products in stores, but instead rely on an independent sales force of distributors to do the selling, which is a business opportunity that anyone can join -- and it is this that WWDB trains people for.
Think of it like this: WWBD is an independent layer of educational material & training that is added onto the Amway business opportunity... and they also are very pushy on motivational material, which you could have probably guessed based on their fairy-tale, Disney-sounding name of World Wide Dream Builders.
Brief History of WWG & WWBD:
WWG and WWBD were originally founded by Ron & Georgia Lee Puryear back in the late 70's as a small support group for Amway IBOs, but has since expanded a great deal to become of the "the largest and well structured training and motivational systems in all of Amway".
Ron & Georgia Lee Puryear have made it to the Founders Crown rank in the Amway business, which very high... high enough to become members of the North American Founders Council, an organization composed of Amway IBOs with the largest businesses who provide feedback to Amway.
According to AmwayWiki, they achieved Emerald and Diamond rank in 1976, Triple Diamond in 1995, Founders Triple Diamond in 2002, Crown in 2003, and Founders Crown in 2004.
But, in 2016 Ron passed away, which led to different management within WWG.
Management:
If you go to the WWDB website and click on the Leadership page you will be presented with 34 people on the team, all of whom are high ranking Amway IBOs at the Diamond level... and most of whom have been at this for 30+ years.
According to Chuck Holmes at OnlineMLMCommunity.com (was part of WWDB for a while), WWDB might be owned by Diamond members within Ron's downline, in which the top distributors take part at the WWDB Board of Directors and make decisions for the company.
But this area is a bit shady and unknown.
Anyhow... below you can see a glimpse of some of the people that are on the management team shown on the WWDB website...
Notice anything unusual?
Yes, that's right... they are ALL couples!
WWDB loves couples and absolutely hates it if one person joins and the other is against it. We will talk more about this in a bit.
But anyways... back to the management. They show us 32 people on the website but these are only some of the management team... and the highest ranking of course.
Services Offered
Okay, so WWG is the company here and WWDB is one of the services that they offer.
In total, WWG offers 9 different services to help Amway IBOs achieve success. These include...
1. Word Wide Dream Builders
This service coordinates all the events/functions, and is the main service that the World Wide Group offers... which is why people often refer to World Wide Group simply as World Wide Dream Builders.
Events that are organized here include seminars, rallies, "attitude meetings", second look meetings, product & sales experiences and more.
2. Diamond Publications
Their Diamond Publications area manages all the support materials, which includes promotional materials to help IBOs with their Amway businesses, training material, and so on.
3. World Wide Productions
The productions team creates all the video presentations that you can see at WWG events as well as training videos on various aspects of the business, such as marketing products for example.
4. World Wide Dreambuilders International
If you live outside of North America then this is who will be providing you with support. They provide similar services and support, but in North America where WWG is the largest you will receive the best.
5. Executive Planners Northwest
This is an accounting firm affiliated with WWG. They provide bookkeeping, accounting and other services for qualified IBOs who are part of WWG.
Now what rank do you have to be for WWG to provide this service? This I'm not sure of.
6. World Wide Design Group
This is their design group that makes creates all the fancy/nice marketing materials for IBOs.
7. Technical Services
Technical services deals with hosting website, securing data, etc.
8. eSolutions
This area of WWG maintains all the websites, apps, etc. The technology provided to IBOs from WWG comes from this area.
9. World Wide Support
This, of course, consists of the support provided. Members are able to contact them via email, live chat, and the "Ask Us and Tell Us" databases.
The Business Opportunity
The business opportunity, as you already know, is Amway.
Remember, Amway is a MLM company that relies on independent distributors (aka IBOs or Independent Business Owners) to do all the marketing and selling. Anyone can join this opportunity and it is this that WWDB trains people for.
Why does WWDB train people? The reason is because they make money off of everyone they get to join, and you'll see why.
Compensation Plan
If you look around for a good explanation of the Amway compensation plan then you will be looking for quite some time. Amway is very secretive when it comes to this and doesn't provide any clear explanation of it to the public.
However, I've done a good bit of research and below I've listed the 2 main ways in which IBOs earn money, which are the same 2 main ways for earning that every MLM has... 1) selling products, and 2) recruiting in other distributors.
1) Retail Profit (selling products)
As an Amway IBO you will be able to purchase Amway products at discount prices and then sell them at a markup, which you can set yourself.
The difference is what you get to keep... pretty simple.
As an IBO you will also be set up with your own Amway website that you can refer buyers to... in which you will earn money the same way (difference between discount price and retail).
2) Business Volume Commissions (recruiting in other distributors)
And now this is where the MLM part of it all starts to come into play.
Like most MLM comp plans, it can get pretty darn confusing, but I'll try to explain it in the simplest way possible.
As an IBO you can recruit others to join the business, they can recruit others in, and so on.
Now for each product that you sell, and for all the products that everyone recruited in beneath you sells, will earn points. There is a PV (point value) attached to each product and this is right around 1/3 of the price. So if you sell a $60 product you will earn 20 PV.
The commissions you will earn will be based on the total PV of all the members in your group, which means you + your downline.
Example: Let's say that you recruit in several people to the Amway business, John, Tod, and Sally.
- John sells $300 of products and earns 100 PV
- Tod sells $300 of products and earns 100 PV
- Sally is an absolute boss and sells $1,200 in products, earning 400 PV
- And then you sell $900 in products and earn 300 PV
The total PV of you + everyone else here is 900 PV.
And based on this number you will get paid a % of the Business Volume (BV), which according to the chart is 9%...
BV (business volume) is the actual dollar value of products that you sold.
So since PV is about 1/3 of the price, BV is 3 times as much as PV, generally speaking of course.
So if there was a total of 900 PV from you and your group, the BV would be 2,700.
You will earn 9% of 2,700 minus the percentage that those on your team earn.
If you were to earn the full 9% of 2,700 it would be $243... BUT the amount that those on your team earn from this all is subtracted.
Example:
- John had a PV of 100 which qualified him to earn 3%.
- You had a group total PV of 900 which qualified you to earn 9%.
- 9% - 3% = 6%, which is the actual amount you will earn from John's sales.
It's confusing, I know. But you get the point... you earn from your own sales and the sales of those recruited in beneath you.
*Note: There are also over a dozen ranks (aka achievement levels) in the Amway comp plan that your earnings will depend on, but I'm not even going to get into this.
This video provides one of the clearest explanations of the comp plan I could find. So take a few minutes to watch it if you are confused:
So now you can see the incentive for WWDB to get people to join the Amway business opportunity and to help them out... because they earn commissions from this.
It's All About Being "CORE"..
Okay, so now we've talked about the Amway business opportunity and it's time to get back to talking about WWDB.
There is something that they call CORE... and this is what they call you if you follow all their training, steps, recommendations, buy all the motivational material and so on.
Basically you are CORE if you do everything you are supposed to do.
Apparently the steps to be considered "CORE" will vary depending on your WWDB group (who recruited you in), but they generally break down like this:
- Recruit - Present the Amway business opportunity (10 - 15 people per month)
- Sell - Retail the products (10 customers at 10 PV each)
- Tapes/CDs
- Books
- Attend all functions
- Be accountable
- Counsel with your upline
- Buy 100% of your own products
- CommuniKate
The problem is that achieving all of these steps to maintain a CORE status is much more difficult than it may seem.
As stated on AmwayScheme.blogspot.com, being able to present the opportunity to 10-15 people and sell to 10 customers each month is much easier said than done, especially in places like the US where the market is already saturated and Amway doesn't exactly have a "good" reputation.
CORE, according to some, is nearly impossible to achieve and, if you don't achieve it, your upline will likely just point to this reason for all your failures.
Success Rates
WWDB provides all this extra education and support for Amway IBOs, but how well is this working?
After all, distributor earnings for Amway aren't too pretty.
Earnings Disclosures:
On the Fraud Files blog there are several Amway earnings disclosures listed and all of them are misleading and down-right horrible.
*Note: Amway isn't very good about disclosing earning statistics on a regular basis. Hmmm... I wonder why?
Example 1 from US Income Disclosure:
- In 2016 Amway reported that if someone sustained an "active" level of activity every month for the entire year "their annualized income would be $2,484".
Now this statistic is already bad enough, but the reality is likely worse than it seems. They also stated that 48% of IBOs were active, but I'm guessing not many sustained this activity throughout the whole year. So in reality the average annual income was much less than $2,484, since most people weren't even active and a large number probably wasn't active for long.
Example 2 from UK Income Disclosure:
*This is from September 2016 to the end of August 2017.
- 17,205 total Retail Consultants who earned a monthly average of £41.82/£48.18
- 19,669 total Certified Retail Consultants who earned a monthly average of £100.43/£155.72
- 66 total Business Consultants (consultants at the ranks of Diamond, Emerald, and/or Platinum) who earned a monthly average of £2,281.11/£2,623.65
What these numbers mean is that, out of a total of 36,940 consultants, only 66 made it to the higher ranks of Business Consultants... AND out of these 66 people the monthly average was still only £2,281.11/£2,623.65.
Bad or not? You decide. I think it's pretty darn bad.
Does WWDB Improve Success Rates?
Unfortunately there is not good data on this. WWDB doesn't seem to disclose any information on this and I have no idea if they even keep track of it.
However, according to AmwayWiki, there over 500 qualified Diamonds in their organization. Now there may have been some that they recruited in before founding the WWG and WWDB, but since they started WWG shortly after joining Amway it is probably safe to assume that most of these Diamonds came in through WWDB.
*Note: It's worth mentioning that most of these DIamonds are in Korea.
But this still doesn't really tell us much since we have no idea how many people are joining WWDB and failing.
I think it is obvious that the training and support provided by WWDB can help, but in some cases it may have a negative effect on people since it can become costly and overwhelming (at WWDB they aren't looking for people who want to join just to make a little bit of money... they will push you).
The Costs
Now let's talk about the costs, which you likely aren't very aware of if you have been contacted by a WWDB member.
Below is a breakdown of the various costs associated with WWDB from someone who was being recruited by a WWDB member...
[Source: LallousLab.net]
There is the cost of...
- Membership
- Costs of attending functions
- Costs of motivational CD's and books
- Planners
- Samples
- Marketing materials and more.
Plus there is the cost of actually joining the Amway business opportunity, which is around $100.
The worksheet above lists the total cost for a single person to join WWDB at $3,500. Add on the $100 Amway fee and it is $3,600. BUT... it appears that this worksheet might not be completely accurate... and that COSTS MAY BE MUCH MORE.
In another WWDB review I was able to find online, which seems to be honest (review here), a newbie WWDB member claims to have spent $10,000 - $15,000 on everything over the course of several months, which included "everything" he was told to buy...
- Staying CORE (doing everything you are supposed to do)
- Motivational materials
- Amway product to keep PV up
- Functions,
- Gas & accommodations
- and more...
So what is the real cost of joining WWDB?
This is still unclear but there is no doubt it can get extremely expensive... and long before you start making any significant money from Amway (which there is a good chance you will never make).
Costs can vary depending on where you are located and the varying prices of attending functions, how pushy your mentor is, etc.
Complaints
1. Shady & Non-Transparent
Since you are doing research on the topic I'm sure you are well aware of the loads of complaints out there you can find about WWDB. Many people call it a scam and have some vary harsh words to share.
The lack of transparency with WWDB is one of the major causes of complaints... and this is something I have definitely noticed myself while doing my research for this review.
- Costs don't seem to be fully disclosed.
- The opportunity is presented almost as some sure path to success.
- I've even read from some people who have been involved that members are encouraged to lie about the opportunity when new recruits suspect that it is Amway
Information provided to new recruits is very vague and doesn't paint a very clear picture of what is going on... this is deceptive and it's no wonder there are complaints about it.
2. Hidden Costs
Going along with the lack of transparency, there are the hidden costs. The worksheet breaking down the costs, which I showed above, shows some of the costs/expenses but still doesn't seem to provide all the details.
Based on numerous reviews I've read from people who have been involved with WWDB and have written about their complaints, it seems that the functions they try to get you to attend are the major expense.
Some can get as expensive as $1k with all the travel/accommodation expenses... and according to some reviews they will try to guilt trip you into going... talking about how the Platinum mentor is taking all this time out of their schedule to give you free training.
3. Absolutely "Ruthless"
Amway sponsors and Mentors of WWDB have quite a bad reputation for being absolutely ruthless when it comes to the business. At first they may appear to be the nicest people on the planet, but what it often comes down to is the fact that they rely on recruits for their income... and recruits are often just numbers.
There are all sorts of horror stories online from people who have been pushed to do insane things just to put more time and/or money into their WWDB business, such as break up with their girlfriend/boyfriend...
[Source: from the comment section of a post on edmontonwwdb.blogspot.com]
*I have heard this from at least 2 people!
If you join WWDB you better make sure your partner is on-board... or there are going to be problems.
4. Most People Will Fail... Guaranteed
Now as I already mentioned, I don't know the success rates of WWDB members who have joined Amway. But what I do know is the success rates (as talked about when I went over the income disclosures) of regular old distributors for Amway... and they aren't good.
At the end of the day, although you can get extra training and support if you join WWDB, you are still joining the MLM Amway... and MLMs have high failure rates for a reason.
The reason is that the comp plan is pyramid-shaped and in order to earn large amounts of money you pretty much have to have a lot of recruits beneath you, unless you are someone able to sell mass amounts of Amway products yourself, which is unlikely.
Most people are at the bottom, and this is how it will always be... and most people struggle as their commissions get funneled up to those above them.
How is this not a pyramid scheme? Here is the difference between a MLM and pyramid scheme... The lines are blurry with Amway.
IMPORTANT NOTE: A lot of the complaints have to do with the WWDB recruiters. Some, as mentioned, are ruthless and deceptive... but I just want to make it clear that not everyone is like this. There are some good reviews out there as well.
Pros v Cons of Joining WWDB
Pros
- Lots of professional training in addition to what Amway provides
- Support from high ranking Amway members within WWDB
- Additional marketing materials provided
- Live events held all over the world - good learning opportunities
Cons
- It's a MLM business opportunity and most people fail (some reports state that 99% of MLM participants lose money!)
- Much more expensive than if you were to just join Amway without going through WWDB
- WWDB mentors can be very pushy and controlling (even more cult-like than if you were to just join Amway by itself)
Is World Wide Dream Builders a Scam?
You can decide the answer to this question. I don't personally consider it a scam but I do consider the whole operation a bit shady and I don't particularly care for MLMs in the first place.
There are quite a few complaints from people who have been lured into the opportunity in deceptive and misleading ways... so I can completely understand how they would feel scammed later on when they start to see the reality of things.
Conclusion - Worth Joining?
Now this is the toughest question to answer thus far. I hope this review gave you a more clear picture of what is actually going on here so that you can make a better decision about it.
One thing is for sure, if you are thinking about joining you have to be willing to put in a lot of work, you have to realize that it can get very expensive, and you have to also be aware that most people fail.
Don't fall for the Disney-like fairy-tales of this being some amazing opportunity that is pretty much a guaranteed success. It isn't by any means.
Now it's your turn: What do you think about WWDB? Have you had any experience with them?
PS: If you want a home-based business opportunity that doesn't require recruiting in people and annoying your family/friends then check out what I do.