Coastal Vacations Review: $11,000 travel discounts?
There is no information on the Coastal Vacations website indicating who owns or runs the business. The “who we are” section of the Coastal Vacations website only offers up the following vague marketing copy:
Coastal Vacations is an association of entrepreneurs, professionals and home-based business owners.
Over eight years ago a Board of Directors committed themselves to researching and building business relationships with travel companies that possess a proven track record of customer satisfaction and industry credibility.
The Coastal Vacations website domain (“coastaltravelpackage.com”) was registered on in July 2002, listing a “COA Network” as the domain owner. A suite address in the US state of New Jersey is also provided.
The name “COA Network” does not appear anywhere on the Coastal Vacations website, however the company does have its own website domain over at “coanetwork.com”.
On the COA Network website the company advises
COA Network was established in 1992 as the leading provider of voicemail services to businesses and individuals throughout North America. Starting with the vision of CEO and Founder, Paul Champaneria.
At the bottom of the Coastal Vacations website, a message informs visitors that the site is ‘Powered by FocalPoint’.
FocalPoint (“focalpointsystem.com”) is a “replicated site and automated marketing system”, created and owned by COA Network.
Given this it is unclear whether or not COA Network actually own Coastal Vacations or whether they’ve just set up the website (and in doing so listed themselves as the owner of the company’s website domain).
As always, if an MLM company is not openly upfront about who is running or owns it, think long and hard about joining and/or handing over any money.
The Coastal Vacations Product Line
Coastal Vacations is NOT a seller of Travel and therefore is not licensed to sell travel. Coastal sells Travel and Travel Related Discount Packages that provide discounted access to many travel and travel related companies.
Despite appearing to operate in the travel MLM niche, as per the above warning, which is taken from the Coastal Vacations website, the company only markets discounts to third-party products and services.
As such, Coastal Vacations itself has no retailable products or services, with affiliates only being able to market access to discounts offered by third-party companies.
Coastal Vacations charge between $1295 to $11,000 for access to these discounts (plus $25 shipping fee).
The Coastal Vacations Compensation Plan
Coastal Vacations do not provide details of their compensation plan on their website (nor do they make any mention of a business opportunity). As such the following has been pieced together from various marketing campaigns run by the company’s affiliates.
The Coastal Vacations compensation plan is a 2-up style plan, requiring affiliates to pass up two sales to their upline before they can earn commissions.
There are three levels within the Coastal Vacations compensation plan, corresponding to the three “product” levels the company offers:
- Level 1 – $1295
- Level 2 – $3500
- Level 3 – $7500
Note that these packages can be bought in a group offering, either Premier for $3995 (level 1 and 2) or Platinum (all three levels) for $11,000.
Each of these three levels operates independently of eachother commissions wise, however buying in at a higher level automatically qualifies you to participate at a lower level.
Note that two passups are still required at the highest level an affiliate has bought in at to qualify them to earn on lower levels sales (no passups required if an affiliate is higher level qualified).
The commissions offered at each level are
- Level 1 – $1000
- Premier – $3200
- Platinum – $9705
Note that I was unable to find commission payouts on levels 2 and 3 individually, only as a package purchase.
After an affiliate has purchased their own Package, the next two membership sales they make are then passed up to the affiliate who recruited them. After these first two passups, an affiliate then keeps the commission generated from each sale they make.
Residual commissions are generated via an affiliate’s personally recruited downline, who in turn must pass up their first two sales at each level to the affiliate who recruited them.
This holds true irrespective of how many new affiliates a Coastal Vacations affiliate personally recruits into the business, each must pass up those first two sales.
Joining Coastal Vacations
The costs of affiliate membership to Coastal Vacations depends on what level an affiliate buys in at. This pegs affiliate membership between $1295 and $11,000.
Note that an ongoing $89 annual fee is charged to maintain level 1 membership (required if an affiliate wishes to continue to receive level 1 commissions beyond their first year).
Conclusion
There are an abundance of red flags evident in the Coastal Vacations MLM business opportunity, the first of which is the company’s so-called “product”.
In MLM business opportunities the sale of discounts, coupons or vouchers does not qualify as a legitimate product. A discount of any kind in and of itself is not a tangible product or service, it is what it is – a discount on some other product or service.
By Coastal Vacation’s own admission on their website, the company itself has no retailable product or service.
This brings us to red flag number 2, a lack of retail revenue being generated within the company. Every level purchase (or Premier or Platinum purchase) includes affiliate membership via access to the business opportunity.
As such there’s no option for retail sales within the Coastal Vacations business opportunity.
No retail means affiliates are getting paid on recruitment, which would define Coastal Vacations as a pyramid scheme (no recruitment = no commissions).
As for the buy in levels, analysis of the commission ratio of the price paid for the memberships reveals a gross price inflation across all levels.
- Level 1 ($1295) – commission is $1000 or 77% of the amount paid
- Premier ($3995) – commission is $3200 or 80% of the amount paid
- Platinum ($11,000) – commission is $9705 or 88% of the amount paid
At all levels, over 75% of the amount paid by new participants is paid directly to affiliate who recruited them.
Arguing any value in the discounts access is provided to in this sense is problematic as, clearly without the commission percentages attached to the price, the question of whether or not people would still pay the prices Coastal Vacations charge is raised.
A minor red flags exist in the affiliate marketing campaigns I saw, which went to great lengths to reassure potential affiliates that Coastal Vacations was not an MLM business opportunity.
With commissions generated by an immediate downline, and then down a possible additional two levels of recruitment (via passups) and commissions rolled up to an upline, how Coastal Vacations is anything but an MLM business opportunity is a mystery.
Why Coastal Vacations affiliates are insisting the MLM business opportunity is not an MLM business opportunity is not clear.
All in all it’s hard not to look at Coastal Vacations as an $11,000 buy-in money game. You pay your $11,000 (or less if you wish to test the waters first), and then set about recruiting others to generate your commissions.
They do the same, you get pass-ups and off you go. Once the recruitment of new affiliates at the bottom of the recruitment-chain dies off however, commissions grind to a halt.
Due to the annual nature of the fees however, (lifetime at the upper tiers), participants have already made their contribution to the scheme and simply lose out.
Some value can no doubt be derived from the access to third-party discounts and services provided with Coastal Vacations affiliate membership, but it’s important to note that these are entirely external to the Coastal Vacations MLM business opportunity.
By virtue of the 25% or less portion of the fees charged going towards providing access to said discounts, it is clearly qualification to recruit new affiliates into the scheme to earn commissions on that is what is being paid for here.
I see no other way to describe it than a cash leveraging MLM. A money game. But unless a person is educated beforehand about what is considered a product… and that 3rd party services cannot be classified as THEIR product… it has the effect of being so MUCH product you don’t question it.
The average Joe (or Jill) does not know ANYTHING of what’s meant by “third party services” and how it can completely change the nature/definition of the business itself.
My question is how they have managed to stay cohesive split into so many different directions with supposedly no one at the controls. And for so long.
I think This Coastal bought the domain from COA and didn’t bother to change the domain owner to dilute the paper trail.
From what I understand, the company itself only deals via postal. You cannot call them, even as an affiliate. They have basically no overhead. The videos on their website look like they were made in the 1990s.
What “company” ? The closest thing to an actual physical address is a shipping center, where the vacation packages are shipped from. The shipping/fufillment center is operated under the control of a man by the name of Al Romine, that is if the information I have is current. In Al Romine’s own words, he started selling Coastal before the internet, and so he had to rely on placing an ad in magazines. He then relied on cassette tapes and fax machines. So this would be placing Coastal’s beginnings in the early 90’s at the latest. This entire time they have been flying under the radar, and why? How? I think it has something to do with the way it is set up. There is no company whose assets can be frozen while an investigation ensues. Instead,if there is an individual grievance, the only recourse is to go after the person who recruited you into the company, leaving the non existent Coastal Vacation “company” to sail on with business as usual .
I have a similar impression of it = “money game”, similar to the conclusion of the article.
From my understanding of it, DISCOUNT and PRICE are not retailable products in themselves (they don’t have retailable VALUE). You can charge something for the service of collecting different discounts into a system (club, discount card, other types of systems). That service will have some value.
Discount and price are classified as “sales mechanisms”, the methods a company can use to regulate the demand in a market, e.g. use seasonal variations in price to make price sensitive customers order in low season rather than high season. Discount has a similar function.
The fact that SOME consumers can be willing to pay for discount (more than the service is worth) doesn’t make it become a retailable product, it only shows that some consumers don’t act rationally.
It’s typically about third party discounts. You will not find any company trying to offer their OWN discounts as “products”. They will offer an inexpensive or free membership in a “discount club” if the discount is the primary “sales tool”. They may also potentially add other services to the membership.
Discount in MLM should normally not be commissionable, i.e. it doesn’t qualify as bona fide sale to end users.
It will be the owner of the discounted service that has to put up the necessary restrictions to prevent the discount from being sold. The owner of the service will also be the owner of the discount, the one that has the right to put up restrictions against retailing it in a misleading way.
As a very satisfied current member of Coastal Vacations, as i read this article and feedbacks I again realize the power of the internet. whether positive or negative.. truth or untruth..
I realize that paper is very patient, It allows a person to write whatever he wishes and it will only expose to the public whatever is written.. No matter if its a website, forum etc.
If you are researching Coastal Vacations please be aware that 95+% of information on the page is FALSE information given by inexperienced and assuming opinions.
A scam will not be in business for 18 years.
Coastal Vacations is a very successful business opportunity that offers REAL BUSINESS INCOME for ordinary people that are willing to follow directions.
Our latest vacation we took using Coastal Vacations product has saved us over $800.00! in a VERY nice beachfront condo!
We absolutely love Coastal Vacations and the income that it has brought us! We are very grateful for this business!
You’re claiming that “the fact that some people BELIEVE in something doesn’t make it true in itself”, or something relatively similar to that?
I can accept that idea.
Please feel free to point out factual or logical errors (of some significance) where you can find them, the information you believe is false. Please post the logics for WHY you believe the information is false.
* A scam will not be in business for 18 years.
* Coastal Vacations is a very successful business opportunity
* offers REAL BUSINESS INCOME for ordinary people
* Our latest vacation saved us over $800.00!
* You absolutely love it and the income it has brought you.
None of those arguments makes any logical sense, e.g. the Italian Mafia has been in business for much more than 18 years, and has been highly successful and profitable. It also provides income for hundreds or thousands of people, and the members simply LOVE it. That doesn’t tell anything about the legitimacy of the Italian Mafia, like you seems to believe.
You’re trying to warn people against misleading information based on assumptions, but you should probably clean up your own ideas first?
You should try to REFLECT your own ideas, i.e. show the world that you’re clearly able to separate between false and misleading information and truthful one.
@ Very Satisfied Customer
How did you even get to this review? It is already gone from the past 30 days Most Wanted. And this website doesn’t show up on the first page of search results, heck, it doesn’t even show up on the second page. It used to, but it hasn’t as of late.
@VS Member
Why not? If they keep a low-profile and as long as those as the bottom are able to recruit, why on Earth can’t a “scam be in business for 18 years”?
Those directions? Recruit new affiliates = pyramid scheme.
Yes but that has nothing to do with the MLM opportunity. In which all you can do is recruit new affiliates.
Fail.
Yes, but you are to “SHUT UP” and follow directions. But mostly just shut up.
Well, shutup and recruit new affiliates or not… you’re still just getting paid to recruit new affiliates.
What vacations you might take are still irrelevant to the commission structure of the business opportunity.
It is amazing to me how good these people can be. You get anywhere near their sphere of influence, and it is liked being sucked into a cult like atmosphere. They are discouraged from the beginning never, ever to ask questions, especially out in the open. And Coastal Vacations and their associations are the worst.
I heard of one of them even going so far as to forbid members from sending messages to other Coastal members on Facebook. It seems that Facebook has opened up a whole new way of people from far and wide being able to actually group together and do something that is highly discouraged…THINK. And to discuss. In the open.
Hello I’m thinking about joining this website and I wanted to be sure I’m not going to regret it. Can anyone tell me that this is a great way to get money and go on vacations?
I don’t have alot of money so I have to be sure before I make big mistake so please give me your opinions
If you don’t have much money spending $1295 to $11,000 for access to travel discounts probably isn’t the smartest idea.
If you truly don’t have a lot of money perhaps skip the travel and work on getting more money first.
I have money to buy it .. I guess I warded it wrong my question is is it worth I investing in to make more money another words is it a legit company?
Try reading the review?
@Chastity- You’re spelling and grammar would have you fitting in with any of the Top Leaders in any number of the companies Oz reviews.
Conversely, your reluctance to read anything factually bothersome makes you the perfect victim.
I hope Chastity Metzger is not your real name, because after these comments you will be sought out and offered many “opportunities.”
The best bet for you is to probably just say away from MLM all together, pick up a book, and re-evaluate all this in another 5 years or so. Good luck.
No it’s not my real name and you don’t have to be so rude!!!! I didn’t realize that I was being graded for my spelling and grammar!!!
I don’t know why that name came up either this Damn auto correct!!
NOT TO MENTION! I have no reason to hide my identity I haven’t done nothing wrong but to try to investigate in the company before I hand over my hard earn money!! Anybody in the right mind would do the same!
@Chasity
You are definitely smarter than most for coming here and doing your research.
I think the rudeness that came across to you is really more of a frustration than anything. Scambusters try hard to stop people for losing their money, but you would be surprised at how many don’t want to hear the truth.
Your question did make it sound like you disregarded all of the red flags pointed out in the review. What did you mean by, “Is this a legit company?” Maybe you could explain.
I was wondering if the company is a real company or not. I read the views but some say it is and some says it ain’t.
freedom travel scammed me once before and I will NOT get scammed again. So I’m trying to get all the info before I do this because it seems like a really good deal.
Another words I’m confused.
For thousands of dollars you will receive access to third-party travel discounts.
You will also get paid to recruit new affiliates, making Coastal Vacations a pyramid scheme.
What’s there to get confused about?
It is a ‘real’ pyramid/Ponzi scheme company. The positive reviews are probably affiliates trying to make money off you or others.
You will be scammed (lose money) again, or you will scam others (recruit) to make money if you do this. Neither is a good choice.
You have all the info you need from the review. It is NOT a good deal.
End confusion?
I have never seen so much BS as on this sight. Chasity here is what you need to understand. Coastal is legit. It offers those who have enough business sense to offer discounted travel from premier travel vendors. These packages have been put together through a legal agreement with these vendors. YOu can’t get them from any or everybody.
Is it a pyramid? What isn’t (Ozedit: Offtopic derail attempts that have nothing to do with MLM pyramid schemes removed)
Obviously yes if you like corvettes or even if you didn’t like corvettes. Here is your value in Coastal Vacations if you use the package and never sale it you will benefit many times over in savings. In-fact one 7 night 8 day cruise where you only pay port taxes and fees recoups most if not all of your initial cost.
Is it a pyramid scheme? Not in the illegal sense. I understand the business has been around for 24 years. I don’t think it would last that long if it were illegal.
Most of the people answering on this sight probably have lost money in some program just like me and I’ve done it a number of times which is what attracted me to Coastal.
I get paid not for recruiting like someone said earlier but for selling travel packages. It is two up comp plan which under normal circumstances would raise my eyebrow because stats show that the average person can only recruit i.e. sale 2.3 people.
HOwever this being the industry that it is a $7 trillion dollar industry, and travel or vacation being the number 1 search term during normal business hours your chances are very good if you treat it like a business.
Most people are looking to make big money but are too stupid and lazy to put the time in that it takes to make it a success.
So to all the Nay Sayers if you haven’t tried it, don’t knock it. And don’t speak on things you don’t know about. If you do base it on facts not speculation.
Good Luck Chasity
Zero retail and paying affiliates to recruit affiliates in MLM = pyramid scheme.
When only affiliates are purchasing travel packages you’re getting paid to recruit. Regulators don’t care what you attach to recruitment.
What industry would that be? Coastal Vacations themselves state they’re not in the travel industry:
Coastal Vactions are in the “selling discounts” niche. Discounts in and of themselves are not a tangible product for MLM.
Oz I would think that after 18 years in business I would see scores of people who have complained about losing money if that were the case. People have to decide whether or not a product or service has value to them. They have to decide whether or not they want to invest their time and money into a business model like the Coastal model.
Here is the one thing they can take to the bank. If they did nothing with the business regardless of what you want to call it i.e. recruiting, and just used the travel packages their investment will return to them a 100% return easily. The more they use it the greater the return.
Now for those who want to make money simply share that experience and be compensated when the one you share it with is smart enough to realize that traveling at wholesale is far better than paying retail.
This ain’t rocket science Oz….
So Oz find me a Coastal Member who paid their money for a package, and used it who is not satisfied and then lets talk. The only complaints you’re going to get here is from someone who paid their money didn’t work the business and didn’t use the package.
Let’s just keep it simple without all the sensationalism!
Coastal is solid. The vendors Coastal works with, many of them are NYSE traded companies…
Whether its an MLM or not is irrelevant. The fact is it has helped a lot of people obtain and enjoy an above average quality of life.
What I suggest is that you buy a level one package and try it out. Use it for a few cruises, Condo or Land package and then write about it based on your own personal experience.
I rest my case. I purchased. I used it and saved over $1,100 on my first trip which was one of the cruises where I only paid port fees and taxes.
Saved over $1,100.00 and got an upgrade cabin. I was only out of pocket $200 after that one vacation. I’ve been on others and have more than recovered my money.
I’ve shared with a few friends and family who have all purchased their own package after traveling on my give away’s, and they have all thanked me. This is not an isolated case but typical of the Coastal program and how people respond when they use it to travel.
Try it before you knock it.. Peace Out
More often than not people who lose money in MLM companies are too embarrassed to speak out.
Typically it only happens if a large sum of money is involved.
You pay a fee to sign up as an affiliate and then get paid to recruit new affiliates who do the same.
In MLM that’s a pyramid scheme. Retail should always be at the forefront of an MLM opportunity and in Coastal Vacations it isn’t.
Choosing whether to recruit or not doesn’t change the fact that Coastal Vacations affiliates are paid to recruit.
False. MLM regulation is very specific, you can’t just gloss over it with the “changing lives” spiel.
Anyway, with an Alexa ranking of 9.2 million looks like recruitment in Coastal Vacations has well and truly collapsed.
Thank You Oz 🙂
Your article included a statement that is just not true. This company you are speaking about is NOT an MLM and this fact is very relevant, so relevant that it would be a make it or break it type relevants.
Old article but still holds to be a fact. At the very top of your Article, it states companies MLM reviews…… misleading from the get go.
Coastal Vacations’ pass-up compensation plan is tracked through a unilevel team across multiple levels.
Multiple level compensation structure = MLM company.
Claiming otherwise, as you’ve done, is both misleading and not true.
Coastal vacations has Blessed my family both on savings on vacation and income.
I’m baffled why people are so hard on Coastal Vacations.
I Love Travel, I Love spending time with my family which Coastal income allows me to do. Also, The people who get the Travel packages agree on saving in their Travel plans.
Now over 25 years in business…. they are doing all right! And No it’s not an MLM .
It’s has been a great experience with Coastal and I would not trade it for the world.
Be Blessed. I Am!
Coastal Vacations’ website Alexa ranking: Unranked.
Sorry for your loss.
Oh and MLM comp plan = MLM company.
I have read all the review but I need detail information which travel partner are on each level and what kind of discount I get per level.
I dont want to sell any MLM but want to enjoy vacation and save money over years. Can anybody send me detail information as website doesnt provide any detailed information.
Thank you
Kwinkal
If you can’t get that information from Coastal Vacations itself, you already know what that means…