Mary Kay sue RetailMeNot for encouraging retail sales
This case is odd and I’m a bit late to the party, but I figured it deserved a writeup nonetheless.
Earlier this month, in a Texas District Court, Mary Kay filed a lawsuit against RetailMeNot.
So the lawsuit alleges,
Mary Kay does not publish or distribute Mary Kay coupons or discount offers to the general public or permit others to do so.
RMN places on retailmenot.com various digital offers and coupons concerning, referring, and relating to Mary Kay products and services, falsely representing that Mary Kay produces and distributes, or authorizes the publishing and dissemination of Mary Kay coupons, and that Mary Kay itself sells products to the consumer by way of retail sales on its website.
In essence, RMN is running a fraudulent Mary Kay couponing scheme.
Uh… what?
In an effort to understand what on Earth Mary Kay were on about, I visited RetailMeNot’s website.
Apparently, this is what the company is objecting to:
What you’re looking at there is a listing on RetailMeNot for “gifts under $25”.
The “Get Deal” button takes you the Mary Kay online store, sans affiliate referral link (ie. it’s the vanilla storefront):
If one clicks on any of the products, said product can then be purchased for what is presumed to be the recommended retail price:
Guest checkout is available, through which Mary Kay connect a customer “with an Independent Beauty Consultant”.
Ie. You can’t actually purchase anything without a Mary Kay affiliate referral code, but the storefront is there nonetheless – clearly marketing Mary Kay products to the greater public.
In linking to Mary Kay’s publicly available storefront, RetailMeNot simply offer free marketing for the company.
Or as Mary Kay put it;
The purported “sales” listed on the Mary Kay merchant page were developed, written, and created by RMN employees. RMN then posts these “sales,” purportedly based on information contained on and drawn from the Mary Kay website, to the Mary Kay merchant page hosted on retailmenot.com.
According to RMN, it advertises these “sales,” without permission or authorization from Mary Kay, merely to increase the number of consumers visiting its website.
Mary Kay does not provide “digital offers” or “digital coupons” for publication on RMN; nor does Mary Kay permit or authorize RMN to list deals, sales, or codes using or referring to the Mary Kay Marks.
By listing these purported Mary Kay “sales” and “codes” on its website, RMN misleads consumers into believing that Mary Kay has a relationship with RMN, that Mary Kay products can be purchased directly from Mary Kay at a reduced price, and that the coupon “codes” are legitimate.
In short, RMN’s use of the Mary Kay Marks implies that Mary Kay has endorsed or approved of RMN’s activities, which it has not and does not.
The specific uses of the Mary Kay Marks by RMN further increases the likelihood of confusion among consumers. For example, RMN’s inclusion of a “Mary Kay” merchant page, the “About Mary Kay” description, and language such as “Show more about Mary Kay, “Shop marykay.com,” and “Coupons from related stores,” lead consumers into falsely believing there is an approval, affiliation or partnership between Mary Kay and RMN.
RMN’s unauthorized activities and use of Mary Kay’s trademarks also implies that Mary Kay has endorsed or approved its activities, which it has not, and further suggests there is a partnership between Mary Kay and RMN, all to the detriment of Mary Kay.
As a result of the confusion that has been or is likely to be engendered by RMN’s activities, the Mary Kay Marks and associated goodwill are therefore being irreparably harmed
All this because they link to Mary Kay’s replicated storefront? Bloody hell.
Memo to Mary Kay: You can’t control who links to information you publicly provide on your website.
The premise that Mary Kay are huffed that RetailMeNot, who fully disclose they are sending their own visitors to the website of Mary Kay, are providing them free advertising is ridiculous.
So what exactly is going on here?
The key to this issue is in Mary Kay’s description of its business model.
Mary Kay’s success can be attributed to its carefully designed direct-sales business model.
Through this business model, Mary Kay produces the highest quality products and sells them directly to independent contractors known as Independent Beauty Consultants (“IBCs”), who then sell the products direct to their customers.
Instead, Mary Kay sells its products at wholesale prices, and on a pre-paid basis, to the self-employed IBCs.
The IBCs then offer Mary Kay products directly to their end-user customers at retail prices.
Did you catch that?
Mary Kay themselves engage in absolutely zero retail activity.
This in turn means that Mary Kay do not pay commissions on retail sales.
The only commissions the company is paying out itself, are on the purchase of products by its affiliates, and affiliates they’ve recruited into their downline.
This is alarming.
The legitimacy of Mary Kay’s business model would appear to hinge on insisting that their affiliates go on to actually sell products to retail customers.
Absent from Mary Kay lawsuit is any mention that they actually do, nor is there any indication that Mary Kay actively ensure their affiliates are actually reselling products they’ve purchased.
In any event, purely from a financial standpoint, money flowing into Mary Kay directly would appear to be 100% sourced from affiliates.
Mary Kay sells its products at wholesale prices, and on a pre-paid basis, to the self-employed IBCs.
IBCs may also choose to recruit others to become IBCs and can earn commissions when the individuals recruited make wholesale purchases of products from Mary Kay.
There’s just no getting around the fact that on a company-level, there is no retail sales activity taking place.
So what on Earth does this have to do with RetailMeNot?
Mary Kay has received various complaints from IBCs and others, who have been pressured by customers to accept and/or honor the false or unauthorized “coupons” posted on RMN’s website.
Seeing as there’s no actual Mary Kay coupons on the RetailMeNot website, it seems Mary Kay affiliates are upset at being made to honor the retail prices quoted on the Mary Kay website itself.
Afterall, all RetailMeNot are doing is directly linking to Mary Kay’s own publicly available online storefront.
Why else, save for the fact they are charging more than the prices quoted on the Mary Kay website, would Mary Kay affiliates file complaints over RetailMeNot’s free promotion of Mary Kay products?
This is starting to smell dirty. Real dirty.
What I’m guessing is happening here, is that Mary Kay affiliates have spent more than they intended to on products. Thus, in order to turn a profit, they’re out there selling said products at prices higher than those quoted on the Mary Kay website.
Potential customers whip out a mobile phone, click through to the Mary Kay website via RetailMeNot and then demand they not get ripped off.
Mary Kay affiliates complain to the company, who in turn demand that RetailMeNot remove any mention of them from their website:
Mary Kay informed RMN that its unauthorized use of the Mary Kay Marks and logo in connection with the listing of these incorrect, misleading, and infringing coupons, sales, and deals was unacceptable to Mary Kay and must cease.
Mary Kay further informed RMN about Mary Kay’s unique business model, its relationship with its IBCs, the fact that Mary Kay does not offer coupons, codes, or sales in light of its business model, and the fact that it makes no sales directly to consumers.
RMN refused to remove the infringing material, notwithstanding Mary Kay’s effort to resolve these disputes informally.
And so now, under the guise of “unauthorized links” (hahaha) and trademark infringement, Mary Kay have filed a lawsuit against RetailMeNot.
When again, all they are doing is providing free advertising and driving traffic to Mary Kay’s own online storefront.
The good news is RetailMeNot have suggested they aren’t going to take Mary Kay’s lawsuit lying down:
RetailMeNot, Inc. takes concerns related to third party intellectual property very seriously.
RetailMeNot, Inc. continues to believe that it operates in compliance with law and in the best interests of consumers and its retail partners by aggregating information to help shoppers save money using its websites and mobile apps.
RetailMeNot, Inc. believes the allegations in this lawsuit are without merit and intends to vigorously contest this matter.
Not only is this a lawsuit that needs to be fought (“unauthorized links” to publicly available information?), but a regulator needs to take a closer look at Mary Kay’s business operations.
Seriously, we have an MLM company here upset at a third-party for daring to encourage direct retail sales activity. For no other reason than they freely admit they have none!
This should be a regulator’s wet dream, so why hasn’t anything been done about it yet?
RMN has 50,000 retail stores on its website. RMN is calling them ‘retail partners’. a partnership is a two way street, RMN cannot announce it has a partner relationship with any of the stores, unless the stores have agree to such a ‘retail partnership’. at least mary kay has not expressly allowed such a retail partnership.
oz, if RMN is just providing free advertising for so many brands, how does it earn? i didn’t get that.
All of them? And are you suggesting RetalMeNot doesn’t have any retail partnerships?
Be careful with over-generalizations.
I presume they do indeed have retail partnerships, that and advertising.
Specifically with regard to Mary Kay though, all they are doing is providing a non-affiliate link to Mary Kay’s online storefront.
The link is advertised as “gifts under $25” and that’s exactly what it links to.
i found this;
linking to publicly available information HAS to be legal, as it is the basis for the internet.
however, linking or interfering with someone’s ‘business/trade’ without permission, should naturally have some protections. this is a gray area. lets see if we can find more info.
bitlaw.com/internet/linking.html
That clearly doesn’t apply here. There is no mention of patnership with Mary Kay on the $25 gifts and under page. Furthermore RetailMeNot explicitly inform visitors who click through the “get deal” link that they are being redirected to the Mary Kay website.
Please actually go and visit RetailMeNot before attempting to further derail with completely irrelevant waffle.
If Mary Kay don’t want third-parties linking to their public storefront, they need to remove the storefront.
RMN puts ads on the same pages that display coupons. This is how they stay in business. In come cases I suppose, they also get “finder’s fee” from preferred clients who supplies them with coupon links.
Mary Key has two options: Get on with Internet age or remove main retail website by allowing only their affiliates have websites.
Regrettably, they decided third option: have the best of both world and litigate everybody who interferes with that.
I agree with Oz conclusion. Mary Key does not want retail sales by company because they are MLM.
Coupons make this difficult because they link to main company site and not affiliate stores. I would recommend to Mary Key not to list retail prices unless customer already in affiliate store.
If they want sales to be done exclusively by affiliates, do not make it easy to check retail price.
These aren’t even coupons being offered here though, it’s literally just a direct link to the Mary Kay storefront (products under $25 section).
i visited the RMN site.
as you say, RMN may have retail partnerships with some stores, and that’s their profit center. they should specify those stores.
similarly RMN on their mary kay page, should specify that they do not have any partnership with mary kay but are merely redirecting them to the mary kay store front.
RMN has 50.000 stores on its website, it may have a retail partnership with only a handful, yet the inclusion of these thousands of store links, will definitely bring them lots of visitors, and help their business grow. it’s like name dropping, to build a reputation.
Why do you need to specify you have no partnership if all you are doing is linking to a publicly available online storefront?
And they do have a popup that informs visitors they are being redirected to the “marykay.com” website.
The link is advertised as “Gifts under $25”, and that’s exactly what it links to on the Mary Kay website.
I could understand the argument if an affiliate referral code was included, but it’s literally just a clean link.
using established brand names, without permission, to draw visitors to your site, so that your online business gets established quickly, without any cost to you–there HAS to be something wrong with this.
i understand RMN is providing free advertising for many stores, but who asked them to? a brand may not want RMN free advertising? they can ask them to stop?
Um… welcome to the internet?
Next you’ll be telling me I need to apply to every single company I write about to obtain formal permission before I publish anything about them.
…and all these guys are doing is linking to a publicly available storefront!
are you a business/trade website?
RMN is a business organisation set up for making profit.
intent is everything.
You don’t get to dictate who links to your publicly available information.
If Mary Kay don’t want business/trading websites, whose sole purpose is to provide their visitors with links to third-party products and services (which, like it or not, is certainly not illegal), then they shouldn’t have this information up and publicly available on their website.
You’re going to have a hard time arguing a profit motive when RetailMeNot do not generate any direct income from linking to Mary Kay’s own website.
It’s literally a page that advertises $25 and under Mary Kay products, and links to the Mary Kay website with a clean vanilla link.
The intent is obviously to provide their visitors access to $25 and under Mary Kay products, as is clearly written on the page in question.
I think Mary key would prefer if referral code of one of the affiliates was included in the link. This would eliminated store wide prices.
If Mary Key did not wont their retail prices to be available to the world, do not list them. Let affiliates login and see retail prices for themselves. These prices are for affiliates’ eyes only as much as I understand.
Mary Key did a stupid thing and now instead of fixing it, they choose litigation.
If you try to purchase anything, the company asks for your post code and hooks you up with a local affiliate (US only).
The issue is the complaints Mary Kay received from their affiliates. These affiliates complained they were being made to honor the prices on the Mary Kay website (RRP), suggesting they got caught trying to resell Mary Kay products at a higher price.
I say got caught meaning their customers caught them, as I don’t believe Mary Kay care how much their affiliates charge (why should they, after affiliates buy from them it’s not their problem).
Otherwise why on Earth would Mary Kay about free publicity?
And the bigger question: Why are these affiliates pushing product at inflated RRP prices? Are they trying to make up losses incurred by over-purchasing products each month?
What’s going on inside Mary Kay?
You’re going to have a hard time arguing a profit motive when RetailMeNot do not generate any direct income from linking to Mary Kay’s own website—oz
the profit motive does not have to be direct. by advertising mary kay for free, RMN is certainly trying to profit also. here’s what MK’s lawsuit says, which is similar to the idea in post#7&9 :
“Upon information and belief, RMN does this solely to drive consumers to its website so that it may charge higher advertising rates and other fees from its affiliated retailers and merchant partners.
By listing “sales,” “deals,” and other coupon codes for famous companies like Mary Kay, RMN drives consumers to its website”
i find this ^^ a logical argument. how can RMN feed for free, off brand names that have taken decades to build?
-a search for ‘mary kay coupons’ leads to retailmenot.com as the first hit.
-RMN uses the trademark – ‘marykay’ in it’s link.
-the mary kay page at RMN says ‘$18 Average Savings’ at the top. mary kay has offered no such savings or discounts or coupons or anything. misguided by RMN, a customer on being led to an affiliate via the MK store, can demand a discount of $18?
– who gave RMN the permission to publish ‘$18 Average Savings’on the mary kay page?
Or, as the page in question clearly states, they are listing a link that redirects to a $25 and under product page on the Mary Kay website.
Value to vistors = indirect profit. Of course a direct profit line has to be established, as it’s not illegal to link out to other websites. And it’s certainly not trademark infringement.
Well, click the link and Mary Kay are indeed selling products for under $25.
within the context of legality, is irrelevant. This is how the internet works. You plug in a search query and you’re returned results.
Hahahah. I’ll just let that one stand, no explanation necessary.
Maybe, based on user feedback this is accurate. It certainly explains why Mary Kay affiliates complained.
“Waaah, we can’t charge $18 over RRP retail because people know how to use the internet!”
That’s not what is happening, nor is it mentioned in the complaint. As such it’s irrelevant.
You don’t need permission to link to a website.
Mary Kay’s interpretation of how the internet works is irrelevant.
Just as the squillion other “find the best price” and “let us do your comparison shopping for you” and “product review” sites do everyday
From the outside, Mary Kays’ statement:
(bolding mine)
certainly appears to make MKs’ case vulnerable, in that it makes no allowance for the fact while RMN could, indeed, intend to attract advertisers, it also makes no allowance for RMN attempting to provide a complete service to its’ subscribers, which includes linking to sites from which it makes no profit.
Either such sites either only feature products from brands from which they gain a referral fee, which, without disclosure, can be seen as deliberately misleading, or, they include as many alternative sites as is possible in an effort to produce a fair and unbiased list.
Including links to non directly affiliated sites can be seen as a free service to customers and proof the customer is not receiving commercially biased information.
actually the mary kay complaint does mention it:
(Ozedit: As per your quote above, no it doesn’t. Rest of the comment removed. Please don’t repeat Mary Kay’s nonsense and attempt to present it as fact.)
I dunno, Oz. I think you got this slightly off the rails here.
Retail Me Not supposedly lists sales, coupons, and any other special offers, and takes reader submissions. Sometimes the codes work, at other times they don’t. Often the sales are just regular offers, it’s a bit of hit and miss. They have plenty of competitors out there.
As you found, MK’s website lets you add things to cart, but you can’t checkout without a rep’s referral code.
MK doesn’t really have a case here, as it’s just a link to their exact section in their website.
However, how you got from there to “no retail” is really thin. Amway is the same way: order something and you’ll need affiliate ID. That would seem to me they really are trying to count retail sales per affiliate, rather than the opposite.
As I understand it you can’t actually order from Mary Kay website. The website will only provide you with an affiliate’s details and put you in touch with them.
Mary Kay use the storefront to create the illusion of a an actual storefront – there’s no checkout attached. It’s a feeder and they’re upset someone is linking to it.
As for no retail, I got that from their own words. They state they only sell to affiliates. Which means zero retail revenue is flowing into the company.
AFAIK I can place an order with Amway through an affiliate. That’s not possible with Mary Kay. All I can do is buy 2nd hand stock (unused) from a Mary Kay affiliate.
Even Herbalife let you place retail orders directly with the company (through an affiliate), with this being a whole other level of “no retail”.
But isn’t that just quibbling between dropship/pay commission (Amway) vs. wholesale (MaryKay)? After all, as long as MK was following proper Amway safeguards like return policy, 70% reorder threshold, and so on, does it matter if the affiliate is holding stock or not?
The differentiation I make is by only selling to affiliates, Mary Kay sets itself up for inventory loading.
I haven’t formally reviewed the company but I’m putting a question mark over their enforcement of retail sales.
I don’t doubt if I ordered $500 of product when I signed up and $1000 the next month, without selling anything to a retail customer, that nobody would bat an eyelid.
There certainly wasn’t any mention of anything in the lawsuit, but admittedly that might be outside the scope of the suit.
In any event, I see a major problem if I, as a retail customer, cannot place an order directly with the company (through an affiliate).
If this was possible then you wouldn’t have Mary Kay affiliates complaining about not being able to inflate the price of products beyond RRP.
Oz you are on the right track regarding the big picture. Also, maybe those inflated retail prices you are alluding to aren’t so the rep can make extra commission. It may be a way to show how much a person can “save” by signing up – just a thought.
Btw, if you choose to write a review, and I hope you do, you absolutely MUST read pinktruth.com. Here you will find the reality of MK’s method of operation.
Be sure to click all around the site as there is probably a years worth of reading from former affiliates and even directors spilling their guts.
Mary Kay sue RetailMeNot ——
mary kays lawsuit asks for a jury trial. pending the trial MK has asked for injunctive relief [preliminary and permanent], as RMN’s continuance of featuring mary kay’s unauthorized page on it’s website can continue harm to MK.
if the court finds that
– MK’s case has merit,
– RMN’s hosting of MK’s page can cause damage to MK,
– that MK has no other remedy under law to stop this damage,
– that potential injuries to MK are more than injuries to RMN,
then the court may grant preliminary injunctive relief to MK, to last till the end of the trial.
so, in this case an important event, in the near future, would be the courts order on the preliminary injunction.
either the court will make a decision itself, or decide on the injunction, after an adversarial hearing of both parties. i’m not too sure about this.
“IF”
If my auntie had balls, she’d be my uncle.
(Ozedit: For the love god please find a legal blog to discuss law theory on. It’s beyond boring.)
oh sorry. you should have just said it before.
I just don’t want to see another 984 comment Herbalife thread full of legal hypotheticals that are ultimately pointless.
The comment format of “random unrelated legal quote obtained from somewhere + wall of text hypothetical theories based on quoted text” might be interesting to write, but it’s terribly boring to read.
Other readers in the past have mentioned this so I’m not alone.
but, i was quoting from 15 U.S. Code § 1125 , which is the act/statute mentioned in MK’s complaint, on the basis of which they are asking for relief.
we are now at post 28. your fears seem unfounded.
i am unable to fathom your logic. but its your blog, my participation seems to be the problem.
that’s ok , you should have said it before.
I certainly don’t mean any direct offense.
It’s just where legal matters are concerned you do tend to go off the deep end a bit.
Most of the coments here both sides have valid points. But there may still be a grey area here needing to be cleared up, if only to reinforce MK has a weak or nonexistent case.
Maybe Oz or Chang would comment on my point?
This goes back to the “right to linking”, vs. “deep linking”.
Seem to recall a case before where TicketMaster and some other outfit was suing each other for directly linking to each other’s venues and hiding the other site’s banners through frames.
However, that case doesn’t seem to have much bearing on this case as this isn’t a deep linking case (i.e. link directly to product) and neither were frames involved.
At best, MK’s case is about a “misrepresentation” implying that Mary Kay has coupons (it doesn’t) and sales (it doesn’t) but then once you clicked through from search terms RMN shows no coupons and sales.
RMN can handle this two ways: 1) it can fight the lawsuit, with a little help from EFF and such, by making a “right to link” issue or 2) simply remove the links as “it’s just a misunderstanding”.
They probably meant “through” affiliates as they sell product only to affiliates and affiliates have to resell it to retail customers.
This is no different from most MLMs except for the fact it makes it impossible to check how much affiliate bought for himself/herself and how much was sold to retail customer.
agreed. It’s no different than Ford selling a car through dealers really. You can’t go to Ford corporate and buy the vehicle.
However, Ford dealers are not trying to create more Ford dealers by recruiting them so Ford dealer money comes from selling actual product.
@John
Not sure what point that is. This comment is registering as your first on this article.
@Boris
I dunno, they go out of their way in the complain multiple times to state they don’t deal with (retail) customers.
I have no problems with affiliates taking orders for retail customers and picking up the products / having them shipped (Herbalife and others do this).
But if the only way for me to get Mary Kay products is to order, wait for an affiliate to order the product and then get it to me or hope that they already have 2nd hand (unused) stock, then there’s a problem.
On paper you need to be able to demonstrate Mary Kay have retail sales. With only affiliate money flowing into the company, that’s impossible.
Otherwise how do you prove this isn’t simply chain recruitment?
I sign up as a Mary Kay affiliate, buy a bunch of products (to qualify for commissions? Not sure, haven’t gone over the MK comp plan), and then recruit others who do the same.
As long as we all keep buying product each month we get paid. No retail sales to speak of.
I know. They can not prove on the paper that they have retail sales if sell this way. But some retail attempts do take place since customers are comparing prices between main website and affiliates through RetailMeNot.
I just do not know if anything will make a difference since MLMs do not report honest sales ratios anyway. Should we be happy that they at least have a product (that affiliates will gift to everybody they know after failed sales)?
95% of companies we discuss here do not even care if they have tangible product that can be gifted or sold at half the retail price.
We are dealing with murky “industry” already. These companies like Mary key are the best whether we want it or not. The rest is just pure garbage.
though case law is still in the developmental stage, with most cases being settled out of court, linking ‘in itself’ is not considered a copyright infringement or trademark infringement.
mary kay is seeking relief under the lanham act. RMN’s reference to ‘mary kay coupons’, ‘average savings’, ‘info about mary kay’, all create confusion about the relationship between mary kay and RMN.
chang, the case you mention may be the ticketmaster VS amazon case, which was also a case of deep linking by amazon, into ticket masters website, which bypassed the homepage and thus caused ad revenue loss to ticketmaster.
this was settled out of court, with amazon directing links to ticketmasters homepage.
in a few other settlements i saw, the site providing the links, generally made the bowout.
the second circuit court has found, that this kind of ‘free riding’ is okay, unless, the ‘very existence’ of the plaintiffs product is threatened. other circuits are yet to provide opinions.
Think Mary Kay better sue Google next.
A search for – mary kay gifts under $25 – shows a link to the same page RetailMeNot is linking to.
A major search engine blatantly displaying links to Mary Kay’s site – OMG think of the damage that must be causing.
Will it matter to the court if the motive for MKs lawsuit is that it exposes UNSCRUPULOUS business practices?
Oh wouldn’t I love to have a juror, who had a sister, who went into debt and alienated everyone for their MK “business”.
I’ll agree with Boris that MK is known to be one of the best representatives for the MLM “industry”. Let’s put that into context by reading pinktruth.com.
There you will find how MK exploits women, encourages inventory loading, and insists these women spend money they don’t have on conventions.
Retail sales past the first few months when mom is trying to support your business is very difficult, hence MKs push to recruit and front load.
You will also read admissions from former directors who grew a conscience and admit they misrepresented their income and outright LIED about things to their downline and prospects in an attempt to make a buck!!!
And there you have one of the BEST examples of MLM.
But don’t they screen for such people. I was once on Jury Duty and lawyer asked all kind of questions whether I or my relatives were affected by that crime.
Is it even possible to talk about MK without mentioning the cult aspects, like “pants prohibited”? 🙂
Probably not, since this case will be about “linking”. Only people/organizations that can raise right kind of questions are in court are former MK directors and their representatives or Government Agencies.
It could be a great trial for sure, but Government does not want to be involved too much in MLM business for political reasons (unless somebody lobby for it).
If you sue one MLM for this practice, you have to sue them all and that would put them on crush course with MLM Lobby.
Who wants to deal with millions of letters/emails/calls to local representatives with cries “Why are you taking my wonderful livelihood” ? Nobody in elected Government for sure.
I’m sure the attorneys will ask if they know any MK consultants. But, isn’t there a limit as to how many prospective jurors MK’s attorneys can reject during voir dire? LOL
There are about 50-100 prospected jurors on one trial in two lots.
First group goes first. If they can not choose enough from first group they bring second group.
Otherwise second group goes as first group into another trial. From my experience only.
I think lawyers car reject 20-30 and the same for prosecutor. Enough to remove anybody connected to MK.
I think they will not be stupid and will reject people only on MLM and specifically on MK connections.
All large established MLM are more or less cults. I think nobody who follows them from outside and some from inside would debate this.
If we start on bad aspects of MLMs we will never stop. They are endless.
a search engines JOB is to link you to sites according to your search words. so google is safe from mary kay.
it is the sites which are providing unauthorized links to mary kay, that are the problem.
if the sites are non commercial, ie comparisons, reviews, etc and link to mary kay, the company may not be able to do anything against them, considering ‘freedom of speech’ and ‘fair use’ and the quintessential nature of the internet.
if the sites are commercial, and stand to benefit from linking to mary kay, or ‘misrepresent something’ about mary kay causing harm, then they may have trouble, because there are acts/statutes to protect commercial copyright/trademark infringement
if you search ‘mary kay coupons’, the top hit is retailmenot.com [RMN]
there are other sites doing the same like savingstory.com, couponfollow.com, couponchief.com etc.
MK has just chosen the biggest unauthorized linker, and taken them to court.
if MK gets a preliminary injunction, and the court orders that RMN should cease linking to MK, till the end of the trial, that is enough to send all the tiddly piddly linkers, scurrying.
A ‘cease and desist’ from MK may be enough to stop them after a preliminary injunction, because they may not have the wherewithal to challenge it in court.
i think the first point to remember, is that – MLM Is Legal.
so, how we view this legal business model, is basically our own perspective and opinion.
i could say, MLM creates a sense of belonging and community, you could say its a cult.
you can pick up any idea in this world, and you will immediately have at least two viewpoints on it.
that’s ok, as long as we remember that it is legal, and people can engage in it with freewill.
what about offices, with ‘no skirts’ rules. what about clubs with ‘formal attire’ rules.
you could say mary kay is enforcing ‘cult aspects’ by prohibiting pants, i could say mary kay is making a statement about ‘femininity’ [it’s the essence of their brand and how they market, mainly through females].
every idea is coin, always two sides.
MLMs are Legal? Yes. Are they good for people or economy? No.
Tobacco is legal? Yes. Is it good for your health? No.
Not everything is legal is good for 99% of the people or economy as a whole.
Tobacco, machine guns, over-gambling, fatty foods and so on are completely legal in US despite being bad for people and economy. We call it here “Inherent Vice”: really wrong behavior that is part of human nature.
MLMs are part of the easy money Vice and part of the lesser evil. We know they are wrong, but if you remove them, MLM people will rush en masse to Ponzis and Illegal Pyramids.
And there will be no stopping them in society of “give me now”. Lure of easy money is part of human nature.
MLMs just help us manage that vice from full blown zombie attack.
when things are LEGAL, it means society as a whole accepts them.
does it mean that every member of society will agree with it? NO.
does it MATTER that every member of society agrees with it? NO.
you are talking about tobacco and guns. i could dispute between vegetarianism or non vegetarianism, somebody else could dispute between capitalism or socialism, or capitalism and communalism, or pink curtains versus blue curtains.
is there a dearth of things, to dislike or disagree with?
you are absolutely entitled to your views and dislike for MLM, i will not, for a moment, try to convert you. you have to give the same respect to people who agree with MLM, and understand that it is a legal entity, which can exist in our society currently.
how do you know, tomorrow, meat, blue curtains and MLM may all become illegal?
BTW is life good? it only ends in friggin death.
so– are you saying if i have a website that I make money from. In the case of RetailMeNot – pointing to a page in Mary Kays publicly available e-catalog – They then need explicit permission from them to provide a link to a publicly available page?
But if I don’t make money from my website it’ll then be OK?
WOW!!!
Do I need to call my accountant and tell them to pull links to the IRS and even links to competitors from their website?
The accountant, by the way, does NOT provide free efiling and tax prep – but provides links to places that do – is that illegal?
If things do damage to absolute majority of society and benefit slight minority, you can not say they are good for society as a whole.
I am not talking about moral issues. I am talking about economical, health and other benefits.
MLMs do not economically benefit 98% of people involved in. Turnover is about 50% a year and about the same as in companies where people work for tips only. This is abysmal.
All of the stuff I listed above(available for purchase machine guns, tobacco, too much gambling/fatty foods): these are not moral issues. They are economical and health issues.
They are putting huge financial/economic burden of society with giving few slight social/economical benefit.
You are talking from freedom point of view. Do you know name of absolute freedom?
It is anarchy. Society can not live in anarchy where everybody doing what they please.
Also society, country resources are finite. So any large economic activity should benefit some sizable portion of society.
MLMs benefit 2% of participants. About 5%-8% of participants can say that they marginally benefit (in minimum pay level range) and 90% break even/lose money.
Where is benefit to society from such enterprise?
Even social benefit of MLM is minimal, if it outweighs joining semi-cultist society.
Connections you made in MLM are only good if you stay in MLM world. But chances are that you will be one of 98% who eventually leave.
I will give you last word since it is endless debate and I can not present better case than this.
Anjali just does not see absolute analogy between search engine and RMN which is search engine for coupons.
Google can put ads around Mary Key link and it is perfectly legal so can any website as long as does not misrepresent content of the link or do not manipulate Mary Key website content.
Only wrong thing RMN did is to put “coupons” on top of search results which is sort of misrepresentation. If they remove this word, Mary Key will not be able to touch them.
An explanation for the lawsuit can be that “Mary Kay coupon”, “Mary Kay giveaway” and “Mary Kay gift certificate” are being used by Mary Kay distributors as a very common online marketing method.
“Mary Kay coupon” → first page filled with coupon companies
“Mary Kay giveaway” → Mary Kay distributors
“Mary Kay gift certificate” → Mary Kay distributors
First page search hits, “Mary Kay coupon”:
0. (photos of Mary Kay coupon)
1. retailmenot.com
2. retailmenot.com
3. savingstory.com
4. couponfollow.com
5. couponchief.com
6. promopro.com
7. ultimatecoupons.com
8. dealsplus.com
9. groupon.com
First few search hits, “Mary Kay gift certificate”:
0. (photos)
1. michellesdreamteam.com (Michelle Cunningham)
2. myunitsite.com (Unit Training Center)
3. pinterest (Mary Kay Business)
4. pinterest (Tonya Zavala)
– – – – – – – –
ALEXA STATISTICS
* retailmenot.com
425 (Global) 133 (USA)
* marykay.com
26,258 (Global) 7,186 (USA)
* michellesdreamteam.com (Michelle Cunningham)
4,465,212 (Global) 1,501,806 (USA)
* myunitsite.com
5,775,330 (Global)
– – – – – – – –
CONCLUSION?
This type of “free advertising” probably feels like a huge frustration to Mary Kay distributors. RMN is competing about the same web-traffic in the same geographical market(s), using the same keywords as they do (at least one of the keywords).
And RMN is a giant (700 million visits in 2014), so they can’t compete with it either. Ordinary SEO methods etc. won’t have much effect.
That’s not justification to file a trademark infringement lawsuit though. Abuse of process much?
I believe we can forget the “higher price” theory. Mary Kay has hundreds of printable coupons, gift certificates, “Christmas sale 50% off”, “Win Free Prizes”, etc.
It’s probably about search engine traffic and leads.
To attract people to a website, the easiest way is normally to offer something people can be interested in. So “Mary Kay coupons” is probably one of the methods the distributors use to attract new prospects.
It clearly isn’t.
But it can of course FEEL like a “good reason”. 🙂
Flyers, coupons, gift certificates, etc. seem to have an important function in Mary Kay’s distribution model.
They have product specific gift certificates, “Hostess Gift”, “$13 gift certificate”, “Christmas Present gift certificate”, “Makeover Flyer” and hundreds of other types.
(Affiliate link, showing a list of types of material)
NOLINK://www.michellesdreamteam.com/#!blank/c1vlv
@rross
you have mentioned two scenarios in your post, first the MK/RMN scenario, and second your accountant/IRS link scenario.
instead of writing whole paragraphs about these scenarios, it is much simpler to point you to the lanham act, and juxtapose your scenarios on it, for a faster simpler, less blah blah, resolution.
lanham act [relevant portion]:
MK is litigating against RMN, on the basis of ‘confusion’, ‘misrepresentation’,’affiliation’, ‘approval of commercial activities by another person’, etc.
your accountant providing an IRS link is merely informational without having any substantial commercial purpose or causing confusion. there is no questionable intent here.
i am talking from the ‘legal’ point of view. without law there is anarchy. law ensures there is no ‘absolute freedom’.
most of the world has adopted capitalism and choice, as the bedrock of economy. we may not agree with everything allowed/sold, in the name of choice, but you have no choice, but to allow these choices, as long as they are legal.
it is very generous of you to give me the last word, you have made some very interesting points. i disagree, but they are valuable points.
back to MK/RMN? 🙂
in a recent [circa 2009] ‘deep linking’ case, jones day vs blockshopper, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Public Knowledge and the Citizen Media Law Project, all filed amicus briefs, which were rejected by the district court.
jones day accused blockshopper of deeplinking to it’s site. the link, was mere reportage, and had barely any commercial value.
blockshopper filed a motion to dismiss. the court DENIED the motion to dismiss, and also ordered a TRO [temporary restraining order] against blockshopper, from carrying the links.
this case eventually got settled out of court.
but an expert view from the american bar association, mentions cases like jonesday vs blockshopper, as a sign of things to come ;
apps.americanbar.org/litigation/committees/intellectual/news_0209.html
@Oz – Sorry for the misunderstanding. I could have worded it better as it was my 1st comment on this subject.
What I meant was that I believe there could be a grey area here, and was wondering if some judgement might still be made, if only to reinforce MK has little or no case.
I was just interested in yours or Chang’s opinion on this since you might have seen something similar in the past.
your comment is addressed to oz and chang, but try and stop me from commenting!
you are very right that ‘deeplinking’ is a gray area, with strong arguments ‘for’ and ‘against’ it, which is waiting for decisive legal opinion from the courts.
litigating parties find it easier to settle out of court, because neither side is sure of their stand.
the thing is, the internet and www, started out as a medium for sharing research, then grew out to become a medium of sharing any information freely in real time.
thereon, it has progressed to becoming a medium of commerce. when commerce comes into play, businesses will need protection from competitors, free loaders, hecklers, hackers, you-name-it.
the hippie free wandering days of the internet, are drawing to a close, at least for commercial based activities. courts are drawing from traditional commercial laws, and applying them to the internet.
this is a very ‘wait and watch’ situation.
So a possible motive for the lawsuit could be:
MK distributors are their customer base.
They don’t want anonymous retail sales. Rather, they don’t want to make it easy for a customer not to be bombarded by the affiliate spiel to join up and front load product, which again is MKs lifeline.
A one-off retail sale directed to their website is a dead end to them, and a lost opportunity to lure the women in.
the motive of this lawsuit MK vs RMN, is whether RMN is causing confusion/pretending affiliation/making a freebuck, about/off MK’s established brand . nothing else.
yes, MK is saying it is a wholesaler, which does not do retail, and does not provide discount coupons or sales. it has a suggested retail price, and individual distributors may choose their retail price, or have sales offers, discounts, gift coupons etc.
amway 1979, disallowed an MLM from ‘fixing’ retail price. even coca cola does not have a fixed retail price.
retail ordered from an MLM website has two ways of functioning:
1] the company records the sale through a distributor, and ships the product directly at the retail address.
2] the company hands the retail order over to a distributor, who ships the product through his stock.
as a ‘wholesaler’, i believe the company should try to relieve the stocks of its distributors. the website, any print or other media ad’s, are the companies inputs into relieving the distributors of their products, as distributors themselves cannot afford such marketing.
if a distributor does not have , in stock, the retail order, he can request the company to ship it directly to the retail address.
it’s not like traditional distributorship does retail itself, or does not pressurize its distributors:
example; a friend’s dad, was the distributor of some internationally branded office products in india. month after month, the pressure to carry a ‘particular’ amount of inventory was horrendous.
the companies of course, supported sales, through print and media ad’s. but sales or no sales, he had to pick up inventory, and there was no returns of unsold products.
they had to sell their property and migrate to israel [jewish]. i lost a childhood friend to ‘good’ traditional distributorship. and ONLY MLM is bad. ha ha.
In other words, their products are just a bait. Retail sales are irrelevant to business plan of this company.
@John
No worries. I don’t personally follow linking litigation but I’d be very surprised if RMN took this to trial and lost.
My gut tells me MK are looking for a settlement. They don’t want a trial, they just want to appease the affiliates complaining about not being able to
ripoff customerssell products higher than suggested retail on their website.Right. That’s why they openly acknowledge having received complaints from their affiliates about RMN’s linking to their retail pricing site in their complaint.
:rolleyes:
@Oz
The affiliates complaining that they can’t charge more than retail just doesn’t make sense. Affiliates struggle to make retail sales as it is, so I doubt they are price gouging and are probably ‘discounting’.
Something isn’t jiving with MKs supposed motive. Plus, anyone can buy product off ebay for much cheaper than retail – TimeWise Cream $17 ebay, $24 retail.
I didn’t have to dig too deep to support what I’m saying. pinktruth.com/2015/03/premier-club-director-marybeths-earnings/
If they were discounting, why would they complain about publicising of Mary Kay’s official RRP (as per their website?)
If anything that would be a marketing tool? At least as far as their customers go it would be an advantage no?
Analysis of why they are doing it is a different matter.
i agree with char, in that, affiliates offer discounts, rather than charge over SRP.
what mary kay is complaining about in it’s suit is mostly this:
1] mary kay does not offer discounts, sales, coupons, by it self, and RMN by alluding to these, creates confusion and harms the MK brand.
2] RMN alludes to ‘average savings’ and provides a percentage 18% or 17% etc, for MK products. this sets up a pre-expectation of a particular amount of discount from MK affiliates, which customers expect them to honor, because RMN has induced them to expect it.
we know MK affiliates set their own retail price, some may sell at full SRP, some may give 10% off, some may do as in char’s example, and give 30% off. so, RMN does no favor to MK affiliates, by sending over customers with pre determined expectations.
A former MK distributor has an interesting story (about not making money).
NOLINK://www.huffingtonpost.com/learnvest/mary-kay_b_1748195.html
Mary Kay seems to be about the idea “recruit people, and make them believe the opportunity is about selling products to consumers”.
The experienced ones will make money on selling products to a downline, but they will try to make new recruits believe it’s about selling products to consumers.
that’s silly norway. the experienced ones will make money, not only by recruiting reps, but encouraging those reps to build their own teams, for longtime income.
human perspective is such a wonderful thing, because i read the article you linked, and came away with a different impression, than you gathered.
these sentences from the article paint a story of support and product sales to consumers:
-She said she barely had to find new people to sell to because she had ‘such a steady base of customers’ and such a fabulous team
-my first step was to attend Mary Kay “classes,” taught by Marissa at a local event space. We watched make-up demonstrations, ‘learned about ways to find new customers’ and, of course, heard more success stories
-In the end, I roughly broke even when you compare the cash I made with what I spent
-I don’t regret my experience, but I certainly didn’t make any lifelong friends
-On the plus side, to this day I still carry around leftover Mary Kay Oil-Absorbing Beauty Blotter tissues in my purse
-This is not to say that I don’t think anyone could be successful selling Mary Kay. If you’re a true businesswoman willing to put the time and money into make it happen, you probably could end up making a lot of money
so, products are good enough for the author to use them, being trained to find ‘customers’ is a priority [over recruitment], the upline herself had a strong customer base, with some short term work the author at least broke even, and admits she is not a true businesswoman.
nowhere in the article does the author say she was pressurized by her uplines to ‘recruit, recruit recruit’ which is the mainstay of a product based pyramid. the word ‘recruit’ was just missing!
All I read there was “pyramid scheme”.
sigh, in MLM, retailing products is one option, building a team for long term income is another option, doing one does not cancel/hinder/outlaw the other. balance balance balance.
Recruiting reps who recruit reps who recruit reps etc. etc. = the pyramid scheme option.
One person retailing and a thousand “building up a team” = no balance, no balance, no balance
yes. the pyramid structure within every MLM, can go two ways:
1] it is purely recruitment based, with recruitment commissions, inventory loading, widget products, and not based on product sales to Consumers = pyramid scheme
2] it is based on worthy products, with no recruitment commissions, no mandatory inventory loading, and based on product sales to Consumers = MLM
it’s a close call, that’s why there is so much grey. that’s why when an MLM critic recently emailed the FTC, asking for a clear definition of MLM, they replied, that they could not heed his request at this time. no bright lines.
every MLM has a recruiting pyramid inside it, it is the sales of real products to Consumers, that absolves it.
No it can’t. All you did was describe a pyramid scheme and a product-based pyramid scheme.
No retail? Pyramid scheme.
All you did was describe a pyramid scheme and a product-based pyramid scheme—oz
no sir, a pyramid scheme or a product based pyramid scheme, does not sell to Consumers, but only to reps, ‘who buy to earn commissions’.
(Ozedit: Which is precisely what “not only by recruiting reps, but encouraging those reps to build their own teams” is.
Commissions via recruiting reps who recruit reps etc. = pyramid scheme.)
Quit it with the spam.
No retail = pyramid scheme.
Wow – this one has surely taken on a life of it’s own..
What would Mary Kay think?? =)
if you like the company enough to defend it, maybe you should join..
There are a lot of tires turning in this thread but not much traction being made.
This article was more about the “news” than a typical review. We can debate it to death but it looks like this one will be fought out in the court system.
(I think what I’m trying to say is maybe it’s time to let this one die folks)
i really like the moon, but i’m not going there anytime soon.
[everyone can be silly!]
or
Product based pyramid schemes sell to one consumer or a handful of consumers to make it look like they’re not a product based pyramid scheme
Exactly. I just thought if RMN could disprove MKs reason for the lawsuit, that may help RMN. IDK
You missed an important part, the part about the inexperienced ones.
Inexperienced ones will usually believe in the idea that MLM is “a type of independent sales job”, a type where you own your own business and eventually will be able to make a profit based on retail sales to consumers.
It will be much easier to recruit them if you sell them exactly that idea, if you pretend that building a team is something they can do later when they have got experience themselves.
Those inexperienced ones will not join recruitment based opportunities where they will need to recruit strangers into something they may see as a pyramid scheme. You can’t tell them directly that the only realistic way to make money is to recruit a complete downline.
That’s the whole clue if you’re running a business. “Sell the ideas people already believe in. Don’t try to introduce any ideas they’re not comfortable with. Offer a reflection of their own ideas”.
It simply doesn’t make any sense trying to encourage people to recruit other people and to build a team, if they don’t already believe in that idea. Most people simply won’t join a business like that.
Have you ever managed to “encourage people” to do something or to believe in something?
For example, have you managed to encourage anyone here to believe in the idea of an “MLM buyers’ club”? 🙂
I’m not saying that it isn’t possible. People can clearly be encouraged to buy something, to do something or to believe in something. You will only need to find out what they can be willing to accept first.
are you talking about ‘dumb people’ or ‘inexperienced people’.
if your’e talking about ‘dumb people’, they may believe what you are propounding.
however, ‘inexperienced’ but ‘nondumb’ people, know that:
1] MLM is “a type of independent sales job”
2] they may be able to make a profit based on retail sales to consumers
3] and eventually they may be able to build a team to earn commissions and long term income
the experienced ones, help the inexperienced ones to build a team, via recruitment, because it’s pays them too.
in this way, the happy MLM network/pyramid grows and remains legal, because there are lots of sales to Consumers going on, both inside and outside the network.
Just to clarify something …
I interpreted the St. Augustine team leader “Marissa” to be the experienced one, and Cheryl Lock to be the inexperienced one. Cheryl’s “new friend” Helen was more difficult to identify.
“Marissa” did certainly not try to encourage Cheryl to recruit other people and to build a team. Cheryl was encouraged to attend Mary Kay “classes” to learn about selling techniques and how to find customers. Cheryl was also encouraged to buy an inventory of products, so her new customers wouldn’t need to wait for products.
So where in that story did you get the idea that experienced people will encourage new recruits to recruit other people and to build a team?
I was clearly talking about inexperienced people.
Cheryl was and is the inexperienced one. She did believe and she does still believe it can work for some people solely by selling products.
“Marissa” was the experienced one. She managed to make Cheryl believe in the idea that the Mary Kay opportunity could work for her.
Tracy Coenen “Pink Pyramid Scheme” got the required experience after some years, long after she had quit Mary Kay. She has realized that it couldn’t have worked without recruitment of a downline. She has got some proper business education in place, so she’s not fooled by the ideas she initially had.
Exactly.
Selling snow cones to eskimos works because they believe in the idea of snow.
Your ideas are probably too vague to work in business. I won’t recommend you to invest too much money in that idea. It actually had very little substance.
Ideas are normally about those visual images or “movies” people can see before their “inner eyes”. They usually come in the form of rather complete stories with a lot of details,
e.g. Cheryl could probably see herself running a successful business as a “Mary Kay Beauty Consultant” when she was introduced to the opportunity by “Marissa”.
Those visual ideas are the factors that motivates people to hand over their money. Experienced sales people will try to add some substance to the ideas the consumers already have.
What’s vague about selling a snowcone?
I specified “for business”. It didn’t sound like a real business idea.
In business, you will usually need to analyse the market first, e.g. what people can be interested in and what they can be willing to pay for. That part seemed to be missing.
That’s why selling snowcones to eskimoes is so difficult. There is no market, but its not because eskimoes don’t already have the “idea of a snowcone.”
100 years ago Eskimos had NO “idea of a snowmobile,” now they buy thousands of them annually.
You often say that nobody comes into MLM without a pre-existing need or “idea of” what they want. I disagree. Just as often they come into it having been sold something they could never have imagined existed.
Would it have made it any easier if they DIDN’T already have that idea? A business idea can be poor because of many other reasons.
They probably became interested because they saw other people using snowmobiles. You have probably missed something in my comments.
Based on what? You should normally have pointed to some factors contradicting it.
People must normally feel they WANT IT or NEED IT before they can become interested enough to BUY IT. But they can buy it for other reasons than that, e.g. “group pressure” and other types of “social pressure”.
Cheryl’s friends in St. Augustine accepted buying Mary Kay products for a very short period of time before most of them had built up enough resistance against it to say “no”, so her sales efforts didn’t have the effect she had visualized.
Experienced people would have known that it couldn’t work for a long time. Tracy Coenen decided to FIND OUT later why it didn’t work, so she could use the experience to something useful.
I don’t think we’re talking about the same thing here. I gave a short description of IDEAS as “the visual movies people can imagine inside their own head”, e.g. eskimos can clearly visualize themselves riding a snowmobile if they see other people do it.
If you had tried to push the same snowmobile in central Africa, people would have visualized quite different ideas. Your sales arguments about “usefulness in the winter” would probably have failed.
They can also visualize themselves eating a snowcone so what’s your point?
Here’s a different part of the story in post #72:
NOLINK://www.cbsnews.com/news/is-mary-kay-a-pink-pyramid-scheme/
The initial story was “The Pink Pyramid Scheme” by Virginia Sole-Smith, posted in “Harper’s Magazine”. The link here goes to a CBS MoneyWatch interview based on that article.
People must probably redefine pyramid scheme definitions. The focus on “retail sale versus internal consumption” won’t work on Mary Kay, because MK is only selling in wholesale (except the starter kits).
The main problem in Mary Kay is that its profit comes solely from its own sales force, from inventory loading among the distributors. Distributors often end up with more than a life-supply of MK products “for personal consumption”.
But will they BUY THEM because of that idea? The point in sale is usually to get people to buy something and to pay for it.
Cheryl bought the idea of becoming an independant “Beauty Consultant” and running her own business. It didn’t work very well, and it doesn’t work either for most people.
The customers didn’t respond like she THOUGHT they would, so “Marissa” sold her an idea that couldn’t really work in reality.
Cheryl had rather incomplete ideas, based partly on her own “wishful thinking”. She didn’t have the necessary experience to correct those ideas and to make them become more realistic.
Are you hearing voices? I never said anything about “usefulness in winter.”
You haven’t mentioned central Africa either, so what’s your point?
That paragraph started with “If you had tried to push snowmobiles in central Africa”. So the use of “Your sales arguments” was actually correct in the context where it was written.
Take your meds dude. I never mentioned central Africa or “usefulness in winter”
O
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Glub Glub
I don’t believe anyone have claimed you did it either, so I don’t really see your point there. Try to bring the discussion back to Mary Kay.
There’s a link to an article in post #72. I discussed something from it with Anjali. I also posted a link to another article in post #98.
Before that, the discussion has mostly been about the RetailMeNot lawsuit.
well well well, in the face of the suit filed against them by mary kay, retailmenot [RMN], is covering it’s bases!
the mary kay page at RMN is showing distinct changes, with RMN trying to get compliant with the law. this is what the new mary kay page at RMN says:
there used to be a discount average [example: average 17$ discount] provided at the top of the mary kay page, on the RMN website. that too went whoooosh.
the ‘about mary kay’ section has transformed too. it now clearly informs readers that IBO’s have their own promo codes, and one IBO may not honor the promo codes of another.
if RMN was so confident that it had not transgressed any legal boundaries, why would it make these changes? guilty conscience pricks the mind!
now what? will MK and RMN kiss and make up, or will MK still go for the jugular and press for damages arising from RMN’s previous conduct?
Sounds like an easy out for RMN. Make some small changes, retain their Google precense and its business as usual.
You don’t really think visitors to RMN are going to give a crap about the messages?
If it does go to court they can state they made every possible effort to clarify that they do not work with Mary Kay.
Covering your bases != guilt.
ha. it was RMN which came out with a thunderous blunderous statement about how they were ‘sure’ they were within the limits of the law.
then they ran and changed the mary kay page.
who cowed first. which way did the wind blow stronger. who’s the boss of the first round.
That doesn’t mean they’re not.
I had to modify my Faith Sloan pages when she filed that DMCA complaint…
that was because your service provider must have requested it. and your service provider must have requested it, to maintain the conditions for ‘limited liability’ that he enjoys as a service provider.
RMN has nobody breathing down their neck. they could easily wait for a court decision, if they are ‘sure’ about their position.
there are three possible reasons [i can think of] for RMN’s changes to their mary kay pages:
1] they are unilaterally correcting a mistake, and hope the case will go away
2] they are watering down the alleged ‘confusions/misrepresentations’ MK has accused them of, so that the court does not see reason ‘enough’ to grant MK’s preliminary injunctive relief, asking RMN to remove the MK page entirely.
3] MK and RMN are in settlement talks, and hence RMN is making certain changes to the MK page. they’re walking the talk, so to speak.
i like point 2 best.
Or, rather than it being a “win / lose” situation, rather than sit on their hands, they made “very” sure.
Just as any prudent website owner would.
retailmenot [RMN] has replied to mary kays suit on 21,may,2015.
as expected their argument revolves around ‘freedom of the internet’ and ‘free dissemination of information in public interest’.
this is what RMN said in a press release after their filing:
RMN claims that traffic to their website attracted by their ‘mary kay’ page is negligible.
RMN claims they are only sharing information which is already on the net as posted by various mary kay reps.
in response to mary kays request for injunctive relief RMN makes the following request:
i think that freedom of speech and all, is very good, but it is not unlimited.
intent is everything.
whether RMN generates traffic in particular due to mary kay is not the question.
the business model of RMN is that it glides on the back of established brands using their brand power to generate traffic and earnings to its site.
its a free lunch and why should the internet allow that, in a commercial space?
for instance, i sometimes see other blogs carrying copy pasted behindmlm articles, beating behindmlm in ‘search’. that pisses me off, because those websites/blogs, are feeding off for free on the hard work that goes into publishing behindmlm.
why do they top searches, just like RMN tops searches for mary kay products which reps are individually and painstakingly selling on the net?
it will be interesting to see the courts response in this ‘gray area’.
hello, RMN and mary kay, don’t you dare settle, this issue needs a judicial finding in ‘public interest’!
retailmenot.mediaroom.com/courtfiling
Intent is a secondary factor. Right View should be the primary one.
People can have very good intentions about making everybody rich through a Ponzi scheme, but it will fail anyway because Ponzi schemes eventually will collapse. So without that Right View that it simply can’t work, the intent will be rather meaningless.
“Freedom of Speech” was mostly about the injunctive relief. “73. Mary Kay’s request for relief expressly calls for an order prohibiting RetailMeNot from using the Mary Kay mark in any way whatsoever.”
“Make it more difficult to attack legally” or “make your opponent’s arguments fail” are some of the first methods I would have used.
* One of the Prayers for Relief by Mary Kay was about an injunction.
By adding some of Mary Kay’s own statements to its website that request for an injunction will look less reasonable. It will reduce potential doubts about that request.
sadly, mary kay and retail-me-not have gone and settled their dispute, out of court.
the terms are confidential, but RMN has made changes to its mary kay page:
since RMN is a deals/coupon site, i don’t understand what it gains by advertising mary kay anymore, Without Coupon Codes.
this is a halfway win for mary kay, with no loss of face for RMN.
it would have been so much more interesting if the court had decided this matter!!
couponsinthenews.com/2015/09/29/retailmenot-and-mary-kay-settle-coupon-code-fight/