Qivana Review: Autoship concerns & missing information
Qivana launched in 2009 and operate out of the US state of Utah.
Heading up Qivana is co-founder Derek Hall (below right), who serves as CEO.
Refreshingly, Qivana don’t shirk from naming past companies its execs have been involved in:
Derek’s career has been focused on growing sales revenues and profitability for a variety of industry leaders. He has served as President and CEO for Nature’s Way, Botanicals International, Integrative Therapeutics, Unigen USA and Univera.
In addition, he served as Vice-Chairman and CEO of ECONET, Inc. His success of achieving and maintaining profitability at the companies over which he has presided is a matter of record.
Usually MLM companies will acknowledge involvement of their execs in other MLM companies, but rarely cite a name. Sometimes this is easy to research and sometimes it takes a little more digging. Either way it’s annoying, so full points to Qivana for complete disclosure.
As for the companies Hall has been involved in, they’ve been around for a while and from the brief research I did appear to be well-established in the industry. A common theme of dietary supplements, health and nutrition runs through all of them.
As at the time of publication I haven’t reviewed any of the companies on BehindMLM, so I can’t really go into any specific details on each of the opportunities. That said I did look each up, and specific to Hall’s involvement didn’t spot any pressing points of concern.
In early 2009 there was some kefuffle when Hall left Univera (of which EcoNet is the parent company). Shortly after Qivera launched, Univera filed a lawsuit (MLM Watchdog)
against Qivana LLC and its CEO, Derek Hall, for intentional interference with economic relations, unfair competition, and misappropriation of trade secrets.
The suit relates to actions taken by Qivana that are detrimental to the structure and integrity of Univera’s business operations and that threaten the businesses of Univera’s independent distributors (Associates).
The complaint alleges that Qivana has attempted to target a certain group of Univera Associates in order to persuade such Associates to breach their Associate Agreements with Univera and to violate Univera’s Policies and Procedures.
Given Hall was CEO of both Univera and EcoNet, they appear to have been upset he left and worried he’d raid the company’s affiliate-base.
By the end of 2010 (approx a year and a half later), the lawsuit was settled:
Univera, Inc., announced today that it has reached a settlement in two lawsuits filed in Federal Court in the Western District of Washington and the Middle District of Florida, and one lawsuit filed in Utah state court (collectively, the “Litigation”).
The Litigation involved Univera, Inc., Qivana, Inc., Univera’s former CEO Derek Hall, and three former Univera Distributors: John Terhune, Marshall Douglas, and Joe Land.
“From the beginning, Univera’s actions in the Litigation were designed primarily to protect the businesses of countless independent distributors (Associates) who were adversely affected by the actions that led to the Litigation,” said Thomas J. Hoolihan, Executive Vice President and General Counsel for Univera and its parent Company, ECONET, Inc.
Unfortunately ‘the terms of the settlement were not disclosed‘, so how the lawsuit was settled is a mystery. In any event, both Univera and Qivana are still in business today and appear to have successfully moved on since.
Read on for a full review of the Qivana MLM business opportunity.
The Qivana Product Line
Qivana’s flagship product range is branded “Qore”, with the company explaining
No single product can deliver everything your body needs and your time is too valuable to wade through hundreds of confusing products.
That’s why we created Synergistic Health Systems—giving you the power of many products with the simplicity of a single product. We’ve removed the guesswork while offering efficacy unlike any other company.
QORE is your foundation for optimal-aging. Aging well is a choice you must make. QORE makes it easy with a very practical daily regimen offering nutrients tailored to your body’s core systems—your heart, immune system and digestive tract.
The products that make up the Qore range include
- Qore Probiotic – “improves digestion, immune system function, and nutrient absorption”
- Qore Essentials – “a daily blend of Asian herbs designed to help you reach your biogenetic potential”
- Qore Defense – “made with ingredients clinically proven to activate, support, and boost immune system function with daily use”
- Qore Detox – “contains Puratox, an exclusive blend of natural products, with a scientifically validated ability to rid your body of heavy metals, free radicals and toxins”
- Qore PM – “combines a centuries-old formula from Asia, with cutting-edge sleep research, in a balanced formula to address all areas of sleeplessness”
Two additional product ranges are available under the Metaboliq (“A world class system that can correct and reset your metabolism”) and Prime (“nitric-oxide activator”) brands.
- Metaboliq Max Burn Pack – “ensures your successful total body transformation by offering a simple step-by-step program”
- Metaboliq Burn Pack – as above, smaller (and presumably cheaper) pack
- Metaboliq Shake – “two delicious flavors (chocolate and vanilla), expertly-engineered to correct your metabolism”
- Metaboliq Bar – “a healthy snack or part of a METABOLIQ meal”
- Metaboliq Boost – micronutrient capsules
- Metaboliq Resist – “this natural mint will help you overcome your craving for those sweet treats that add unnecessary calories”
- Metaboliq Recharge – ” this powerful blend of amino acids ignites the mitochondria in your muscles, increases its fat-burning efficiency, and burns excess fat stores for 2-3 hours at a time”
- Prime – “the most powerful, potent and broad spectrum N-O formula on the market”
Unfortunately, Qivana do not provide retail pricing for their products on their website.
The Qivana Compensation Plan
The Qivana compensation plan offers retail commissons, with residuals paid out via combined binary and unilevel compensation structures. Various other incentives and bonuses are also on offer.
Retail Commissions
Qivana offer retail commissions on their products to preferred customers (customers who elect for a monthly autoship order), with the commission paid out being the difference between the wholesale and preferred customer price of the products ordered.
Unfortunately Qivana also mischaracterize affiliate purchases as being able to pay out retail commissions too:
Business Owners purchase products at the discounted wholesale price and then sell them at the retail price, keeping the difference.
Whether or not retail customers can purchase direct from the company, outside of the autoship program is unclear.
Also unclear is any indication of what a typical retail commission percentage in Qivana might be, as the company does not provide retail or wholesale product pricing on their website.
Recruitment Commissions
When a Qivana affiliate recruits a new affiliate, they are paid a “Fast Start Bonus” on that affiliate’s first product order.
How much of a bonus commission is paid out is determined by the recruiting affiliate’s standing monthly autoship order:
- 100 PV autoship = 10% bonus
- 200 PV autoship = 20% bonus
200 PV autoship affiliates also earn an additional 5% on the first product orders of any affiliates recruited by their personally recruited affiliates.
Binary Commissions
Residual commissions in Qivana are paid out using a binary compensation structure.
A binary compensation structure places an affiliate at the top of two binary teams, left and right.
These teams are made up of recruited affiliates (both direct and indirect recruits), and any preferred customers an affiliate might have.
Sales volume from product orders is tracked through the binary, with a Qivana affiliate paid 5% of the volume matched on both binary teams. Binary commissions are calculated weekly.
In order to qualify for binary commissions, a Qivana affiliate must have personally recruited at least two affiliates, have a downline generating 500 Group Volume (GV) a month and be personally generating at least 100 Personal Volume a month (50 PV of which must be an autoship order).
Binary Bonuses
To encourage Qivana affiliates to grow their binary teams, the following incentives are offered:
- 4000 GV of sales volume on each binary team a week within 75 days of joining the company = iPad
- 6000 GV a week in sales volume on each binary team = Car Bonus ($300 for Platinum affiliates, $500 for Platinum Pro, $750 for Executive Diamond and $1000 for Royal Diamond)
- 8000 GV in weekly sales volume on each binary team, achieved twice in any four-week period = “a DreamWeek vacation for two”
Leadership Bonus Pool
Qivana’s Leadership Bonus Pool is a residual unilevel commission.
A unilevel compensation structure places an affiliate at the top of a unilevel team, with every personally recruited affiliate placed directly under them (level 1):
If any of these level 1 affiliates recruit new affiliates of their own, they are placed on level 2 of the original affiliate’s unilevel team. If any level 2 affiliates recruit new affiliates, they are placed on level 3 and so on and so forth.
Qivana pay commissions down a theoretical unlimited number of unilevel levels, however commissions are paid out on generations rather than directly on levels.
A unilevel generation in Qivana is defined by a Silver Pro ranked affiliate in any given unilevel recruitment leg (note that generations in each unilevel leg are defined independently of the other legs).
Once a Silver Pro ranked affiliate has been found, all affiliates between the affiliate at the top of the unilevel team and that affiliate in that leg are defined as the first generation.
Once another Silver Pro affiliate is found further down the recruitment leg, all affiliates between the first Silver Pro and second Silver Pro ranked affiliate are defined as the second generation.
Using this generation definition, Qivana affiliates can be paid down a maximum of seen generations, as per the following qualification criteria:
- Gold affilite (200 monthly PV and four affiliates recruited) = paid out on one generation
- Platinum (200 monthly PV and six affiliates recruited) = paid out on two generations
- Platinum Pro (200 monthly PV and eight affiliates recruited) = paid out on three generations
- Diamond (200 monthly PV and twelve affiliates recruited) = paid out on four generations
- Executive Diamond (200 monthly PV and sixteen affiliates recruited) = paid out on five generations
- Presidential Diamond (same as Executive Diamond qualification) = paid out on six generations
- Royal Diamond (same as Executive Diamond qualification) = paid out on seven generations
Note that Qivana do not provide complete affiliate membership rank qualification, so I’m unable to provide the exact differences in qualification criteria between the Executive Diamond, Presidential and Royal Diamond affiliate ranks.
Also note that the percentage paid out on the generations varies from month to month, with Qivana stating the percentage is subject to them paying out “50% of all bonus volume”.
No specifics or examples of the percentage payout is provided, with Qivana only stating that the Leadership Bonus Pool ‘can account for up to 75% of (an affiliate’s) total weekly commissions‘.
Mega Bonus
The Mega Bonus is an annual payout to Qivana affiliates who qualified at the Diamond rank or higher:
- Diamond – $10,000
- Executive Diamond – $15,000
- Presidential Diamond – $25,000
- Royal Diamond – $50,000
- Crown Diamond – $150,000
- Elite – $300,000
- Executive Elite -$400,000
- Presidential Elite -$500,000
- Royal Elite -$700,000
- Crown Elite – $1,000,000
The Mega Bonus is paid out monthly, as long as an affiliate maintains the required rank.
Unfortunately Qivana do not provide affiliate rank qualification requirements in their compensation plan material, so what is required to maintain these ranks is unknown.
Joining Qivana
Qivana provide no information on their website indicating how much affiliate membership costs (standard or otherwise).
I clicked “enroll” on their website in an attempt to find out, and was met with the following “server error” screen:
Conclusion
Whether by design or otherwise, there is currently too much information withheld by Qivana to warrant taking their business opportunity seriously.
Not providing basic affiliate joining costs and affiliate rank qualification requirements is just not good enough.
Analyzing what information is provided by Qivana reveals a decent enough product range (on the assumption that the products are not overpriced, which we don’t know because Qivana fail to provide any prices), but several red-flags within their compensation plan.
Qivana’s compensation plan reads like a chain-autoship recruitment scheme.
The problems start when one takes into consideration the “active” requirements affiliates must adhere to:
An active Business Owner is defined as having at least 50PV monthly rolling volume and at least 50PV AutoShip.
Requiring affiliates to be on an autoship order for commission qualification (at any amount) throws into question the motivation behind the purchase of said products.
Are affiliates purchasing product to qualify for commissions or because they genuinely want them? With Qivana forcing affiliates to have an autoship order to participate in the income opportunity, the latter is a difficult case to argue.
50 PV autoship appears to be the minimum “active” (commission qualification) autoship requirement, but through the “QuickStart Bonus”, Qivana actively reward affiliates who spend more on monthly autoship with a higher commission percentage.
Hardly a co-incidence, the 200 PV in autoship required to qualify for the higher QuickStart Bonus percentage is the same as the monthly PV requirement to maintain the ranks that pay out via the unilevel.
Quite obviously, the idea here is that affiliates sign up to a 200 PV monthly autoship order and then focus on the recruitment of new affiliates who do the same.
If you look closely, this is given away in the copy used to market Qivana’s compensation plan. Take this excerpt from Qivana’s description of their Leadership Pool Bonus:
The Leadership Bonus Pool offers another way to get paid by earning commissions on personal enrollees and their downline.
As your rank and the number of people you personally sponsor on AutoShip increases, the number of generations you can earn in the Leadership Bonus Pool also increases.
From the same bonus, there’s an air of pressure applied to new recruits to purchase products – once again for no other reason than commission qualification:
Purchasing 500PV as your initial order automatically qualifies you to receive Leadershop (sic) Bonus Pool on your first generation for your first four weekly commission cycles with no other requirements.
Purchasing 1000PV on your initial order automatically qualifies you to receive Leadership Bonus Pool on your first generation for your first twelve weeks with no other requirements.
Buy products, sign up to autoship, recruit affiliates who do the same and get paid.
Advancing up the affiliate ranks is also in-part tied to recruitment (requiring sixteen recruited affiliates at the Executive Diamond level), although the full qualification criteria is for whatever reason not provided.
The end result is a business model that in all likelihood ignores retail altogether (hence the lack of pricing provided), and instead winds up being a chain-recruitment scheme. I’d be very surprised if any retail activity was taking place within Qivana.
Approach with extreme caution.
No screenshot for that “fail to enroll” screen, Oz.
Oops forgot to add it, thanks.
I really appreciate that you reviewed Qivana, and having used your site to check out a few different companies over the last year, I’m glad you can identify the scams and pyramids. I’ve been looking for a good company.
Yes, you’re right, there’s a broken link on the Qivana corporate site. My supposition is that they expect someone to try to enroll from a referral by an enrolled affiliate. You could find and ask one for the missing information. I’ve found a few Qivana affiliates on YouTube.
Your review is missing information that you complained wasn’t available publicly. I got more than enough from affiliates such as prices and so forth, so I wonder if the public website is the only source you’ve used?
That’s fine I guess, because I have been looking at Qivana and Nerium, and it’s hard to find some particular information online. I only found more information about those two companies because I asked the people affiliated with the respective companies.
It’s actually hard to find some answers to my questions online in my experience too.
I feel that much of the success or growth momentum of any company depends on the faith of the affiliates in the products and business model. Any company that can back that up with facts, honesty and scientific research looks better to me.
Thank you again for identifying the flaws you notice when you do reviews of MLM companies.
@Michael
Glad you found the review useful.
I typically flag a lack of information disclosure as there’s no reason for a company to hide general information about an opportunity from the public.
I shouldn’t have to talk to an affiliate to get basic information like joining costs and compensation plan information.
All BehindMLM reviews are approached from the standpoint of a member of the general public conducting their due diligence with publicly available information. Qivana failed on that front.
This is done by MLM for several reasons:
1) It’s to make sure you have to listen to the sales pitch. They won’t answer questions until you do.
2) It’s to make sure they get “foot in door” technique. Once you get the sales rep you can’t exactly kick him/her out quickly.
3) It’s to control your exposure to information. They will quickly pitch you and they don’t *want* you to do further research.
4) They don’t want you to “verify” their answers, since they are the only source of information.
Keep in mind that “information control” is a cult brainwashing technique. Go look up BITE model by Steven Hassan.
Reviews are, and should be, primarily based on the companies’ own information, publicly available on their own websites. It will give a “true picture” for how a company presents itself to “prospects” (customers and affiliates), but it will very often require additional research.
It can be used as an initial defense if a company owner complains about the information here. “It was found on your OWN website, in your OWN presentation of the compensation plan”, i.e. owners maybe should look at their own presentations first before complaining.
“Difficult to find information” can in itself be an important information. Some companies will use vagueness as a method to filter out people who ask difficult questions, because they primarily want more “easy targets” than that (e.g. they may want to be the PRIMARY or ONLY source for information, so they don’t want people to look for additional sources).
“Difficult to find information” will typically reflect ordinary consumers being misled, while the experienced people may be able to profit from the system (because they know exactly how it works).
Qivanaproducts.com list all qivana products with extensive info on each including retail cost. Obviously wholesale pricing is not made available to the public.
I can tell you in addition to wholesale prices, there is bulk order pricing available for orders of $1000 or more that range from 60 to 70 percent off suggested retail making the products very attractive for retailers in the wellness industry.
I am a Qivana distributor as you may have guessed by now and am very pleased with the Company to date. Retail business is highly encouraged by the leadership of the Company in addition to the recruiting of new distributers.
This came in by email today:
Qivana was just served as a party to a significant IP theft lawsuit.
their launch of SkinSHIFT made them liable for damages as a result.
@Robin do you have any more information? I can not find anything.
I can’t say much more other than I can confirm that Qivana has been joined as a defendant to a lawsuit between An Australian Company which purports to be the inventor of the Skinshift product line and several other parties namely Ruthie Harper and Derek Hall.
The suit was filed last year in Texas in Travis County. I will have a copy of the documents next week and wil post them here.
Qivana is in damage overdrive now. Derek Hall has issued a statement on Facebook and emailed all the downstream people asking them to in turn pass the message forward to all of their downstream.
He said “We have members of our teams who don’t share our desire for such a culture and there are those who believe in that desired end.”
This is not what I would expect as a public comment on a matter such to be as serious as this.
Wow.
Does anyone have any more information on this?
I have found the release on the Jones Day website about Harper and Skinshift but it doesn’t state they are suing Qivana as well. Can someone post some details please.
I have read the petition against Qivana and Harper and it is pretty thorough. This is not a frivolous matter at all.
I think the petitions is over 100 pages and gives a detailed account of ( I think I should use alleged here ) theft and fraud. It will be interesting to see how this unfolds.
There’s a bit more info on this site with a link to Jones Day
sparkpeople.com/myspark/messageboard.asp?imboard=7&imparent=34001556
You can find the petition in googles cache engine when you search for it but the original document from its index of Travis county courts. I tried to paste it in here but it’s too big
here’s some juicy
Sorry guys the petition is really long and still trying to find a way to upload it. But I did find something very juicy.
According to the petition it says:
It talks about David Urman who works for SkinShift copying the material and admitting he along with Qivana and Ruthie Harper will reverse engineer the SkinDNA Test and reporting algorithms.
According to the Petition, a Jerry Campisi who is a Master IBO is also mentioned in the petition along with Qivana.
Was anyone else able to find this petition?
I haven’t seen a copy of it myself, hence the lack of coverage.
I can’t find the actual court documents but I have found the case in Texas.
As a public filed case this info should be easy to get. Anyone got a copy of the documents?
I actually took the Q site provided to the top of the search, as my company actually is successful in doing this.
Apparently, the Q did not expect this; they hijacked the site, sent all of over 6000 leads to some member in Russia, and left me holding the bag.
I am still a member, but intend to join the lawsuits, and get my money back-if not I will have them shut down.
I have proof of the IP thefts, and will go to the US Attorney if need be…
Found a copy of the Qivana Lawsuit:
scribd.com/doc/271815135/NAI-266492314-9-Wellbeing-Plaintiff-s-Third-Amended-Petition
Its a very good read.
So basically…
‘Qivana has misappropriated Wellbeing Genomics’ trade secrets in Texas‘ and now there’s a vendor lawsuit.
Oh no looks much worse – they are suing on 11 different counts and one is a restraining order against Qivana from ever using or selling a DNA Skin Test and skincare.
There is also false advertising claims, fraud claim, theft of trade secrets & breach of contract
You have to wonder how this Dr Ruth sleeps at night. If on the balance of facts she has done what the lawsuit claims she has done, it is such a gross deviation from ethical conduct that one would have to question if she is fit to practise medicine.
As for Qivana they probably don’t even care. a dollar is a dollar is a dollar without regard to where it comes from or who gets stepped on to get it.
I give Qivana 6 months before they are out of business and I give Ruthie Harper 5 months before her medical licence is revoked.
For anyone who feels I am a disgruntled customer making things up, all you have to do is call Qivana and ask them about the lawsuit.
Or better yet here is a copy scribd.com/doc/271815135/NAI-266492314-9-Wellbeing-Plaintiff-s-Third-Amended-Petition
For anyone that was following this, the verdict was handed down in a Texas courtroom today.
Harper, Urman and Qivana were all found guilty on all charges. Harper was found to have breached agreements, disclosed confidential information and Qivana knew.
This is nothing shy of a total disaster for Harper, Skinshift, Urman and Qivana. I say again, Ruthie Harper was found guilty on some 14 or so counts.
Uh, it’s a civil lawsuit… you can’t be found “guilty”.
Oz is right it was a civil suit.
jonesday.com/experiencepractices/ExperienceDetail.aspx?experienceid=31090
There is a press release from JonesDay on the topic.
When I do get copies of the judgment i will circulate them.
Here is a news write up:
setexasrecord.com/stories/511002015-wellbeing-genomics-prevails-in-dna-test-trade-secret-trial
Still tracking down the court papers…