About a week ago I received a legal threat from Xtreme Green CEO Lawrence Kahn.

Linked to in Kahn’s letter was our 2014 Xtreme Green review.

Kahn claimed our review was causing Xtreme Green to suffer ” injury from the loss of sales” and that if we didn’t remove our review, we “may be deemed liable” for their losses.

In my response, I pointed out that the statute of limitations had long-since expired in any US jurisdiction.

Not withstanding that our review was written in good faith, date-stamped and accurate as at the time of publication.

I informed Kahn (right) that if Xtreme Green had changed its business model, the polite thing to do would have been to simply request an update.

I sent my response to Kahn on June 26th. To date I haven’t heard anything back.

Having verified myself that Xtreme Green has indeed changed their compensation plan since our initial review, today we revisit the company.

Read on for an updated review of the Xtreme Green MLM opportunity.

The Company

In 2014 Xtreme Green was headed up by CEO Stuart Graves. Today that position is held by Lawrence Kahn.

In addition to CEO, Kahn is also cited as co-founder of the company on the Xtreme Green website.

According to his corporate bio, prior to Xtreme Green Kahn worked in marketing and the automotive care industry.

Xtreme Green Products

Except for the addition of a transmission treatment, since our initial review Xtreme Green’s product lineup has remained unchanged.

  • Fuel Max Plus – a “super concentrated fuel catalyst” that “helps break down large hard-to-burn fuel particles, capturing more energy from the fuel, resulting in maximum fuel economy with reduced emissions”, retails at $30 for a box of six treatments
  • Engine Life Treatment – “effectively turns an ordinary lubricant into a super-lubricant”, retails at $40 a bottle
  • Super Duty Oil Stabilizer – a “proprietary formulation … scientifically designed to provide extra protection and enhance the performance of motor oils for vehicles with diesel engines and older gasoline engines which are burning or leaking oil, smoking, have worn seals or are running rough”, retails at $30 a bottle
  • Waterless Wash & Shine – “an environmentally friendly, citrus-based formula which saves, time, money, and the planet’s most precious resource, water!”, retails at $15 for a 6 oz. bottle and $20 for a 16 oz.
  • XPL101 – a “penetrating spray lubricant”, retails at $10 a can
  • Transmission Life Treatment – “formulated with proprietary XPL+ technology to work with your transmission fluid to reduce heat, friction and wear in your vehicle”, retails at $40 a bottle

Xtreme Green claim their products are “eco-engineered for today’s vehicles with tomorrows environment in mind”.

Some prices are up since our 2014 review, although this is to be expected with most consumables over time.

The Xtreme Green Compensation Plan

Xtreme Green combine retail commissions with recruitment and three-level deep residual commissions.

Retail Commissions

Xtreme Green affiliates are paid a 40% commission on individual product sales to retail customers.

This increases to 45% for retail “4-Pack” orders and 50% for “case lots”.

Recruitment Commissions

When a newly recruited Xtreme Green affiliate signs up with an optional Affiliate Pack, the affiliate who recruited them is paid a recruitment commission.

How much of a commission is paid out is determined by how much the newly recruited affiliate spends:

  • Affiliate Pack ($149.95) = $30 recruitment commission
  • Variety Pack ($300) = $60 recruitment commission
  • Affiliate Business Pack ($449.95) = $100 recruitment commission

Residual Commissions

Xtreme Green pay residual commissions on generated sales volume down three levels of recruitment (unilevel):

  • level 1 (personally recruited affiliates) – 20%
  • level 2 – 10%
  • level 3 – 5%

Joining Xtreme Green

Basic Xtreme Green affiliate membership is $29.95.

New affiliates can also sign up with optional “Affiliate Packs”:

  • Starter Pack – $99.95
  • Affiliate Pack – $149.95
  • Affiliate Business Pack – $449

Each Affiliate Pack comes with an assortment of Xtreme Green products.

Conclusion

Xtreme Green’s current compensation plan is a vast improvement from the autoship centric mess they had in 2014.

That said it’s still entirely possible to earn on recruitment and bypass retail.

The Starter and Affiliate Packs are fine, but the Affiliate Business Pack stretches its cost far beyond that of reasonable personal consumption.

After signing up, the “Monthly Convenience Plan” (autoship) of recruited affiliates can be used to generate ongoing residual commissions, without any need for retail sales.

That said retail sales are there, but there’s no particular incentive to focus on them while direct and residual recruitment commissions are on offer.

Another aspect to consider is the retail viability of Xtreme Green’s products.

Given what Xtreme Green are promising, surely in the four years since our initial review the products would have taken off and been widely adopted by consumers?

Gas costs and auto maintenance expenses are constantly on the rise, so who wouldn’t welcome targeted financial relief?

As I write this, Xtreme Green’s website Alexa ranking is 10.8 million. Which for an e-commerce website is well and truly dead.

Reflecting this is Xtreme Green’s linked Facebook page, which hasn’t been updated since 2016. The company’s Twitter profile was similarly dead, save for a recent tweet on June 10th.

That’s not to say Xtreme Green’s products aren’t being sold by their affiliates, just that there doesn’t appear to be much going on with the company itself.

To simply what I’m getting at; If Xtreme Green is able to deliver what it promises its products can do, where are all the customers?

I don’t know when Xtreme Green abandoned its previous compensation plan, but even then – the notion that our review would impact the company’s retail sales is silly.

Retail customers don’t care about Xtreme Green’s MLM income opportunity. They’re supposed to be purchasing, using and ideally loving the company’s products.

Not really seeing it, which brings us back to the current compensation plan.

If the majority of Xtreme Green’s revenue is generated via affiliate orders, the company is operating as a pyramid scheme.