College Sweetheart Neglected, Suffers Serious Health Problems
Received February 24, 2008
I wish I would have found your website before I left to sell books in the summer of 2007. I agree with everything that you said in your testimonial and more. I puked my breakfast up every morning and lost a total of 10 pounds in two weeks. I only weighed 105 lbs. when I left. I couldn't eat in the morning for the rest of the summer, even once I returned home, without puking. Life was hell. But the true reason I left was because of the way I was treated by my student manager. I was date rapped my sophomore year of high school and I never really have dealt with it. I didn't even tell my parents about it until I graduated high school. Well, I had a flashback after speaking to a dad at the door of one of the houses. For some reason talking to that specific dad made me hyperventilate, have a panic attack, and have mental pictures flash into my mind from the date rape. I locked myself into my car for 5 hours. I called my regional manager, no answer and no call back. I called my student manager and told him what was going on and he told me to just get over it and knock on the next door. I then finally broke down and called my mom despite all the warnings to never call home during the day. Well my mom flipped out about what was happening and that no one was trying to calm me down over the phone (other than her) because I have asthma and she didn't want me passing out from not getting enough oxygen. After three hours and my mom calling the corporate offices and threatening to sue did someone on my "team" call me. All they told me was to read something and focus on something else. That was all they said to me. I was finally able to just drive back to headquarters and pack my stuff to head home after 5 hours had passed. I was so scared at that moment. The worst part of it all was that even two and three weeks after I left and was back home my regional and student manager kept calling me and basically treating me as a failure. I was close with one of the students in my group and he noticed I was gone on the Sunday meeting. He called to make sure I was at least safe, but didn't want to know anything else. My student manager called me the next day and ripped me out and said that just because I failed doesn't mean that I need to talk to the other team members and try to make them fail as well just so I would feel better. I still see my old student manager and he acts as if we are best friends. I really don't know what I should do, but I feel like I should warn all the students I see him with.
No Qualifying Process: Everyone Accepted into Southwestern
I liked the testimonials sections the best. Please add my experience....it was horrible. Are you kidding me?
My personal experience with "Southwestern" was consistent with the stories. Pay for everything...trip to Nashville....hotel stay in Nashville (1 week / 4 people in my room) ...trip to my territory...which happened to be Pensacola, FL. All gas and miles on my car my problem. First day consisted of us going door to door to "find a headquarters." Luckily an old man had pity on me and let me and 2 of my book selling buddies stay there.
1st guy quit his 2nd week....took me 2 weeks after that to quit as well. Not due to my lack of sales ability...but due to my lack of interest to work 85 hours per week to make $500-$1000 US dollars. That’s if you’re good....if you’re not great at sales you’re screwed.....and that’s the problem with Southwestern.....there is NO QUALIFYING PROCESS...everybody is accepted. I have a guy walking around my neighborhood right now SUMMER 2007 Dayton, OH! With POOR sales ability and BAD ENGLISH! POOR BASTARD! WOW! anyway...like I said...everybody is accepted!
THE BIGGEST SCAM OF ALL!!!!!!!!!
When you "sell" somebody books you ARE NOT ACTUALLY DELIVERING BOOKS TO THEM THAT DAY....rather you are asking them for the 1/2 of the MONEY UP FRONT WITH NO BOOKS!!!!!!!!!!!!. That's right...you are soliciting for money up front in EXCHANGE for the PROMISE that you will bring the books back in 2 months? Are you kidding me?
Here is how it goes....you knock on the door....person answers...assuming you’re a great salesman/salesgal...they let you in the house.....your goal is to get them interested in the books....get them committed to buy the books........oh but wait...YOU DON'T HAVE THE BOOKS!!!!!!!! that's right...you want them to give you the money for the books TODAY!!! In fact...write a check out to you personally for the books TODAY........that they ARE NOT GETTING TODAY!!!!!! In good faith that you will bring the books back at the end of the summer!!!!!! ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? Get money up front for a product that YOU ARE NOT delivering TODAY!!!!!!!!!! WHAT A JOKE!!! This is the biggest thing you must look at as somebody possibly volunteering for this program.......you will be going DOOR to DOOR asking people for money up front for a product that THEY DON'T RECEIVE!!!ARE YOU KIDDING ME????
In this day and age there are better ways to make money over your summer!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
College Student’s Typical Day on the Bookfield
I have recently gone through the Southwestern Experience and came across this website. (I was doing some research in hopes to find some resources that holds truth behind SW so that my teammates would not feel so bad about quitting.) As I read the testimonials of others, I felt inclined to share my own story. If you would please publish the following paragraphs on your website, I would deeply appreciate it.
I was first recruited for the Southwestern Company when I was first-year in college. Every week after I was recruited, I had to go to these meetings with my student manager. It didn’t matter that I had homework, projects, and exams coming up; I had to go and I had to comply with her schedule, in addition to the weekly homework that she assigns me. The day after the finals, we were to drive our way to Nashville, TN to receive our one-week of training in “Sales School”. This training consisted of many inspirational speeches, lots of memorizing our “sales talk”, brief overview of what we’re selling, and lots of running.
Oh- I nearly forgot to mention all the hidden costs that come with this internship. The first hidden cost is the fact that the company DOES NOT pay anything for you. All costs ranging from staying in hotels to gas money is all you. On Sundays in the bookfield, they hold meetings in conference rooms at hotels, and guess who pays for that? Correct… you. As well as all the “fun” stuff you do on Sunday, your supposed day off. The second hidden costs are the selling materials that they distribute to you on your first day of sales school. It consists of a horrid green colored bag with all your samples and supplies needed to sell books, as well as paperwork and inspiration CDS/reading. However, what I personally dislike about the bags is that they are 40 lbs and I am not allowed to leave it out of my sight; that includes carrying it with me to the bathroom. Personally, I was told that $300 would suffice for the trip to TN and your territorial state, but I spent over $500 for just hotel money, gas money, conference rooms, and food.
Ok, now let’s talk about a typical day on a “bookfield”, or at least, my typical day. It starts at 5:59AM, when the alarm goes off and we are supposed to race to the cold showers. Then, we go through the usual morning routine before we leave for our breakfast spot. We eat, we do our silly executive exercises (which is basically a lot of yelling to get pumped up), and then we leave to our territory. I get dropped off at my territory at around 7:20AM every morning. I start knocking on door approximately that time and end at 9:30PM. A number of things can and has happened in those 14hrs and 10 minutes. I have been yelled at by annoyed homeowners, targeted by dogs as prey, pulled over by policemen, etc. If I’m lucky enough, it’ll t-storm on me and I would work in the rain. Also, one thing I would like to add is that I am a walker. I have no car, which means to get to places of longer distance, I need to bike there. I haven’t ridden one in over 7 years. Obviously, I fell off… in doing so, I skinned both my knees, each injury at least the size of a half-dollar.
One of the days in the first two weeks of selling, you HAVE to follow a student manager. I was fortunate enough to follow one the day after I fell. I was also lucky enough to follow someone who loves to walk. Even though she had a car, we jogged (and occasionally walked) for NINE hours. Now, my knees hurt throughout the duration of this time and I warned the student manager that I’ll lag a little behind due to that pain. Her response to me, “Don’t think about it. Just ignore it” and keep jogging. So, I spent most of that day trying to keep up with her speed while lugging that 40 lb bag with two bad knees. I will tell you… it was nearly infected and now, after one month, it still hurts to be on my knees.
They sell us on the idea that we’ll be able to make big bucks by working with them. In truth, we make next to nothing when you add in all the expenses that we had traveling, paying for hotels, gas, etc. Another thing they said was that as long as you work 75+ hours a week, you will be successful. In truth, most people work way more than that. My schedule was set up so that I worked, on average, 85 hours a week. I repeat, I was a walker and I have very low tolerance for physical activities so I would take 10 minute breaks every goal period. There being 6 goal periods in total, that means I spend 1 hour out of the 14 hrs resting. I was reprimanded for wasting one hour when all I needed was “one ten to fifteen minute break”.
When I had thoughts of quitting, they scheduled for me to follow a student manager again and talk to the sales manager. It is basically a tactic to make the job seem easier (because it always seems easier when someone else is doing it) and to get to you reconsider quitting. Talking to the sales manager was no joy ride because there was a lot of guilt-tripping there. They try to turn it so that you are deceived into thinking they actually care about your success while your support system at home is there to doubt your abilities. Well… needless to say, when I made the final decision to go home, they all gave me a hard time. They all looked down on me and did not bother hiding their disappointment at all. I went through four days of great emotional distress because I could not figure out the simple answer to a simple answer: Do I want to quit or not? It took four days because they were unwilling to let me go without a fight.
