When I got a letter from "Vector", offering a job with benefits, $17 per hour/appointment (more on t...

1. The Vector Marketing Scam - Yahoo Voices
When I got a letter from "Vector",
offering a job with benefits, $17 per
hour/appointment (more on that later)
and an environment geared towards
students, I was certainly interested.
What I didn't know then is that Vector
Marketing, according to who you ask,
is either a great source of student
work for hardworking entrepreneurs,
or else a manipulative scame. Which is
true? Let's start with my Vector
experience.
The letter directed me to a website,
workforstudents.com, that I
remembered seeing plastered around
my campus down in Richmond,
Virginia. On the site I filled out a very
basic application. The sheet said that I
was to call to set up an appointment;
to my surprise they called me the next
day. I set up an appointment (we
needed to allot over 90 minutes to the
interview, which surprised me, but what the heck, no other job leads had been promising.) With
plenty of time to spare, I arrived at the Falls Church headquarters on Columbia Pike and headed to
the proper room.
The setting was a tad unexpected; I was in a cramped and rather cluttered lobby with folding chairs
around the perimeter and trophies in a corner--of course, the obligatory motivational poster
("Teamwork") decorated the far wall. A number of other students, less well-dressed than me, were
seated filling out a basic questionaire, along with some older folks who I figured were hurting from
the economy and were willing to give the job (which I still had little concrete ideas about what it
was) a chance. We were treated to some poor music coming from a boombox in the corner while we
waited and the place filled up with applicants (some people in jeans; I mean, seriously, no one will
take you seriously dressed like that, so why bother wasting 90 minutes?) Three of us were
shepherded into an adjacent room at a time for "pre-screenings", basically elaborating on the
content of the paperwork we filled out. The district manager who talked to us acted something like a
robot, mechanically calling out names and remembering them almost immediately. I still can't be
sure he wasn't at least part machine, or just trying out for the new Terminator movie.
Anyhow, eventually (and by this time I really had to pee, but the bathrooms were locked) were
shuffled into the center of the room for the presentation by Mr. Robot Manager. Luckily his robotic
tendencies melted and he became more animated as he (finally) told us what we were doing there.

2. As it turns out, Vector Marketing is the marketing spinoff company of Cutco Inc., a cutlery
manufacturer. Oh, so the job, as it turns out, is to be a knife salesmen. Not exactly what I had in
mind, but it's a job that pays decently, so I continued to listen. The manager tells us the history of
the company, who runs it, and goes through the product line (they make a $* of knives, man) and
demonstrates a few. These include scissors that snap pennies in two or else make them into flowers
(I feel like I should have mentioned that this penny mutilation probably falls under defacement of
current, a felony, and if we in the course of our jobs were to be doing the exact same procedure we'd
all be criminals, but I digress. I forgot to mention it, anyhow.) Other items were a nifty swiss-arm-
-filet knife and various cutting tools used on leather and cloth to demonstrate their effectiveness.
Once he had us sold on the product, the manager went into detail about what we would be doing.
Rather than cold-calling, we would set up personal appointments, show the product in a similar way
that he showed us, and then get paid for the meeting--whether we made a sale or not. (This excited
me the most.) After going through benefits and salary, he called us back to the other room one by
one for final job decisions (that was fast). Noting my professional attitude and dress (hell yeah), I
was offered the job. My first reaction was relief and well-being. Finally, I had a halfway decent job.
And while salesmanship wasn't my strongest suit, I was willing to put in the work as necessary.
However I had barely gotten home when I realized that joining Vector would be a waste of my time
(and most other people's.) Why? Let me explain.
First is the pay. The $17 per hour is technically possible, but in reality, you're actually making it per
appointment, which last from 45 minutes to an hour. So factoring in travel times (you're allowed to
work as wide or narrow a field as you want,) you won't be putting in a solid 8 billable hours.
Suddenly that $136 per day has shrunk considerably. Then there's the fact that since you're
demonstrating actual merchandise, you have to pay a $130 or so deposit (refundable). But you're
still sinking in money to something when you haven't actually made anything yet. Not exactly
optimal.
The benefits touted? Non-existent. There are some mandatory meetings, and some recommended
group meetings for pizza and such, but I'm trying to make money, not exactly friends. You have to
check in to the home office every day, and there's meetings every week, which result in you losing
time you could be relaxing or working. Either way, it's a loss of time.
Finally, the whole business model is less than ideal on second look. You don't cold-call, which saves
you rejection in the short term, but Vector doesn't give you leads; you're expected to cull them from
"personal contacts"--i.e., friends and family. I really don't feel like shilling knives to people I know,
especially not my family. My parents wouldn't buy wrapping paper from me when I was selling it for
the school in grade school, why the hell would they buy "premium" knives that start at $30 a pop and
then go up from there?
So is Vector a scam? Not really. But that doesn't mean it isn't toeing the legality line in its deception
and manipulation. The reason they want college workers is because they are barely legal and its
more likely friends and family will be guilted into buying a knife from them than a random person.
It's a simple fact. But even if your immediate friends and such buy merchandise, you have to ask
them for more leads to stay afloat. But as you move to more obscure and obscure people, they will
be less likely to have a strange person carting around sharp pointy objects into their home (let alone
the potential safety of the salesman). In short, the longer you're at it, the less likely you are to
succeed in making appointments, and thus the less money you'll make. And if you're trying to find
leads, Vector isn't paying you--meaning that suddenly the job has turned into the on-commission
sales job the company claims to abhor, with you hustling for a meeting with every possible client.
Waitaminute, that's not the low-pressure job I was promised!

3. The end result? If you work very hard, you can make seriously money selling Cutco products; these
people, paying their way through college, are documented by reliable secondary sources besides
Vector. But they are much fewer in number than Vector would have applicants believe. In 1996, for
example, The Washington Post reported that Vector employees were on average making $3 a day
when all was said and done. For many, the job will get them little, or they might even lose money.
When my parents seconded nagging doubts about the job, I did some research and found that my
distrust was well-founded; the company has continually had run-ins with the law about their
business practices. A student group called SAVE (Students Against Vector Exploitation) has sprung
up to combat what they see as manipulative practices.
In short, even if Vector can be a profitable job for some, it is misleading people deliberately. The
internet is full of people extolling the virtues of Vector and others denigrating it entirely (they also
say the knives are bad, but I really have no hard evidence this is true.) Why else not say anything
about what kind of job it is until candidates are at the interview--to the point they won't tell you over
the phone if you inquire? Any job requires hard work, but misleading people into believing a
commission job where you are technically not even employed by Vector is a position with the
company is morally wrong, the legality put aside. Even on Associated Content I've found many that
suggest people like me are a bunch of malcontents for not wasting three days on unpaid training and
actually inflicting such an experience on ourselves... but if it looks like jumping off a cliff is a bad
idea, why would you jump off the cliff (by the way, I plan on deleting all spurious blantant comments
along the lines outlined above on sight. I'd like to think you aren't paid to spread Vector PR, but
given that their recruiters are all college age, I'm not doubting they wouldn't do it.)
In short: my advice is to stay away from Vector. As for me, I'm still unemployed... but I'd rather be
free than working for abusive employers.
References and further reading
*Graves, Dante (April 7, 2010). "Shady businesses profitable at college students' expense". State
Press. Accessed May 19, 2010.
*Hermitt, Andrea (May 3, 2010). "Students, beware these bad summer jobs". WalletPop. Accessed
May 20, 2010.
*Lucchesi, Nick (February 4, 2004). "Vector Marketing targets unaware college students". The
Journal (Webster University). Accessed May 18, 2010.