Scentsy is an mlm company that is often promoted by people who invite you to a “home candle party” if they don’t pitch it to you as a “work from home” business opportunity to get you to sign up as a member.
Scentsy is known for a variety of products, with the most popular being a starter kit of wax warmers and wax melts (with different scents).
So, if someone has proposed the idea to you and you were considering placing an order but are not sure whether it is a pyramid scheme or an MLM company, you’ve come to the right place.
In this Scentsy Review, we address some of the most commonly asked questions asked about the company.
We won’t be delving much into the quality of the products; instead, our focus will be on the online business opportunity they offer.
Before I start…
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What Is Scentsy?
Scentsy is an American company that sells fragrance items that make your home smell great. It is a Multi-Level-Marketing (MLM) business.
Its main products are Scentsy wax bars, warmers, diffusers, oils, and other fragrance-related items.
If you go online, you’ll find tons of reviews of those products so we won’t be going deep into them in this review.
This Scentsy review examines the opportunity to earn money from home that this company gives you.
Scentsy products are sold through independent Consultants. These consultants are the ones that invite “hosts” to bring friends together to share Scentsy in their homes and gatherings.
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What Products Does Scentsy Sell?
Scentsy sells a wide range of products that give your home, car, and clothes a nice scent.
Some of the products you can buy from their online shop include:
Warmers and Wax
They sell elemental warmers that melt wax without illumination. They also sell mini warmers that plug straight into the wall to help keep smaller spaces clear.
There are different styles of warmers and they can be placed in kitchens, laundry rooms, bedrooms, and bathrooms.
They also sell wax in a wide range of fragrances to suit different tastes.
Diffusers and oils
They sell diffusers of different designs and shades and the accompanying oils that disperse the beautiful fragrances.
There is a wide variety of oils to suit different preferences.
In addition to those, they also sell:
- Laundry products: Laundry liquid, scented softener, dryer disk, washer whiff, etc…
- Cleaning Products – Kitchen soap, freshener, multipurpose kitchen cleaning spray, etc…
- Personal Care Products – Bath bomb, body cream, body wash, hand cream, hand soap, lotion, etc…
- Accessories – Car bars, room spray, essential oils
As I mentioned earlier, we won’t be reviewing these products and will focus on the income opportunity the company presents.
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Who Started Scentsy?
Scentsy was launched in 2004 by Heidi and Orville Thompson.
When they began, the couple was selling wickless candles as alternatives to traditional candles and decorative warmers before they grew this humble business opportunity into an international company.
The company is now well known for its Scentsy warmers, wax bars, and other scent-based products.
There are in excess of 100,000 consultants selling products for Scentsy through network marketing.
The company often brings in about $450 million in revenue and in 2018, it made it into the Forbes list at #35 for best mid-size employers in the country.
How Much Do You Pay To Join Scentsy?
If you want to be a Scentsy consultant, you will be required to pay $99. This money is payment for the Starter Kit (plus local tax and shipping) to join Scentsy.
Scentsy compares favorably with other businesses within this niche.
However, there are others that are cheaper to get into. For example, Farmasi only charges you $19.99 to join their partnership program.
That being said, it is easier to get started at Scentsy than it is to launch brick and mortar businesses.
For example, if wanted to start a business with a physical location selling goods or services, you would have to to deal with huge startup costs that can go up to tens of thousand of dollars.
Compared to that, the $99 you pay to become a Scentsy consultant looks cheap and you can see why people who want to work from home see the appeal in joining a business like Scentsy.
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How does Scentsy Consultancy Work
When you join, you become part of a hierarchical structure that ranks in this order (from the lowest rank to the highest):
- Escential Consultant
- Certified Consultant
- Lead Consultant
- Star Consultant
- Superstar Consultant
- Director
- Star Director
- SuperStar Director
The rank has a bearing on how much money you make as we’ll see in the next section covering the Compensation plan.
In addition to retail sales, Scentsy allows you to recruit other people to join the program.
This provides you with a downline below you and when they sell the products, you are paid commissions on all those purchases.
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The Scentsy Compensation Plan
The Scentsy Compensation Plan is relatively simple compared to other network marketing companies out there.
The Scentsy compensation plan provides you with a chance to make 20% commission on the first 1,000 points in lifetime personal retail volume (PRV) and it is paid out every month.
When you make over 1,000 PRV points within a month, you receive a 25% commission on all sales. You also transition from an escential consultant to a certified consultant when you reach that milestone, as shown below:
Consultants can earn up to a 9 percent bonus on Personal Wholesale too.
But they must reach the minimum values set. Here are the terms:
“Consultants earn 20 percent on the first 1,000 points in Personal Retail Volume (PRV) and 25 percent on all sales after that, plus up to a 9 percent bonus on Personal Wholesale Volume based on rank and a 5 percent bonus when monthly sales exceed 2,000 points in PRV. They may also earn leadership bonuses based on downline sales. Qualification for incentive trips is determined annually.”
The wholesale commissions begin from the Lead Consultant level.
If someone you have sponsored reaches the lead consultant level, they qualify for a wholesale commission of 2%.
This means that you can make a differential commission of up to 4% of their wholesale volume.
If you reach the Director level or higher, you generate a wholesale commission of 9%.
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How Much Will You Make As A Scentsy Consultant?
As I mentioned earlier, Scentsy has eight ranks for their consultants and as we’ve seen in the compensation plan, every rank earns a certain amount of money as a commission from both individual sales and the sales of your downline.
Since your earning potential is determined by how high you rank, you should strive to move from a lower level to the higher ones and to do that, you’ve got to recruit more consultants.
How much can you actually earn as a consultant?
Just to recap: The Escential consultant is the lowest rank and you get paid 20% for your PRV below 1,000 points.
The 1,000 PRV is cumulative and there is no limit to how long you will be allowed to take to reach this milestone.
You can take anywhere between a few weeks to months or years to reach the milestone. So, how fast you take to graduate depends on how good of a marketer you are.
The next step after escential consultant is the certified consultant position. You will be making 25 % on your PRV from that rank upwards.
You move on to the next level when you earn 500 PRV points in product sales per month and this goes all the way to the highest level (Superstar Director)
How Much Do Directors Make?
The amount of money you make increases drastically when you become a director, star director, and superstar director.
When you join these higher ranks, you earn a Director’s Bonus — a commission you earn for wholesale volumes of all consultants in your downline.
As a director, you can earn commissions as deep as three director generations into your downline.
The commissions you earn are: 3% on the first generation, 4% for the second generation, and 5% for third generation directors.
If you add it all up, you make 30% commission on your retail sales. Then you earn a 9% wholesale commission off of the consultants you bring in. Then you earn a 5% Director Bonus for attaining the Director level.
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Can You Make Money With Scentsy?
Although not everyone succeeds in an MLM, you can still make money with Scentsy.
However, it won’t be easy and you’ll have to put in a lot of work to become a certified consultant. It will be even tougher to be become a director.
The challenge is that you need to be a high-ranking member of this hierarchy to make REAL money.
You may be wondering, can you make enough money that you can live off?
The answer to that depends on a variety of factors.
Scentsy did a study in 2020 to determine how much people actually made from the program. Here are the findings taken directly from the Scentsy Income Disclosure Statement:
Independent Scentsy Consultants earn between 20% and 36% commissions and bonuses on personal sales and may be eligible for leadership bonuses based on their teams’ sales. The chart below shows how Independent Scentsy Consultants in the United Kingdom performed, on average, in 2020. As with any business endeavour, a Consultant’s success will be a direct result of the time and effort they devote to selling the product and leading a team. The earnings below represent commissions that Scentsy actually paid to Consultants in 2020.
We have divided our Consultants into two groups for this disclosure. Group 1 consists of Consultants who were with Scentsy for all 12 months of 2020. Group 2 consists of Consultants who were with Scentsy for less than 12 months in 2020, including those who joined Scentsy for the first time, and those who left Scentsy either due to inactivity or for other reasons.
The survey focused on UK Scentsy Consultants and it gives us a gist of how the program may perform in other developed economies.
I should clarify that these findings have no bearing on how you will perform if you choose to sign up for the program.
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Is Scentsy A Pyramid Scheme?
Scentsy is NOT a pyramid scheme.
Why do I think so?
It is not a pyramid scheme because you can still get paid based on your sales to retail customers without having to recruit new consultants.
Recruiting Scentsy consultants to your downline improves your earning potential but you can just focus on selling Scentsy products to retail customers and get commissions.
On the other hand, pyramid schemes recruit you and they inundate you with pitches of what they think you’ll earn.
They often promise to change your life and even get rich by selling products. But that’s often a lie because your income relies mostly on how many people you recruit, not how much of the product you sell (you are paid from the subscription fees).
Pyramid schemes encourage you to keep recruiting to keep a constant stream of new distributors flowing into the business.
Scentsy does not have a membership fee as the money you spend buys your first batch of inventory.
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Is Scentsy A Multi Level Marketing Company?
Scentsy is an MLM company (or direct-selling company).
Why is it a multi-level company?
MLM companies sell products through person-to-person sales or direct selling, usually from your home, a customer’s home, or online. A good example of this that we have looked into recently is Cutco Knives.
When you join an MLM program, you can make money two ways: First is by selling the MLM’s products to “retail” customers who are outside the MLM and the other way is by recruiting people to become consultants. You earn commissions based on what they buy themselves as well as their sales to retail customers.
Your recruits and their recruits become your downline.
Is Scentsy Legit?
Scentsy is legit because it sells legit products and pays consultants for buying products and selling them to retail customers.
It is a member of the direct selling association, an organization that ensures that it doesn’t break the rules that govern MLM programs.
Now, although the company is legit, it doesn’t guarantee that you will make money.
In fact, most people won’t earn a decent living working from home when they sign up for the program because there is a lot of competition.
You have to do a ton of marketing to build what you’d call a profitable and successful online business through Scentsy.
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Scentsy Conclusion
Scentsy is a legitimate company that sells real products. They also give people the opportunity to make money selling their products thanks to the multi-level marketing business model they run.
Although the products are great and you can make money selling them, when it comes to making money, you are have to work hard to break even leave alone earn money.
And the thing is, this is true for any source of passive income online.
Most people who join Scentsy as consultants wind up not making money, which is not unique to Scentsy. Most MLM companies have a similar story: People join hoping to make money but they end up not making it (or worse, lose it).
Scentsy does not make bold promises about your earning potential like other mlm companies out there that are often misleading.
The MLM business model is great if you are one of the few people that can make it work. But the problem is that many people who join cannot make it work and these are the people who say that making money online is impossible and that a company like Scentsy is a pyramid scheme.
That being said, can you fully rely on selling Scentsy products for your income?
No, I don’t think this is practical for most people and to be honest, I would say the same thing if we were talking about running your own business.
If you are thinking of joining Scentsy (or any other MLM Business), you should understand the products first. Most of these have a “unique selling point” because the products they sell are quite popular and you can find them being sold by other businesses.
Before you leave
If you’re tired of scams and want a real solution for making money online check out my no.1 recommendation.
It’s helped me earn over $300,000 in the last 12 months alone:
Go here to see my no.1 recommendation for making money online
(This is a 100% free training)
David Fortune has been the editor NoBSIMReviews.com since 2019. He is an expert at writing content on stock advisory services, side hustles, reviewing online business opportunities and many more topics. You can learn more about David on our about us page.