Why has Forever Living Products closed down its MLM business in the USA?
Over the past few years we’ve written several articles about the MLM Forever Living Products. We looked at how much it’s possible to earn with Forever Living, uncovered the lies and dark secrets some of the UK’s top Forever Living managers were hiding, and revealed what it really takes to get to the top of an MLM like Forever Living.
More recently though, our articles have charted the seeming downfall in fortunes of Forever Living – from the financial woes of its top managers, to the dramatic decline in the company’s UK turnover. Here’s a quick visual of just how much their annual UK turnover has dropped in the past few years:
The company has also sold off its impressive UK headquarters, Longbridge Manor, and moved into rented offices in Solihull. And it’s not just us who has noticed the decline. According to an MLM software company, Forever Living’s revenue was down 6% from 2023 to 2024.
Forever Living isn’t the only MLM to struggle in the past few years. As we investigate here, the entire network marketing industry appears to be dying out. To us, given that research published by the Federal Trade Commission shows that an average of 99.6% of people who join an MLM will lose money after deducting business expenses, this can only be a good thing.
Forever Living is closing its US MLM opportunity
Which brings us to a recent announcement we saw on Beyond MLM that Forever Living Products is terminating its MLM opportunity in the US from 1 May 2026.
Here’s what the changes will look like after this date:
- No new Forever Living business owners in the US will be recruited
- All incentives tied to recruitment and organisational expansion will stop
- The Forever Shared Retail/Amazon Subscription Program will be discontinued
- The ‘active’ requirement will drop from 4CC to 2CC
- The leadership bonus requirement will be 4CC
Forever Living also specify that, after 1 May 2026, no US Case Credits can be used towards the Forever2Drive car plan, Chairman’s Bonus qualification or FLP Global Rally qualification.
Until the end of 2026, existing downline purchasing will continue to generate earnings under the current structure. However, after 2026 this too will be discontinued.
From what we can see, it looks like all that will remain of the US business will be customer sales which, given that a network marketing expert has admitted that ‘most MLM sales are to reps’, could be the kiss of death to Forever Living in the USA. Considering the company was founded in Tempeh, Arizona in 1978, this must be sad news for them.
Why is Forever Living ending its US MLM business model?
So why is Forever Living ending its USA MLM business model? On their company policies and procedures document, they state:
“As of May 1, 2026, the Company Policies and Procedures (“Company Policies”) applicable in the Unities States were amended due to unforeseeable restrictions making it unmanageable for Forever Living Products to mitigate its risk worldwide, while keeping the U.S. business structure as it is.
“These restrictions include ongoing monitoring and structural requirements that make operating the current U.S. model impossible without introducing broader regulatory risk. Rather than continue operating under unmanageable and increasing regulatory risk worldwide, the company has made the decision to narrow the U.S. structure and focus on a model centered on product sales and long-term compliance.”
What ‘unforeseeable restrictions’ and ‘broader regulatory risk’ are they referring to? Could it be the proposed changes to the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) Business Opportunity Rule and new Earnings Claim Rule? The proposed rule would require MLMs to provide substantiation of any earnings claim to anyone upon request. They would also need to maintain records of the substantiation, and be prohibited from providing their reps with recruitment materials containing deceptive earnings claims.
Given the entire MLM business model appears to be built on seducing people with the promise of easy money, when the reality shows that many 80% of participants in an MLM will earn less than 70 cents an hour before expenses, we believe that this (very welcome) proposal by the FTC spells doom to many network marketing companies.
Were Forever Living Products forced to change their MLM business model?
Could it be that Forever Living are getting ahead of the legislation and changing their model early? Or have they been the subject of greater scrutiny, and been forced to make these changes? We know that Truth in Advertising (TINA) filed complaints with the FTC after finding the Forever Living had “made atypical income claims to market its business opportunity”.
Forever Living was also on an October 2021 list of recipients of FTC Notices of Penalty Offenses concerning money-making opportunities and concerning deceptive or unfair conduct around endorsements and testimonials.
In 2024, Forever Living was placed under ‘monitoring enquiry’ by the Direct Selling Self-Regulatory Council for income claims made on social media, including “No income limit”, “Financial freedom” and “Minimum investment with great opportunity to grow uncapped and very scalable business”. The company admitted that the social media posts “were not aligned with the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) guidance regarding the dissemination of income claims”.
The FTC has a history of penalising MLMs beyond simply sending Notices of Penalty Offenses. In October 2019, AdvoCare International were fined $150 million to settle FTC charges it operated an illegal pyramid scheme. The company, its former CEO, and two top promoters were also permanently banned from multi-level marketing (MLM).
And in 2016, the FTC sued Herbalife, alleging the company and its affiliates had deceived consumers into believing they could earn substantial money selling diet, nutritional supplement, and personal care products. Herbalife settled with the FTC and agreed to pay $200 million to compensate consumers and fundamentally restructure its business.
Perhaps Forever Living were concerned that they too would face similar punishment? They certainly would not have made these changes to their business model without their hand being forced in some way, as it will cost them a considerable amount of money in lost sales to their own reps, and reduce the growth of the business, in our opinion.
Whatever the reason they are changing their business model in the US to move away from MLM, we are delighted. And we hope this change will extend to other MLM businesses both in and outside the USA. We believe that a world without multi-level marketing can only be a better place.
