If you read our blog post last week on Anna Delvey, you might sense a trend. Yep, that trend is true crime! Last weekend we had some free time and started watching Amazon’s docuseries LuLaRich. LuLaRich follows the establishment of the company LuLaRoe by owners Mark Stidham and Deanne Stidham.
LuLaRoe is a multi-level marketing (MLM) company headquartered in California that sells a variety of patterned leggings, skirts and tops. We first heard about the show on the podcast Christi’s Couch. Before then, we heard the name LuLaRoe in passing, but didn’t know much about the controversial company.
The docuseries follows the Stidham family and how they got women all over the country to start selling their products. While MLMs are a legal business model, according to Michigan state government, “compensation must primarily be based on the sale of products and services to the ultimate consumer.” Based on LuLaRoe compensating salespeople more for getting other people to sign up, instead of selling the actual products, LuLaRoe is portrayed more like an illegal pyramid scheme.
LuLaRoe Recruits
After watching all four episodes, we found some common trends between the people who LuLaRoe targeted:
- The majority were white women
- They were young (mostly 20s when they started)
- They were stay at home moms
- They got married and had kids right out of college
- Most have never held a typical post-college job
- They were enticed by the #GirlBoss and #BeYourOwnBoss mentality
- They’re the ideal clientele for the products
Most of the women in the docuseries fit the characteristics listed above and were the perfect people to swindle. After all, they bought into the family first model the Stidhams espoused constantly. They were told they could have it all: be great moms/wives, while also contributing to the finances.
It started out as a fun side hustle. Women made money selling clothing and made some extra cash. But then they were encouraged to start signing up more people to be sellers. That’s where most of the money came from. Bonus checks to the most successful could be as high as six figures per month. Everything was going well…until LuLaRoe grew too quickly. Too many sellers and not enough clients, the quality of the products getting worse and the sellers being encouraged to spend all their earnings on flashy objects left a lot of women in trouble.
In recent years, the number of sellers decreased exponentially as many women filed for bankruptcy after realizing they were part of scam. While they were losing their houses, the Stidhams were getting richer and richer.
The Company
LuLaRoe promotes a fake image of happy women on social media. Conferences, cruises and concerts try to showcase a culture of togetherness and support. That couldn’t be further from the truth.
The docuseries highlighted that LuLaRoe is patriarchal and encourages women to except the man as the decisionmaker of the household. Deanne Stidham also body shamed women and tried to convince them to get sketchy weight loss surgery in Mexico. Apparently, she received a commission.
What started out as a fun part-time job, turned into a cult. One seller remembered being at a conference and Mark Stidham went into a rant about his Mormon views…which felt odd for the sellers to have to listen about.
The more people who joined the company, the worse things got. While many lawsuits have been filed against LuLaRoe and the Stidhams, the company is still operating to this day. While it shrunk to less than 20,000 sellers (down over 70,000 from the peak), women are still signing up for seller positions and buying the products from a corrupt company.
Final Thoughts
It’s appalling how many people were taken advantage of by the Stidham family. Obviously, we encourage everyone to not purchase from this corrupt company. Also, in our opinion, every piece of clothing they sell is ugly.
According to Chren 
This is such a great post, and MLMs are quite dangerous. Thank you for sharing this!
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We agree, MLMs are dangerous and everyone should be cautious.
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What a crazy story! It’s sad that this company is still operational.
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That sounds bonkers! Great post!
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Thank you!
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Right? We wish it wouldn’t operate anymore.
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MLMs are awful; and so many people get sucked into them! A couple of my friends got caught up in one selling health shakes, etc. It was all about recruiting other sellers and not selling the product. Thanks for sharing more about this “company” and the documentary about them; I hadn’t heard about them before.
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MLMs are the worst and they basically just want to take advantage of people. John Oliver did a video explaining how they work.
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I didn’t really know anything about the company except for shoddy leggings. I knew that there was a documentary but had no idea what the whole things was about. How are they still in business? I can’t believe it. I hate how people take advantage of others. I think I need to add this to my watchlist.
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You should definitely watch this! I don’t know how people still by the products, but they are way down since the peak a few years ago.
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This is absolutely awful! I hadn’t heard of this company before but I’ll definitely be avoiding them, it’s appalling how they took advantage of so many people. Thanks for sharing such an informative post!
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Thanks for reading! We’re just hoping to help make sure more people don’t fall into this trap.
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You made me laugh at the end. ‘Every piece of clothing they sell is ugly.’
Another insightful post, this has garnered much interest. I shall be checking it out on Netflix later.
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Thank you! And yes, haha! We can’t believe that a company selling such ugly clothes became so famous.
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I was listening to a podcast episode about MLM and honestly, they are such awful businesses! Thanks for sharing, will add it to my watch list!
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We we’re shocked how bad these can be. Thanks for reading!
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I’ve heard about LuLaRoe before & I think all of these MLM companies are terrible. So many people who join them are in a vulnerable position like these women wanted to make money to help their family while being a stay home mom, but most people who join an MLM end up losing money while the people at the top (in this case the Stidhams) face no consequences & just keep getting richer.
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It’s horrible how much people profit off of MLMs. Each MLM seems to have a “target” seller in mind.
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I haven’t heard of this docuseries but I’m definitely going to check it out this weekend on Amazon. I’m super interested in these stories and true crime. Thank you for sharing!
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This is such an interesting post! I haven’t heard of the docuseries but I need to check it out! Thanks for sharing.
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