Compensation plans are written in a vocabulary that assumes you already understand them. This piece explains the shape of how these arrangements work, so that when you read Faberlic's own plan the words mean something.
One thing to be clear about before starting: the actual numbers, percentages, levels and conditions are published by Faberlic and change over time. Anything specific you read anywhere else - including summaries and screenshots from other consultants - should be checked against the company's own current materials. This article deliberately contains no figures for that reason.
The two ways value reaches you
Almost every plan of this type has the same two components underneath the terminology.
The personal discount. You buy at consultant prices rather than retail. This is immediate, requires nothing beyond registering, and is the part that most consultants actually benefit from. If you buy cosmetics anyway, this alone is the whole proposition.
Volume-based rewards. Beyond your own purchases, the plan recognises the total volume of products moving through you and the people you introduced. This is where the levels, percentages and qualification conditions live.
Most confusion comes from conflating these. The first is simple and certain. The second is variable and takes time.
The vocabulary
Points or volume. Products are assigned a value used for calculation rather than their price, so the plan works consistently across countries and currencies. Your "volume" is what you and your structure have moved in a period.
Period. Calculations run per catalogue cycle rather than per calendar month - Faberlic reissues its catalogue roughly every three weeks, and that cycle is the accounting unit.
Structure or organisation. Everyone you introduced, plus everyone they introduced, and so on. Represented as a tree with you at the top of your part of it.
Levels or ranks. Thresholds. Reaching one changes what you qualify for, and typically each has conditions that must be met within a period rather than once.
Qualification. The conditions for a given period. This is the part people most often misunderstand: reaching a level once does not usually mean holding it permanently.
How the pieces fit
In outline:
- You order, at a discount, generating volume
- People you introduced do the same, generating their own volume
- Some portion of their volume counts toward your total
- Your total, per period, determines what you qualify for
- Qualification determines what you receive on top of your personal discount
The design intent is that value flows from products actually being used. Where plans of this type have gone wrong historically is when recruitment is rewarded independently of anything being sold - which is worth understanding as the line between a legitimate direct-selling structure and a scheme.
What the plan does not promise
- A minimum. There is no floor. Doing nothing produces nothing
- Passive income. Structures require ongoing activity from actual people; nothing runs itself
- Typical earnings. Anyone quoting one is generalising from their own case
- Permanence. Levels are generally maintained by continuing to qualify
Reading the real thing
When you open Faberlic's official plan, look for four things specifically:
- What generates volume, and what does not count
- What each level requires, and over what period
- What must be maintained versus what is achieved once
- Which conditions depend on your own purchases and which on your structure
Those four answers are the plan. Everything else is presentation.
The honest summary
For the majority of registered consultants, the discount on their own purchases is the entirety of the benefit, and that is a reasonable outcome - it costs nothing to obtain and applies from the first order.
The structural side rewards sustained work with people over long periods. It can be worthwhile, and it is not fast, and no article claiming otherwise is describing the same activity.
For a realistic look at what people actually earn, see the related piece in the business section - and read Faberlic's published plan directly before making any decision based on it.