The decision to start a business of any type is huge. It has the potential to impact every area of your life as well those you are responsible for. Therefore making the decision requires that you perform the proper research to minimize the risk of making a major mistake. The key word is minimize the risk, you can not eliminate it. If you get the right information and blend it with the proper mindset you can increase your chances of success by a large margin. The time and money you put into a business should be considered an investment with some reasonable expectation of a return. Simply throwing your time and money to the wind with the hope that something good will happen is the same as gambling. After all, hope is not a strategy .

In working with people who look at the EPI opportunity I try really hard not to bash any other opportunity. The fact that other businesses do not offer the same products, compensation, support, training, or culture, does not make them bad - just different. There are however some things to consider, it is the princple of momentum. Basically, you have to really determine if the opportunity is capable of delivering the results you want in the timeframe you would like based on the time and effort you can bring to bear.   A new team member who has been involved with many home businesses over the years recently joined EPI as a distributor. That was not what caught my attention. What struck me is that he had just signed up with a MLM company that he said was a great company. However after just a week in that business he stumbled onto EPI and immediately surrendered his downline and joined the EPI team.

So the question is, why would a person of his experience, knowledge, and success drop an opportunity so quickly? I was surprised at his reasons and this is why I am sharing this information. Here is what he had to say:

• most MLMs run on hype. Even the trainings are little more than pep rallies.
• only 3% of people in MLM make over $1000 a month
• full disclosure had to become law before the companies would comply and publish what really happens in the business
• most people in MLM only make $78 a year in profit
• there is no 'Middle Class' in MLM. There are only big winners and big losers and very little in between
• compensation is not based on product quality, it is based almost solely on recruitment
• most all these businesses are built upon people exploiting their 'warm market', (friends and family) there is very little taught in the way of real marketing techniques
• the money gets split in so many different ways that there is no way that everyone can make real money on such small profit margins
• many of the products are over-priced and over-valued
• a fair amount of the money made in many MLM companies is from 'training material' sold to those involved. I know of a major class-action law suit that was filed against a MLM in my area for exploitation and misrepresentation. The company lost.

Remember this gentleman did not have 'sour grapes', he was successful, he just found something better. Again, I am not saying that all these are bad companies. I am sure there are a lot of nice people involved. Some even have nice products. At the end of the day there are still huge tax advantages to having your own business but you are not in business just for the tax breaks, you want to be in business to make money and hopefully a lot of it.

Here are some points that speak to how EPI is different than the typical Multi-Level-Marketing company

1. We are not a MLM, we are a direct marketing company. No downlines to worry about and split profits with. http://www.emeraldpassport.cc/teachings4life/
2. You get paid first. Once you qualify as a director your profits are yours to keep and you get paid directly, the company gets paid by you after the fact.
3. We provide 100% disclosure from the word go. There is nothing to hide. www.threesteps.info
4. We make money when people are successful in the business, not just for signing up. 
5. Achieving wealth is based on the exploiting trends. We do just that. www.trendstowealth.com http://www.forbesarticle.info/
6. We offer real training from people who are successful in the business for free. http://www.epassportinc.com/callschedule/callschedule.cfm  There are 26 more calls offered by Team Falcon every week.
7. A 75% profit margin is nothing to sneeze at. This is possible because we are reverse-margin and our Phase I product is delivered 100% over the Internet. No warehouses, no shipping, easily duplicated, and higher margins.
8. Our products have value far in excess of what people pay for them. www.productwow.com
9. The marketing engine ensures you have prospects.
10. We are Information Marketers, not high-pressure sales people. If people see our information and products but do not get it, we simply move on.

Here is a harsh reality for some. This economy as we know it will not be able to handle what is about to occur, the retirement of the baby-boomers. All experts agree that it will send everything into a tailspin, not just in the US but abroad as well. Why? The Boomers have not prepared for retirement and will end up supporting their children and their parents as well in many cases. We also live in the era of enormous consumer debt, so much that debt itself has become a product that is bought and sold. There will simply not be enough money in the government coffers to handle the load. Many will still be paying for their houses and other expenses at a time when they will have the least income. http://www.4trends.info/  Check out the Boomer section of this link. Taxes will have to be increased and the cost of living is expected to double! Are you prepared to handle that?