ETA: My opinion about George HW Bush is he saddled us with Clarence Thomas and that’s been a bad thing for the country. *sigh* such a mixed bag.

We may be seeing the demise of a multi-level marketing firm right in front of our eyes. LuLaRoe, a company that initially made its name on MLM sales of so-called “buttery-soft leggings” is being sued by its major supplier MyDyer for $49 million.

LLR was flying high back around 2016, but a combination of shitty leggings (basically they ripped when being put on), horrible patterns (and the “consultants” weren’t allowed to pick their patterns) and awful quality caused consultants to bag the company. There was a period in 2017 where LLR was doing a 100 percent refund (minus shipping) of unsold product due to complaints about the horrible quality. The MyDyer suit alleges $120 million worth of product was returned. Based on the information I’ve gleaned over the past year or so from various places, there are people who have shipped back product for refunds and have been waiting 7-8 months for checks to get cut and it’s not happening.

In the meantime, LLR continues to sell product to its consultants, but the latest deal is that while the consultants might order (for example) 100 pairs of leggings, they might get 60 pairs and the other 40 pairs they don’t get, and LLR doesn’t refund their money but holds it as a credit. In light of this lawsuit, it makes sense why LLR is playing games with people’s money like this—they need it to prop up their sinking ship.

One of the principals of LLR, Mark Stidham, is quoted in the lawsuit as telling representatives of MyDyer back in September:

“Look guys, I am not going to pay you guys a f****ing dime unless a judge orders me to pay it, and DeAnne and I will take our two to three hundred million dollars to the Bahamas, and f*** everything.”

Here’s the story:
businessinsider.com

Here’s a link to the lawsuit for all the lawyery goodness:

The firm handling the lawsuit, Reed Smith LLP, is a huge international outfit with 85 lawyers in its Los Angeles office alone. I would say that LLR is toast.