FTC
PEOPLE ON THE MOVE – March
Ryan Napierski, Nu Skin
Nu Skin Enterprises has named Ryan Napierski as president and CEO. Napierski, who currently serves as the company’s president, will succeed Ritch Wood upon his retirement Sept. 1. Napierski also will presumably replace Wood on the board of directors later this year. Napierski has spent his 25-year career with Nu Skin.
How core values and COVID-19 shaped TLC
By: Teresa Day Craighead
Company Profile:
Founded: 1999
Location: Fair Haven, Michigan
Website: totallifechanges.com
SSN: What is your book about?
JF: I never thought our story was unusual; you start in a one-bedroom, and you work your way up. But we’re in that business model where people want to be a part of a community and a culture, and having the book helps point to that. The book talks about our journey from factory workers to entrepreneurs, to network marketing to owning a company that developed a culture we value. In Detroit, Michigan, everybody works at the Big Three (Ford, General Motors and Chrysler automobile manufacturers), in some way. And it’s that “dream” job; you get the security, the full benefits, and the pension after 30 years. John (Licari) and I met on the line there, and we quickly realized it wasn’t for us.
Direct sales companies should prepare for a new wave of regulatory actions
By: Brent Kugler, Guest Contributor
Companies should take the time to consider if their plans hit the guardrails laid out by the most recent statements and actions of regulators.
Like it or not, the legal requirements for multi-level-marketing (MLM) compensation structures have changed in recent years. Many existing comp plans used by direct selling companies for years may now, if challenged, be considered non-compliant by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Indeed, comp plans considered to be compliant as recently as two years ago may today run afoul of the FTC’s latest criteria for evaluating compensation structures.
Skeptical court probes FTC’s approach to seeking ill-gotten gains
By: Larry Steinberg, Guest Contributor
If the FTC loses this case, the agency will no longer be able to rely on Section 13(b) to obtain an order requiring a wrongdoer to return all of the money it illegally obtained.
FTC Commissioner Rohit Chopra, who will leave the FTC after the Senate confirms him as the newly appointed director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, is known as one of the more prolific commissioners. He has spoken and written extensively in his three years on the FTC including, notably, in a November 2020 paper wherein he called the AMG Capital Management v. Federal Trade Commission case an “existential threat to the agency’s ability to hold wrongdoers accountable.”
The previous month, in a letter to Congress, Commissioner Chopra, joined by the other four FTC commissioners, described Section 13(b) as the primary tool that the FTC uses to return money to consumer victims, and pleaded for Congress to amend the statute so that it would expressly provide for monetary relief.