The MLM-structured beauty brand is moving into an affiliate-commission structure, and people are upset.
This week, Seint Makeup, a brand founded in 2013 by Cara Brook, announced that starting in October, it will abandon its multi-level-marketing strategy and instead adopt an affiliate-commission structure and program. This angered many people online; here’s why.
First, What Is Seint Makeup?
Seint Makeup (originally Maskcara Beauty) was founded to create products that were simple and could be useful for all types of natural beauty. “Helping others look beautiful is nice, but helping them believe they are beautiful is life-changing,” the brand’s website says. The products include your everyday beauty products: affordable bronzer, highlight, contour, and palettes; an array of makeup brushes; and skin care, such as a cleanser, toner, moisturizer, and more. The reviews online are mixed: Some artists rave about it, while others say the shade ranges were horrible and that the quality of the products wasn’t the best, especially for the price.
The brand introduced an artist program in 2017. “Have your cake and eat it, too” is how it described the program to makeup artists. The program was rooted in artists and influencers sharing the products they love and use with their audiences, thus creating a multi-level-marketing (MLM) business. Think Mary Kay and Avon; it’s a marketing strategy companies use to enlist distributors and encourage them to sell products and recruit new distributors. It’s notoriously considered a scam because of the pyramid-scheme recruiting process.
Why Are People Angry at Seint Makeup?
The announcement this week angered artists who have been working with the brand for years: “Artists will no longer receive compensation for recruiting or team building efforts; instead, they will be exclusively rewarded through our affiliate program based on their dedication to sales and exceptional customer service,” the brand said in an Instagram post late yesterday. The comments have been shut off on the post, but artists have expressed their frustrations.
Sarah Aulbrook, a Seint makeup artist, took her thoughts to TikTok. “A lot of people are emotionally in it right now, and it’s hard when you suddenly have your income ripped from underneath you,” she said. But she herself doesn’t seem fazed by the news because she claims she never treated it as a “team-building thing.” “I didn’t do the MLM part of MLM; I did the affiliate version, which is what it’s transitioning into, so it doesn’t affect me at all, thankfully … the makeup’s not going anywhere, the makeup is still a great product. It’s not changing at all, as far as I know,” she continued. When a commenter asked for a reason the brand has decided to move away from MLM, Aulbrook responded, “Not in any detail.” On her Instagram, Aulbrook is seen on trips to Mexico with top-selling Seint artists. “Artists need to sell roughly $35,000 USD within 6 months to qualify for this trip. So everyone here worked their butts off and are so deserving,” one of her captions read as she posed in the ocean. One friend of a Seint makeup artist posted a video of her throwing all of her Seint products out with text reading, “Don’t screw my friends over! You’re pathetic Seint/Cara Brook.”
A podcaster named Jill, who often leads anti-scam and MLM discussions, shared her thoughts that MLM schemes are not as lucrative as they once were in the days of Cutco knives and Tupperware parties: “They’re not able to recruit at the high numbers they used to back in the ’80s, ’90s, and early 2000s. Gen Z and Gen Alpha are just not buying it and not buying into the messaging, which, as a millennial, I’m really proud of them.” Jill also mentioned that she heard Seint had its top leaders sign NDAs and that they weren’t allowed to tell their teams about the changes and announcements coming.
Three years ago, a Reddit user started a thread pleading for help. “Help me get out of Seint beauty ????,” the thread is titled. “I signed up because I had a lapse in judgment and I fell for the social media marketing. Some of these girls make it seem so glam and they look amazing, have tons of money it seems and all these followers. I hate the makeup. It’s terrible and I can’t sell this to a single soul. I also don’t believe in MLM at all, so I’m not sure why I did it. But there isn’t anywhere on the website that I can cancel,” she said. Other former sellers advised her to email Seint to cancel, but she resorted to canceling her bank card that her Seint account was attached to.
