Southwestern Advantage

Southwestern Advantage
Private
Industry Conglomerate
Founded 1855
Founder Rev. J. R. Graves
Headquarters Nashville, Tennessee, United States
Key people
 Dustin Hillis, CEO
Spencer Hays, former Chairman of The Executive Committee
Parent Southwestern family of companies
Website www.southwesternadvantage.com

Southwestern Advantage, formerly known as Southwestern Company, is a 160 year old publishing and professional sales training company that recruits and trains college and university students as independent contractors to sell educational books, software, and website subscriptions door-to-door using direct selling methods.

Program

Every year, the company recruits a few thousand American and a few hundred European university students to work as independent contractors who sell educational books, software, and subscription websites during the summer months.[1]

The company operates on a structured multi-level marketing platform where student dealers participating in the program are independent contractors, not employees. The money they earn is solely determined by their sales revenue minus their expenses and the cost of goods sold. They do not receive wages or employee benefits,[1] and the program does not offer any guaranteed pay.[2] Because students hired are independent contractors, they are expected to fully finance their living expenses, food, gas, and rent, even when on company trips. In addition, expenses of the required Sunday meetings with managers paid for by the students themselves. Foreign students must pay for their visas and airfare themselves.[3] Students regularly work 72 or more hours per week, almost twice the upper limit imposed by the Fair Labor Standards Act.[4]

Students provide the company a letter of credit signed by two endorsers, typically the student's parents, in which the endorsers agree to be responsible for up to $500 each if the student fails to pay any money owed to the company at the end of the summer.[1][5] Students entering the program attend a week-long training program in Nashville, Tennessee.[6] They are responsible for the cost of travel and their personal expenses.[7] At the conclusion of the training, students are assigned to a sales area outside their home or school states. Sales areas are predominantly suburban or rural.[8]

According to the anti-human trafficking charity Polaris, organizations often send their recruiters to target unemployed young people and college students with promises of high profits. As independent contractors, Southwestern Advantage avoids the Fair Labor Standards Act's mandates for minimum wage or overtime pay.[9]

Working conditions and income

Students typically have a host family near their sales area, generally alumni, family of other interns, or families found by door-to-door appeals. Housing is not guaranteed by the company.[1][10]

Dealers report working 72 or more hours per week in the field, making 30 or more presentations each day, in addition to time spent on bookkeeping, talking to managers or at sales meetings held each Sunday.[1] According to the company, in 2010 the average first-year dealer who stayed with the program for over 20 days grossed $2,415 per month before expenses,[4] which usually range from $1,500 to $3,000.[1]

Students are taught to indirectly ask if there are other families in the neighborhood who may have small children.[11] Such questions have sometimes been regarded as suspicious, resulting in complaints to local police, close police scrutiny and even an arrest for disorderly conduct.[12] By traveling door to door, students sometimes draw the attention of local law enforcement.[13] Local requirements are reviewed by the company prior to the summer in order to sell products legally, and Southwestern Advantage offers assistance in the event of permit issues. Students are encouraged to leave their cellphones at home to focus on the task at hand, but it is not required.[3]

At the end of the summer, products are shipped to the dealers, who revisit the homes where they made a sale to deliver the product and collect any balance due. Dealers generally pay their living expenses out of the down payments they collect, remitting the rest to the company to cover wholesale costs. Dealers return to headquarters in Nashville, where they settle accounts and receive a check for the season's earnings.[1] Some dealers are invited to return in subsequent years as managers, who recruit their own teams during the school year and earn a percentage commission on the sales of their team, as in multi-level marketing.

Products

Southwestern Advantage publishes and markets educational books, software, and subscription websites. The main product, Southwestern Advantage, is a series of educational reference books targeted to school-age children. The product line also includes software, college prep material, and others.

Lobbying

In 2007, Southwestern Advantage lobbied against[14][15] the Malinda's Traveling Sales Crew Protection Act,[16] an anti-human trafficking bill intended to stop companies from putting their workers in dangerous and unfair conditions.[17][18] The bill was passed, but in a form that applies only to sales workers who travel in groups of two or more.[17]

Bans from campuses

Harvard University banned Southwestern from recruiting on its campus in 1977; four years later Southwestern resumed recruiting despite this ban.[19] In 2005, the University of Maryland banned Southwestern from recruiting on its campus; as of 2009, however, the University continued to receive complaints against the company.[20]

In the UK University of Durham's campus in 2005, the Durham Students' Union, stating that the "Southwestern Company 'experience' is not marketed as openly as it could be, and some students may be misled", banned Southwestern from Dunelm House and mandated the union president "to liaise with Southwestern Books to work towards marketing which is clearer and to ask the company to develop its recruitment process to ensure Durham students are aware of the risks and pressures that the job entails."[21]

The Guild of Students at the University of Birmingham passed a motion in May 2006 banning the company from its premises and encouraging the University to do the same.[22]

In 2010, the University of Idaho announced that Southwestern Advantage is prohibited from recruiting on campus due to misconduct and violation of University and Career Center policies.[23]

A non-binding motion was passed at the 2010 AGM of the Students Association at the University of Edinburgh banning the company from all union premises.[24]

Notable alumni

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 BBB Review of Southwestern Company in Nashville, TN Archived October 11, 2012, at the Wayback Machine., Better Business Bureau
  2. ↑ "Southwestern Advantage Questions & Answers". Southwestern. Retrieved 7/2/2013. Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  3. 1 2 Southwestern FAQs: What else do I need to know about the International Division? Archived December 16, 2008, at the Wayback Machine.
  4. 1 2 "Southwestern Fact Sheet" (PDF).
  5. ↑ Letter of Credit – The Southwestern Company Archived September 11, 2012, at the Wayback Machine.
  6. ↑ 2011 Fact Sheet Archived March 27, 2016, at the Wayback Machine.
  7. ↑ Is there any money up front? Archived March 4, 2016, at the Wayback Machine.
  8. ↑ What about student safety? Archived January 15, 2016, at the Wayback Machine.
  9. ↑ Project Polaris: Knocking at Your Door
  10. ↑ Living Arrangements/Where will they be going? Archived January 15, 2016, at the Wayback Machine.
  11. ↑ Company defends salesman who had license revoked
  12. ↑ Man arrested selling books door-to-door
  13. ↑ Bandera (TX) Bulletin, "An out-of-towner has come a'knockin"
  14. ↑ Student keeps door-to-door sales alive Archived August 8, 2011, at the Wayback Machine.
  15. ↑ Wisconsin: Father, group upset about sales bill
  16. ↑ Malinda's Traveling Sales Crew Protection Act Pounded By Out-Of-State Company Archived March 21, 2012, at the Wayback Machine.
  17. 1 2 Wisconsin Tightens Rules on Sales Crews
  18. ↑ Bill To Regulate Traveling Sales Crews Considered At Capitol Archived March 21, 2012, at the Wayback Machine.
  19. ↑ The Harvard Crimson: Book Company Recruiting Despite Ban By Harvard Archived March 3, 2016, at the Wayback Machine.
  20. ↑ The Diamondback Southwestern Co. still banned from recruiting on campus Archived November 8, 2012, at the Wayback Machine.
  21. ↑ Durham Students' Union - Policy - Southwestern Books Archived August 28, 2011, at the Wayback Machine.
  22. ↑ University of Birmingham - Guild Council Motion - Southwestern on our Campus
  23. ↑ Southwestern Company banned from recruiting at UI , University of Idaho Argonaut
  24. ↑ AGM attracts few, refuses to condemn Millbank violence Archived December 28, 2010, at the Wayback Machine.
  25. ↑ "Representative Marsha Blackburn Biography - Project Vote Smart". Votesmart.org. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  26. ↑ "Go Southwestern, Young Man | Opinion | The Harvard Crimson". Thecrimson.com. 1976-06-01. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  27. ↑ Template:Quoted in the Magnolia Story
  28. ↑ "Several Famous People Held This Trying Summer Job". NPR. 2011-07-15. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  29. ↑ Three Weeks in October: The Manhunt for the Serial Sniper - Charles Moose, Charles Fleming - Google Books. Books.google.com. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  30. ↑ "Welcome Glacier Commercial". Glaciercommercial.com. 2003-11-10. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  31. ↑ E. Thomas Wood (2009-02-27). "Dortch Oldham dies at 89". nashvillepost.com. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  32. ↑ "Rick Perry Bible reference book salesman long before 'The Response' - Maggie Haberman". Politico.Com. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  33. ↑ "40 under 40 2002 - Pages - Crain's Chicago Business". Chicagobusiness.com. 2002-10-30. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  34. ↑ Chu, Kathy (2006-07-21). "College students learn from job of hard knocks". Usatoday.Com. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
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