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And no one is safe.

Looking slick and very pricey, direct sale products are lurking again in the suburbs of our land, where stay-at-home moms hungry for adult contact and extra income now push bakeware, educational toys and other products to friends and neighbors.

Also Today Don't ask, don't sell My parents' experience as network marketers soured me for the new wave of home parties. By Kerry Ose   The family for sale We take a week to examine the ravenous commercial forces that prey on us each day.

Working on a commission-only system, the women are bringing huge profits to a group of companies that use a pyramid-like sales structure to keep them supplied with fresh, unsalaried labor despite rapid turnover.

While statistics show that the odds of financial success for the women who sell are slim, the promise of cash and "a life" remains seductive. These days it is hard to find a mother at home who isn't selling or being pestered to buy Discovery Toys, DK Books or the baking stones, apple peelers and marble rolling pins of the Pampered Chef, which employs an army of "independent kitchen consultants" to sell in living rooms across the nation.

For companies that sell this way, business has "been on a steady rise" for the past decade, says Amy Robinson, a spokeswoman for the Direct Selling Association, whose 150 members include the Pampered Chef; Creative Memories, a scrapbook company; and Discovery Toys; as well as Amway Corp. and Tupperware Corp.

Direct sales in the United States totaled about $23 billion in 1998, says Robinson, up from $22.1 billion in 1997. There were 9.7 million people -- 73 percent of them female -- selling directly to consumers in 1998, up from 9.3 million in 1997.

While there are no figures on the exact percentage of stay-at-home mothers in the direct-sales workforce, they are believed to constitute a majority. Nearly four decades after Betty Friedan urged middle-class women to find fulfilling work outside the home -- whether or not it was financially necessary -- stalwarts of the stay-at-home camp are digging in deeper, looking to supplement family finances while keeping a commitment to be at home with the children.

Direct-sales companies are keenly aware of this dilemma and have made "home business" more attractive than ever, especially to women strapped not only for cash but for a challenge of greater complexity than doing the laundry. The companies talk up fun, friendship and financial independence, and the system they rely on is familiar to anyone (perhaps everyone, at this point) who has had a brush with Tupperware.

Here's how it works: A group of women -- usually stay-at-home mothers -- gathers for a "party" at one of the women's houses, where a "consultant," trained by tapes from her network marketing firm, demonstrates sample products and makes a presentation.

Her show begins with a pitch to her friends to host similar parties. It is a fervent request, often in the form of a testimonial about the benefits of working for the company, that is inspired by the fact that the consultant can only hope to make decent money if she gets a lot of women to sell for her, at which point she gets a percentage of their sales.

Next comes a demonstration of the product (a Pampered Chef consultant will whip up a few dishes using the company's equipment, for example) and a catalog is passed around in an atmosphere of guilt disguised by cheerfulness. Orders -- and checks -- are given to the consultant, who has the goods shipped to the party hostess for sorting and distribution.

The hostess, in return for her trouble, gets a discount on the products she orders. The more the guests order, the more merchandise she gets -- so there's an unspoken agreement that everyone has to buy something. For the consultants -- and the companies -- the real money comes from referrals. If a party attendee hosts her own party, with new friends, the company gets more potential customers.

"It's hardest when you have a friend who's selling these goods, because then you can't just buy something and be done," says one veteran of the circuit who has been to five of the parties in the past year and declined invitations to another two. "You feel totally obligated to have a party, and then you just pray that your saleswoman friend isn't too pushy to your other friends and neighbors. And then you feel bad for inviting the others, since you know they'll feel like they have to buy something."

Next page | High prices and low commissions