Has anyone heard anything about this company? They recruit students to sell books door to door in the USA and UK. I have heard rumours that it is a cult like organisation. Any info would be great!

I have searched the internet for information on The Southwestern Company and I have come up with the following links:

[www.gatorpressure.com]
This blog written by a guy who did a summer makes for interesting reading.

[www.streetracing.org]
Half way down the page.

[eusa.ed.ac.uk]
Another forum addressing Southwestern recruiting on campus.

Thats all I have found so far. It concerns me that this company is directly targeting students. Any comments or more information would be appreciated.

I worked for Southwestern Co. for three summers, and part-time recruited for two school years between the summers. What I can say about it is it's hard work; hard physical work, but very hard emotional and mental work. Anyone that can make it through a southwestern summer has become a much stronger person, and I have found that Mentally I am much more "aware" of things, and emotionally I am much tougher. It's not for everyone, but it is an experience that will build a tremendous amount of character if you stick with it and don't give up.

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JMak
Has anyone heard anything about this company? They recruit students to sell books door to door in the USA and UK. I have heard rumours that it is a cult like organisation. Any info would be great!

Don't know about this company specifically, but there is a lot of information avaiable about traveling sales teams and the abuse and exploitation the leaders perpetrate.

This website has a list of articles you can search for. Here is one:

[www.culteducation.com]

Also, another from the www:

[www.parentwatch.org]


Ellen

I worked for Southwestern for five summers. I am not religious or associated with any cults, nor am I attracted to them, unless you consider academia a kind of cult. I'm now a professor.

Southwestern is not for everyone. In fact, very few people have the strength and independence necessary to succeed at it. You have to work really hard, and it makes most sense to see it as a multi-summer occupation. The things I learned my first summer didn't really pay off until my second summer, etc. By the end I made a ton of money. But I didn't at first, and the job didn't get any easier over time. It's a drag to knock on doors all day. That's certain. But as far as I was concerned, it was no more a drag than cleaning fish, or mowing lawns, or painting houses, or manual labor, or typing labels, or any of the other horrors that I experienced and which are accepted as appropriate employment for young people. Those jobs taught me little and paid horrible wages. Sales has proven useful to me time and again: in interviews, in lectures, and most important, in not abandoning my goals. I don't know if I would have made it through graduate school or tenure if I had not the experience of perseverence that SW taught.

As for the organization: it varies with manager and organization. I had smart and decent leaders. That's not true for all. I was respected, for the most part, and I respected, for the most part, the people I worked with and for. I have never much liked working for anyone, and the people I met at SW were among the best colleagues I've ever had. But that's just me.

Regarding cults: there are some revivalist aspects to the training and the Sunday Meetings. The company did start off selling bibles, after all. I found these group experiences to fall somewhere between the silly, the intriguing, and the dull. Much of it is just Jamesian psychology (self-affirmation) with a little Prostestant work ethic. No, I still don't believe that one can will oneself to wealth and happiness. But it is important to believe that one has some control over one's life, even if that control is ultimately an illusion. Fatalism can be self-fulfilling. SW teaches its employees, or independent contractors, the standard run of motivational sales techniques. Most did not work for me. Some did. I found the training interesting and somewhat absurd. A good deal works, and a good deal doesn't. The best managers recognize this.

I consider myself a smart and independent person. Are some people susceptible to peer pressure? Yes. Do some people lose their sense of irony? Yes. Does SW mess with people? No more than any job, I would say, and maybe less. After all, most of the day you are out there, all alone, talking to "Mr. and Mrs. Jones."

The real thing that messes with you is that: America, like every society, is a strange place. SW highlights that oddness. But so do my college and graduate classes. Is it dangerous to think for oneself?

Southwestern is nothing like those magazine scams. You are not indentured, and they don't bus you around. As far as direct sales organizations, it's one of the best. The product is good, the training is decent, if a little absurd, and the people are generally top-notch. That being said, selling anything door-to-door is really hard and not for everybody. It takes a lot of dedication.

The truth is that SW is a great opportunity for some people who want a great challenge and a great reward. I could never recruit many students to the job because most didn't want to work hard. But for those who do, SW is one of the best summer jobs out there. Summer jobs, after all, generally tend to stink. I didn't like SW, but I came back year after year. It sure beat flipping burgers.

Disclosure: The following message is solely my opinion. The information provided is what I witnessed and experienced.

You will hear that this job is not for everyone and that is especially true. I worked for the Southwestern Company during the summer of 2005, had an exceptionally successful Organization and there is not an ounce in my blood that would ever encourage anyone to do the "Southwestern Experience." I'm not going to sit here and call the company a cult. You can decide that for yourself. I will, however, describe for you the effects the company will have on your physical, emotional, and spiritual life if you decide to take "the challenge."

You will hear the leaders in the company say "control the controllables." Well, in truth, there are an infinite number of things to control while you're out on the "bookfield," infinite being the keyword, most of which you can't control. Things happen, you hit and kill someone's dog, you're car breaks down, you become ill, you're raped (and yes, it happens, despite what Southwestern reports). These things that happen, things that are out of our control, they become viewed by the company and eventually by yourself as failures. It begins a pattern of failure in the booksellers. What eventually ends up happening is the students come back to their Head Quarters each night and are encouraged by their peers and student managers to lie about their statistics (how many doors you knocked on, what time you started and stopped). It develops a pattern of lying. Student’s self esteem gets placed in their success, and because a majority of the student sellers are not successful, most students come home with their self-esteem destroyed. Southwestern claims to enhance character, and if patterns of chronic failure and lying are qualities of enhanced character, then they've done their job.

Emotion: It's miserable selling door-to-door. There's fear, anger, hurt, sadness, depression. According to Southwestern, all your emotions are controllable items. The theme is, if your emotions are affecting your production for the company, then they must be turned off. I can't count how many times I heard peers calling other successful bookmen "machines." That's what you become: numb, cold, dry, heartless...a machine. It took until April of 2006, almost a year, before I began to really experience joy again.

Health: There is little time to eat during the day. I did have a full breakfast in the morning at my "breakfast spot" however lunch consisted of a PBJ or even gas station food, and dinner was string cheese inside rolled turkey. My hair fell out in chunks, my skin was constantly blemished, my period was whacked, I lost about 15 lbs on the bookfield, getting down to a weight that was unhealthy for me. You go to bed at about 12:30 each night and wake up at 5:59 every morning. There is no "you" time except for Sunday afternoons spent at a park with your Organization for no more than a couple hours. You loose all sense of yourself because you become a machine for the larger machine: the Southwestern Company. They present the facade that they care about your success; in reality, they just want their share of the profit from your hard work. In fact, my student manager sat down with me to explain the breakdown of the system of profits for the company and myself. It all seemed legit until I was later informed that the student managers would receive commission off of my production. According to what he had just explained, there was no room in the budget that allowed for their commission. Somebody down the line was lying. I later found out that my paycheck at the end of the summer would be 3.42% of what my managers would be making off of my emotional and physical distress.

The product: Southwestern is relentless in the claim that their product is a good "investment." This may be true according to the standards of some school systems. However, after selling the product, I will tell you first hand that Southwestern has cut corners on their product to make more money. The books contain low quality recycled paper, and while the binding may be strong, the cover shows signs of wear soon after purchase. The diagrams are outdated and elementary, and the books really only work if you have the entire set, costing more than $500.

Spirituality: Southwestern's claim to fame is that they helped soldiers get back on their feet after they returned from war by providing "Bibles" for them to sell door-to-door. While this validates the history of the company, management has since changed (it's been over 150 years). My student managers sold me on the idea that the Southwestern experience would bring me closer to God. They say that they make an effort to go to church on Sunday mornings and that weekly morning routines involve group prayer. None of that ever happened. I was removed from my support system, my family, close friends, mentors, pastors, everything that offered support in my life, and spent thirteen weeks in the "desert" so-to-speak. The company is solely out to make money. They've perfected a program that keeps students barely alive enough to meet or exceed profits from the previous year via peer-pressure and brainwashing. At the end of the summer managers said things like, "We know this summer wasn't that fun, and even if you weren't as successful as you had planned to be, there is still an obligation to return next summer and try harder."

Would you like to know what my managers were doing? They were sitting in well furnished offices, playing golf, flying to different parts of the U.S. to give us “Southwestern” rallies. They were dressed in designer clothing, driving imports, and taking long weekend vacations. Rumors floated of six digit salaries for these mongrels as opposed to the average student income of less than five thousand dollars.

The system doesn’t work. That’s what it comes down to. They claim that if you stick to “The Schedule” then you’ll succeed. It places weighty pressure on those students who are sticking to “The Schedule” and not seeing results. The basic idea throughout the company is if you’re not successful, then you’re not following the schedule, and if you can’t follow the schedule, then you’re not a hard worker and you don’t have what it takes to be successful in a real job. I can’t tell you how many times my success in that job was directly related with how well a wife and mother I would be down the road.

Cult? Maybe. Unhealthy? YES! I do not recommend this job to anyone and will gladly provide more information if requested.

Please read this:
[www.durham21.co.uk]

I worked with Southwestern for 3 summers while in college, and their definitely challenges. However, the experience was very rewarding. I learned a lot about sales, business, and myself. The accusations above are quite frustrating. My first summer my diet for lunch and dinner consisted of apples, banannas, green peppers, carrots, and three sandwiches. Students pack lunches and dinners over the summer and thus choose their own diets. To blame a company that has won multiple awards including Nashville's Best in Business in 2006 for your own diet choices seems irresponsible at best and libel at worst.

In regards to attitude, my Southwestern experience was very valuable. Southwestern does not teach people "not to feel", they taught me to not sweat the little things quite so much. 90% of the time during the summer I was rejected, and learning to deal with that and maintain a positive attitude has made me a better businessman, friend, and husband. In the future it will make me a better father. If it is true that you were encouraged to lie about your stats each night, that is a shame. It has always been my experience that being honest with my manager was the most important part of our relationship.

In regards to the managers in Southwestern playing golf all day and never working, that is laughable. My district sales manager while I was selling is now a close friend of mine, and he puts in 60-80 hours a week to help the students that he works with. Also every Sales Manager in the company started out selling books for at least 4-5 summers. Also, the average first year intern makes over $8,000 for a twelve week summer, so it isn't exactly like we were struggling to make it out there. To suggest that most students fail is simply not true.

Finally, the casual nature with which you discuss rape in conjunction with the Southwestern experience is pretty hard to swallow. I have met several hundred women that have worked with Southwestern over the summer, one of whom is now my wife. This is the first time I have ever heard of someone being raped over the summer. If you were, that is certainly tragic. I would never want to make light of a rape case. However, to suggest that this is somehow something that should be expected as a result of working with Southwestern is crazy. Southwestern takes an entire half day of training and devotes it to teaching common sence saftey to the women it works with each year. The fact that 1/4 of all women on college campuses experience sexual assult is one of the most troubling statistics I have ever heard. However, to suggest that high school girls should not go to college and to blame a particular university would be totally unjustified. Before this I have never even heard of a single rape case, and it is certainly no where even close to 1/4! All of my female friends that I have made through this job have told me that they felt way more safe during the summers then they ever did at college.

If a student was considering a Southwestern summer I would certainly suggest they determine whether they are willing to put in the work required to be successful. If they were then I would jump on it. It was one of the most rewarding experiences that I have ever had.

I sold books with Southwestern for four summers as an undergraduate student. Without a doubt it was one of the most challenging yet rewarding experiences I have ever had. I worked really long hours and was exposed to rejection for the first time. But I chose to work that schedule because I wanted to make the most of a summer away from home. I took some guff from buddies back at school for selling books with my summers (not necessarily the most glamorous internship in their minds!) But I would much rather have taken a summer to improve my sales skills and work on my independence than wait tables and live with my parents. Most all of the students I worked with did well with their Southwestern summers, but some kids did quit after a few weeks. It does take some patience to learn how to sell and work the job efficiently and I did have a roomate quit after 2 weeks because he was frustrated. I was frustrated a thousand times my first summer but I'm glad I stuck it out and learned how to do the job. I look back at my experience with Southwestern very positively and know that I will frequently use what I learned selling books. It was definitely NOT a cult. Some of my friends thought I was crazy because I used positive self talk to keep me motivated during the day! So it's easy to understand why someone might think Southwestern students are different. Because they are. If you are a hard worker and can handle a summer away from your buddies, go for it. I'm glad I worked as hard as I did as a college student because I graduated in 2005 debt free from a private school, having made well over $100,000 profit in four summers as an undergraduate history student. But man did I work hard.

Here's a "friendly" blurb about the door-to-door sales business. It might be of some interest to note that Werner Erhard started out as one of these guys and formulated his "est" programs (now Landmark) from his earlier motivational sessions designed to get his people up and moving, pounding the pavement, and perfecting their techniques. The company he worked for, Grolier, was sued by the state of California for fraudulent and deceptive sales practices in 1971.

[www.usatoday.com]

"...Door-to-door sales caught on in the USA in the early 20th century. The practice has waned in recent decades amid a decline in households with a stay-at-home member, evolving state sales rules and rising concerns about privacy. Yet technology has yet to erase the traveling salesperson's stealth weapon: persuasion. "They can make you feel uncomfortable about saying no or good about saying yes," says Walter Friedman, a Harvard historian who wrote Birth of a Salesman: The Transformation of Selling in America. "These are the things ads can't do.""