For years, Amway has relied on polished events and carefully scripted success stories to project stability and opportunity.
Behind the scenes, however, critics and survivors have documented a culture where hype often outweighs reality, and compliance rules are bent to keep recruits inspired.
When Leaders Say “We Messed Up”
At the 2025 Amway Summit in Lousville, Kentucky, Double Diamonds Larry and Pam Winters — founders of Leadership Team Development (LTD) — stood before thousands and lied. Later, in a released video, they were forced to retract their lies and state:
“We messed up, plain and simple. During our presentations…our words and our videos crossed a line. We violated Amway’s QA content standards and the rules of conduct. And that’s on us. Not LTD, not the team, not Amway.“
For outsiders, this may sound like complete jargon. For insiders, it’s extraordinary. The Winters are not fringe figures; they are central architects of Amway’s motivational empire. Their admission confirms what critics have long argued: compliance rules are routinely broken to keep hype alive.
What Is Amway?
Amway is one of the world’s largest multi-level marketing (MLM) companies. MLMs sell products through networks of independent distributors, who recruit others to join. The pitch is entrepreneurship, but critics argue the structure resembles a pyramid: only those at the very top make significant money, while most participants lose financially.
And here’s the historical twist: Amway helped change the laws so MLMs wouldn’t be classified as pyramid schemes. In the 1970s, Amway faced scrutiny from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The company successfully argued that because it required distributors to sell products to end consumers (not just recruit), it was different from a pyramid scheme. That legal precedent carved out a protected space for MLM schemes, allowing the industry to flourish under the banner of “direct selling.”
This means Amway’s compliance rules — including the Quality Assurance Standards (QAS) — aren’t primarily about protecting consumers. They exist to protect Amway’s legal standing and reputation, ensuring the company can continue to operate within the loopholes it helped create.
Who Are Larry & Pam Winters?
Larry and Pam Winters are an elderly couple who are known in Amway as top leaders, positioned as Double Diamonds. This is a prestigious rank in Amway, signaling high recruitment and sales volume.
They founded the Leadership Team Development (LTD) which is a “tool system” that sells motivational books, recordings, and tickets to large events. LTD generates millions, not from selling Amway products, but from selling belief — training and hype that distributors are pressured to buy.
If you are new to anti-multi-level marketing content, think of LTD as a parallel business: instead of making money from vitamins or cleaning products, leaders profit from selling hope and motivation to their downline.
The Confession
The Winters listed their violations in detail, stating:
“We shared extraordinary earnings and lifestyle claims, which is never allowed.”
They suggested recruits can make lots of money, when in reality most earn little or nothing.
“We mispositioned the Amway opportunity by making it sound easier than it is.“
Making Amway sound easy, when success requires years of recruiting and spending.
“I diminished time and effort by implying success can come fast and oversimplified the work involved.“
MLMs often claim it takes little time and effort to become successful, but success never comes this easily.
“We oversold LTD, the team, and upline mentorship as a key to guarantee all success.“
Promoting their own tool system as the secret to success, even though it mainly enriches top leaders.
“We incorporated religious projection and faith-based promotion…overshared personal beliefs in a business setting.“
Mixing faith with business to create emotional pressure, blurring boundaries between belief and commerce. We call this faith manipulation.
The Winters’ apology validates survivor testimony:
- Consumer Protection Myth: QAS isn’t about protecting recruits — it’s about protecting Amway’s liability.
- Survivor Validation: Former distributors who spoke out about false promises now have public proof.
- Systemic Risk: A company that cannot enforce compliance at its highest levels undermines its own credibility. Especially when that company is the reason these businesses are legally able to operate to begin with.
The Language of Damage Control
This apology wasn’t just about words; it was about performance. Their delivery carried the hallmarks of a corporate mandated confession: stiff body language, scripted phrasing, and repeated emphasis on compliance. To many viewers, it looked less like a heartfelt admission and more like a video recorded under pressure, a ritual of contrition designed to protect Amway’s image rather than to repair harm.
Psychologically, this kind of apology serves several functions:
- Reasserting Authority While Appearing Humble
By saying “We messed up, plain and simple” and “That’s on us. Not LTD, not the team, not Amway,” the Winters take personal blame — but in a way that shield the corporation. This is a classic compliance tactic: leaders absorb the heat so the brand can remain untarnished. - Performing Obedience
Their repeated pledges — “We embrace Amway’s rules of conduct and QAS 100%” — sound like vows of loyalty. In psychology, this resembles re-commitment rituals in high-control groups, where members must publicly reaffirm allegiance after a breach. The apology becomes less about truth and more about demonstrating submission. - Minimizing Harm Through Framing
Calling the scandal “a bump in the road” reframes systemic violations as temporary mistakes. This is a cognitive strategy to reduce perceived severity, encouraging followers to see the issue as minor and forgivable. - Forced Contrition as Image Management
The Winters’ tone and pacing suggest they were not speaking freely. The video has the feel of a compliance exercise — a performance required by Amway to show regulators and recruits that the company enforces its rules. In psychology, this aligns with impression management: shaping perceptions through controlled displays of remorse. - Emotional Leverage
By mixing apology with reassurance — “You deserve leadership who leads you well” — they appeal to followers’ need for stability. This blends guilt with comfort, a tactic often used in high-control environments to keep audiences loyal even after trust is broken.
What makes this apology so striking is how it contrasts with survivor accounts. Former distributors describe years of exaggerated promises, relentless upselling of tools, and pressure to conflate faith with business. The Winters’ video acknowledges those very tactics — but only after they became impossible to deny.
This is the psychology of manufactured authenticity: leaders admit just enough wrongdoing to appear transparent, while framing violations as isolated lapses rather than systemic practices. Survivors know better. These behaviours aren’t just exceptions, they are the rule.
MLM Compliance Doesn’t Work
Since 1979 when Amway faced the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over allegations of operating a pyramid scheme, MLMs have had a legal loophole that allows them to flourish. Amway has relied on compliance standards like QAS not primarily to protect consumers, but to protect itself. These rules are designed to demonstrate to regulators that Amway enforces discipline — even when enforcement is selective and reactive. The Winters’ apology fits neatly into this pattern: a public display meant to reassure regulators and investors, not to address the harm done to recruits.
Behind the corporate language are real people. Distributors who attended the Summit were told success could come quickly, that mentorship guaranteed results, that incentive trips were within reach. The Winters now admit those claims were misleading. But for many, the damage is already done: money spent, trust broken, faith exploited. Especially since this video was hidden behind a paywall and we only received it because Meggan Lanahan posted it on her YouTube Channel.
This is why survivor-centered analysis matters. The apology validates what former distributors have said for years — that hype, exaggeration, and manipulation are baked into the system. Yet it also shows how little accountability exists. Leaders can admit wrongdoing, undergo “retraining,” and return to business as usual, while recruits bear the financial and emotional fallout.
The Winters’ apology is not an isolated event. It reflects the broader dynamics of MLMs:
- Recruitment over sales: Success depends more on recruiting than selling products.
- Tool systems: Leaders profit from selling motivational materials, draining recruits financially.
- High-control tactics: Mixing faith, obedience, and loyalty into a business setting creates emotional leverage.
- Damage control rituals: Apologies are staged performances to protect the brand, not the people.
What This Reveals
The Winters’ apology is not just a confession — it’s a window into how Amway sustains itself. Success stories are scripted, compliance is selectively enforced, and the real profits flow upward.
And here’s the deeper irony: Amway helped rewrite the rules so MLMs wouldn’t be called pyramid schemes, then built compliance standards to protect itself from scrutiny. When its top leaders admit to breaking those very standards, it exposes the truth survivors have long known — the system is designed to protect the corporation, not the people inside it.
The Amway Summit scandal is not closure. It’s confirmation. Once you’ve seen behind the curtain, you can’t unsee how the show is staged.
Copyright Strike Update
Since the writing of this publication, the entity within Amway known as “Leadership Team Development Inc” has false copyright struck the YouTube channel that uploaded Larry and Pam’s apology video. So far, the content creators who have reacted to the video have not been struck but we will keep you posted. This is a silencing tactic Amway is using to try to suppress what occurred from the public. Remember this video was under a paywall and now is no longer. Any updates will be added here in future. We are unsure if the claim is being fought.
By Beth Gibbons (Queen of Karma)
Beth Gibbons, known publicly as Queen of Karma, is a whistleblower and anti-MLM advocate who shares her personal experiences of being manipulated and financially harmed by multi-level marketing schemes. She writes and speaks candidly about the emotional and psychological toll these so-called “business opportunities” take on vulnerable individuals, especially women. Beth positions herself as a survivor-turned-activist, exposing MLMs as commercial cults and highlighting the cult-like tactics used to recruit, control, and silence members.
She has contributed blogs and participated in video interviews under the name Queen of Karma, often blending personal storytelling with direct confrontation of scammy business models. Her work aligns closely with scam awareness efforts, and she’s part of a growing community of voices pushing back against MLM exploitation, gaslighting, and financial abuse.
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