SISTER Wives stars Meri and Christine Brown’s employer LuLaRoe has been sued for “deceptive practices,” as a new docuseries is exposing the company’s “scam.”
Kody Brown’s wives Meri, 50, and Christine, 49, are retailers for multi-level marketing clothing company LuLaRoe, as they hold multiple Facebook Live sales a week.
Amazon Prime released a new docuseries called LuLaRich that exposes how the company launched a “scam” targeted at work-from-home mothers.
Now, The Sun can exclusively reveal that just months before the four-episode documentary aired, the company was hit with a class action lawsuit for endless chain scheme, unfair and deceptive practices claims, false advertising, violation of California corporations code, and more.
Former retailer Jessica Ponkey, on behalf of 30 others, sued LuLaRoe and founders, Mark Stidham and Deanne Brady, on March 24, 2021.
In the court papers, Jessica calls LuLaRoe an “unlawful, fraudulent pyramid scheme which preys on stay-at-home mothers, promising them they can generate substantial income while still being able to spend time at home with their families.”
The Plaintiff claimed consultants’ primary income was from their ability to recruit others into the “LuLaRoe scheme,” as opposed to the sales of products.
Jessica, and the other consultants, were “doomed from the start” despite their efforts, as the LuLaRoe plan allegedly “systematically rewarded recruiting consultants over retail sales of the product.”
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The Plaintiff claimed this business model allowed “those few at the top (primarily Mark Stidham and Deanne Brady)” to pocket millions.
The court papers alleged: “Stidham and Brady have earned hundreds of millions of dollars in profit for themselves on the backs of women who were seeking a legitimate business opportunity where they could earn income while spending more time with their families.”
Jessica became a consultant in March 2017 up until December 2018 and claimed to have “suffered damages as a direct and proximate result of Defendants’ misconduct.”
She, along with new consultants, must pay an onboarding fee of $2,000 to $9,000 depending on the amount of product.
In the lawsuit, she claimed there was a demand for inventory and the company couldn’t keep up with orders.
This allegedly resulted in consultants receiving “mis-sized merchandise or low-quality merchandise, such as leggings with mismatched pant leg lengths or merchandise that quickly developed holes.”
Despite this, LuLaRoe "continued encouraging inventory loading.”
The court papers continued to allege: “Defendants have engaged in constant unlawful, fraudulent, and unfair business acts or practices, and unfair, deceptive, false and misleading advertising within the meaning of the California Business and Professions Code.
“Defendants made numerous misleading representations about the business opportunity available to the Consultants and the income that a Consultant can realize by becoming a Consultant and participating in the scheme.
“Defendants knew, or should have known, that the representations about the business opportunity presented to Consultants were misleading in nature.
“As a direct result of Defendants’ fraudulent representations and omissions regarding their endless chain described herein, Defendants wrongly acquired money from Plaintiff and the members of the classes.”
The Plaintiffs requested a jury trial and damages for financial losses.
LULAROE RESPONDS
LuLaRoe did not answer the complaint, and instead filed a motion to compel arbitration, meaning for the case to go directly to arbitration to settle the dispute.
The court papers read that the Defendants “will, and hereby do, move the court for an order compelling Plaintiff Jessica Ponkey to mediate, then arbitrate on an individual basis her claims against Defendants in accordance with her agreement with LLR, Inc. and related dispute resolution procedures, and staying this action pending mediation and arbitration of Plaintiff’s claims.”
Jessica responded by claiming the “arbitration provision” is their “get out of jail free” card.
The court papers continued: “Defendants undoubtedly want the case to proceed to arbitration because they know it makes no financial sense for Plaintiff to individually arbitrate her claims when the recovery likely will not exceed the cost of the arbitration—especially given that as part of that arbitration, Plaintiff has waived the right to collect consequential and exemplary damages and attorneys’ fees.”
On August 5, the court granted LuLaRoe’s motion to individually arbitrate because the “arbitration provision in the Policies and Procedures is a valid and enforceable agreement to arbitrate Plaintiff’s claims.”
No new documents have been filed with the court.
DOCUSERIES BACKLASH
The lawsuit makes similar claims as the documentary, which features interviews by Mark, Deanna and former consultants.
The Sister Wives stars have been LuLaRoe retailers for years, as Meri has 105,000 followers on her Facebook group, while Christine has 41,000.
The reality stars have come under fire for still working for the business despite the docuseries.
One Reddit user wrote: "It seems like they, especially Meri, are top earners which means they probably have significant downlines... it's super exploitative and they're just using their fame to sucker people into keeping them rich. They could have definitely funneled all of their fame into figuring out some sort of legitimate business instead.
"I was never a huge Meri fan to begin with, but watching that doc has really soured me on Christine.”
Another added: “They’re lying, scheming and taking advantage of other people. They’re awful.”
A third blasted: “Meri just seems so desperate to belong to something and be someone, and that’s how LLR suckered her in.”
DEFENDING LULAROE
Christine's daughter Mykelti also works for LuLaRoe and even defended the company.
She wrote on Instagram after receiving backlash: “The documentary edited as much as they could to bleed drama. The information in it is all old. LLR doesn’t lie to their new retailers. I wasn’t misinformed at all when I joined. It’s people who are trying to blame others for their own failure.”
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Mykelti, 25, continued to defend the company, as she told a follower that LuLaRoe doesn’t “prey” on their salespeople, arguing: “People are trying to get money without work and then blaming the company when they can’t work their own business.”
She concluded: “Those who are still in the company today are here because they know it’s work and they’re willing to put in the effort and not leave simply because they have to show up.”