Karatbars International is most well-known for selling gold as a product. The company started off selling Karatbars that contain one gram of gold. They have since expanded into related areas.
The idea of selling gold through an MLM is… interesting. There is certainly interest in gold. It is often viewed as an investment opportunity, especially for people who are worried about the state of the economy.
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But, if you’re going to purchase gold, buying it from a reputable company makes much more sense.
For that matter, how would you promote a company like Karatbars? Buying gold is a fairly unusual interest. Most people don’t invest in this way. Those that do probably already have a source that they trust.
Two Ways To Make Money With Karatbars International
While gold isn’t the most common MLM product, Karatbars International follows the same practices as most MLMs. You can make money by promoting the products or by building a team as well.
As part of this post, we’re going to examine both areas, along with the overall chance of making money with Karatbars International.
Make Money From Product Sales
The main product that Kartbars International is pretty simple to understand – it’s a piece of gold, in the form of a gold card.
The card is meant to provide a way to easily exchange gold around the world. Karatbars International has moved away from just gold recently and has been focusing on blockchain as well. This has included (for some reason) a Voice-over-Blockchain-Protocol Smartphone IMpulse K1 phone.
I’m not entirely sure why a company focused on gold decided that blockchain and a smartphone were good directions for expansion. I’m sure that Karatbars International has their reasons, but still, an unusual combination of products like this is rarely great for sales.
Karatbars International once had an excessive amount of hype on their site, focusing on the idea that the economy is going to crash and that gold is the real way to store wealth.
The hype has been toned down since then, but the site still talks about how people can “build and preserve a secure existence in the form of gold” and the way that gold is a “stable and secure world currency”.
There’s some hype around the gold they sell, making it sound like it’s “better” than others. But there are many companies that sell gold on the marketplace, all with various quality control techniques. I am not convinced that the gold you receive from Karatbars is any better than others
Its value is certainly going to be the same on the marketplace anyhow.
(A Short Gold Rant From Me)
One thing I don’t like about the gold buying/selling community is that everyone seems to have an ‘end of the world’ mentality.
- The economy is going to crash!
- The next depression is coming!
- The dollar is a fiat currency and worth nothing!
- Paper money isn’t real money!
- Save in gold to store real wealth!
However, these types of sales pitches usually cherry-pick data and present information in a way that makes you want to buy gold, rather than actually understand the facts.
The truth is, if the sh*t hits the fan tomorrow, I’d rather have invested in bullets than gold. Are you going to start stocking up on bullets? Most people aren’t.
Yet we listen to a presentation about how the dollar is going to crash and how we’ll be buying bread with wheelbarrows full of money, and suddenly we want to stock up on gold.
The other thing you need to understand about gold is that yes, it does retain its value over time versus the dollar which loses value. However, that doesn’t mean that gold is a better investment. And don’t forget, there are many other types of investing that can also grow your wealth, most of which are more profitable than owning physical gold.
The value of gold in 1980 was about $850 an ounce. In 2013, reached about $1,700, reaching a high of $1900. Now (2015), it’s about $1200.
What’s the point of all those numbers?
If you had invested in gold in 1980 you might have doubled your money if you bought and sold at the right point. [reference]
If you had invested in stocks and received a conservative 7% return, you would have almost quadrupled your money.
Real estate varies based on location, but the median home price in 1980 was around $65k. Today it’s about $275k. [reference] Again, more than 4x your money’s worth.
In both scenarios, gold was a worse investment vehicle.
Also, consider that this precious metal also doesn’t provide an opportunity for passive income. It does not pay dividends like stocks or have the option of renting it out like a house. It sits in your bedroom or in your office safe doing nothing other than hoping that inflation rises.
Don’t get me wrong, it is smart to have some precious metals in your investment portfolio, but it’s not the life-saving miracle money system that gold sellers want you to think.
Back To Karatbars International…
So does Karatbars International have good products? Well, gold is just gold. The other products are interesting enough, but only to the right audience.
Let’s be realistic. How many people are going to be interested in Karatbars International? Many may not have the money to invest in gold, while others will simply not be interested.
Besides, the gold from Karatbars International tends to be sold for above market value. You are going to have a hard time selling gold for more than it’s actually worth, considering people interested in buying gold are going to be fixated on what the spot pricing is.
So then, what about making money?
The first aspect of note is that you’re selling through a replicated website, so there’s no need to buy and then resell any products.
When you make sales, you make a 10% commission on any direct package sales that you make. That’s it, 10% commission. The commission seems to be just on Karatbars Business Packages. It doesn’t look like you earn money from the sales of any other products, which is slightly absurd.
Make Money Building A Team
As you might expect, there are multiple ways to earn with your team. The first is that you can make a 3% commission off the second level of your team and 2% from your third level.
Like many other companies, there is also a rank-based aspect to the commission scheme. Members start out at the Distributor rank and move up from there. Progressing through ranks is just based on total sales. You don’t need to rely on your team performance or structure at all.
This structure does make it easier to move up through the ranks, but only if you can make a lot of sales. Once you hit the Silver Supervisor rank and above, the sales targets need to be hit every month.
If you do make the targets, then you earn from 0.5% to 3.5% commission from your team as a whole.
The table below shows another aspect of the plan. This time you do need to hit various team goals to make your way up the ranks. The commission rates are higher here. Still, most members wouldn’t get up this far.
We’re not going into the other areas of the plan. The basic pattern is the same as always – to make a decent income, you need to build a successful team, one that is able to successfully recruit others and make sales.
Watch Out For Gold Bugs!
Another thing to consider is that a lot of what you’ll be doing to sell gold is to scare people. This is a common tactic with ‘gold bugs’ as they are called (people who believe gold is the only true money).
Read any pro-gold website or watch a YouTube video on the topic and you’ll get the pitch about how the economy is tumbling, we’re ready for the next depression, and the only people with money in the future are going to be those that are hoarding gold right now.
You’ll see charts forecasting the downfall of the US dollar, and how predictions about how China’s going to take over the world, etc, etc.
The truth is, gold may be a store of wealth, but it only stores it. You cannot go to the store and buy something with a piece of gold anymore. Buying gold is an investment, not a hedge against the end of the world.
Scam Warnings
The other thing you’ll have to battle is all the scam reports on this company. There are lots of affiliates out there trying to sell this product. So many that areas of Canada are starting to send out warnings.
There are also long arguments happening on the internet between scam reporters and affiliates. Is this something you want to be associated with your business as a seller of physical gold? I know I don’t.
Other Comments
If you want to buy gold, get it from a reputable place at a decent price. Two places I recommend are JM Bullion and APMEX. A third-place that seems popular is GoldSilver.com from Mike Maloney. However, because of his association with the notorious scam artist Robert Kiyosaki, I cannot recommend you buy anything from his website
If you want to invest in gold, there are many legitimate places to do it. As far as business opportunity goes, because of the high price of gold and lack of evidence that it’s more valuable than any other type of gold, KaratBars International is not a company I would invest my time or money into.
Can You Generate Reliable Income With Karatbars International?
The Karatbars International Review
Products
Business Opportunity
Final Review
I think buying gold and investing in precious metals is very interesting, and enjoy talking about it. While I'm sure that making money with Karatbars International is possible, I wouldn't ever recommend it. The company's marketing approaches aren't great and convincing people to buy gold would be pretty tough too.
If nothing else, think about how many people would be interested in the products from Karatbars International. Do you have a large enough potential audience?
MLM Critic & Author: Nathaniell
What's up ladies and dudes! Great to finally meet you, and I hope you enjoyed this post. I have to be honest though. I'm not a big fan of MLM. Tried it. Hated it.
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Kancifa
KARATBARS ICO IS A SCAM!
Don’t BUY or PROMOT Karatbars ICO because karatbars is misleading people and are missing a lot of the ICO coins purchased.
I have a first hand experience of this. I purchased Karatbars ICO in April 2018(One year today).
I do not have access to it because karatbars support told me that the coins are missing.
I have asked them how can it go missing when it has been paid for? They never had any answer.
They told me that the coins I purchased in 2018 are missing.
Read reviews here: https://behindmlm.com/companies/karatbars-international-to-launch-karatbank-coin-ico/
This is shocking for a supposed to be a multi-million dollar compamy and they can’t manage people’s $100, $200, $1000 or whatever amount ICO coins you purchased.
As of today 07th April 2019, I am still trying to get hold of somebody from karatbars network to tell me where my KBC ICO purchase is, but nobody seems to know.
Karatbars is not a very good company to do business with. They are scam. They tell you to buy Karatbars ICO.
After you give them your money, you do not and cannot have access to your coins because they are missing, this is my situation right now.
How can that be possible? To me, they are a bunch of scammers. Forward this to Harald Seiz if you know him or have seen him.
Ron Halackna
I am a representative with Karatbars International.
Karatbars International has never claimed that gold is the only way to make money. Gold is not really an investment but a form of insurance against a financial collapse that many financial experts such as Michael Lombardi, James DiGeorgia, David Skarica, Marc Faber, and Jimmy Rogers (none with any ties to Karatbars International0 are predicting.
In addition to gold, I also am in the stock market, real estate, and silver.
I do agree with you that Karatbars International is a MLM. I believe that it fits all of the definitions of a MLM.
You are correct that Karat Bars is a bit more expensive than other sources of gold. However it is made up for by the fact that you can get,, along with the karatbar, an autographed color photograph of an athlete. For example, I received a beautiful color photograph of Bobby (the Golden Jet)Hull with his autograph. It is probably worth a decent amount of money but I could care less about that. As a huge fan of ice hockey and Bobby Hull, I find it priceless and will never sell it no matter how much I am offered
Incidently I also own gold that is not Karatbars.
You make some excellent points but I beleve that Karatbars International is a better business than you give it credit. Thank you.
Dave
Hello
I’ve just read your entire review on Karatbars, and would like to suggest to you that you update it as it’s quite out of date, therefore, full of errors.
To begin with it’s free to open an account whether as a customer or an affiliate, then if you choose you can leave it in the corner for as long as you want. I do people who registered in 2013 and made their first purchase in 2016, no pressure, no hassle, you do what you want.
People, myself included my gold as an investment, however, I bought the Gold Supervisor package which you have listed as $810 (old dated price) but know I source my gold without paying any money for it because other people I’ve introduced are purchasing theirs. So, I could have a lucrative gold stock of tens of thousands of dollars for my original $810 investment in 5 years.
They no longer produce digital format packages and haven’t done for quite some time as it wasn’t a very popular product, therefore it was decided to pull it.
I have no idea if currency is going to crash, or if another depression is coming, however many countries around the world have huge gold reserves because of the value it holds.
The other thing you need to understand about gold is that yes, it does retain its value over time versus the dollar which loses value. However, that doesn’t mean that gold is a better investment. And don’t forget, there are many other types of investing that can also grow your wealth, most of which are more profitable than owning physical gold.
Of course it’s a better investment Why isn’t gold a better investment than the dollar? If you put $1000 in a bank today, it won’t be worth any more than that in real terms in 5 years. Yet do the same with gold and it will be.
Yes it’s true about other investment worth more than gold, real estate for one but how many people today can go spend $275k on a new home.
You can’t generalise on stocks as the product is intangible and where’s your evidence to support a 7% return.
You’ve stated Karatbars don’t provide an opportunity for a passive income?I make a passive income from them, I invested in the package, a one off payment and everyone else I introduce to this that remains active (22 so far) earn me 15% on everything they do, so if one person buys the same as I did, I make something like $120 based on your $810 – I actually made 170euros based on 2016 prices (with just one person) and that money was sent to my prepaid Karatbars card at the end of that week to spend how I choose.
Good point about the spot price for comparing to Karatbars price, but are you aware that to get the spot price you need to invest 100k into one troy ounce which is what the spot price is based on, minimum investment of 100K
Karatbars 1g is more expensive yes, but if you go to a grocery store and buy a packet of crisps, you will pay for that than you would for a multipack so it works the same way. It’s cheaper to purchase Karatbars in 5g cards
Packages prices are an advantage if you consider the value of discount codes that come with your package. The value of each package actually exceeds the cost of the package.
In the next 12 months, consumers will be able to use their Karatbars gold cards to make purchases in the mainstream, it’s already possible to do this in some areas.
The two other places to purchase gold are JM BULLION and APMEX , however neither of these pay you high commissions for referrals and introductions so that’s of no interest to me.
To prove that what I’ve just explained to you is true and accurate, I challenge you to source the same quality of gold with the same or better security features at a lower price and I will give you 500 euros in cash on receipt of the gold you purchased elsewhere. It’s not possible
I’d happily welcome you to my team and help you build a gold business if you’re interested? Just let me know and I’ll give you a link.
Thank you for your time
john
Excellent review.
If i lived in the U.S. i would be investing in numismatic coins from Andrew Gause.
He has a show on every week called “the real world of money” on Patrick Timpone’s one radio network.
At least you wont have to worry about having your coins confiscated like they did back in the last depression.
Nathaniell
I’m not sure I agree with investing in numismatic coins either. There’s a lot of scams, especially made-for-TV ads that run around the same topic. They cherry pick data to make it seem like a good investment to elderly people or those looking for extreme ROI. As an investment, I’d invest in gold before collectors coins. But coin collecting can be a fun hobby and sometimes even profitable!
Jeff Irvine
Alan Greenspan, Former Chairman of the Federal Reserve of the United States: “Gold Is Currency; No Fiat Currency, Including the Dollar, Can Match It”
[Comment Spam Removed]
Nathaniell
That was an amazingly fast and spammy comment Jeff. You must have it down to a science!
I’m not saying there’s no value in Gold. In fact, I would like to invest in it (yes, physical gold. I have some conspiracy theory tendencies myself, despite how the article may sound). However, purchasing gold through an affiliate-diluted MLM company, at a premium nonetheless, is a bad idea IMO.