What do you think of a company that relies on getting information about your children from your neighbors without your consent?
A college-aged woman knocked on our door and said she was visiting every child’s home in our school district to provide resources for our children to use to complete homework. she invited her in. it was also hot outside, and she had left the distinct impression that she was employed by our school district. She showed me her list of names and she told me that she had to visit every family in the assigned section of her district.
You are reading: Southwestern books door to door
the charade that she was associated with the school district continued, even when I asked direct questions about it. she would not say “no, I am not from her school district nor am I an employee of her school district”. until I asked him directly “were you sent by our school district and are you employed by them?” instead, she said she was interning for “them” (a deliberately vague pronoun meaning her company, rather than the school system), and was brought in from colorado while interns from our area of the state were sent there as part of the program. she said it was for college credit.
He asked personal questions about my wife, me, our house, our children, and details about our children’s education. she did all of this under the (technically unreported) guise of being an official of the local school district. she had tricked us into sharing conversational information with someone who misrepresented herself.
edited to add: when the salesperson got the affirmation that our daughter would attend the school she was listed in, the saleswoman immediately made it appear that she had a personal relationship with the principal of that school. he named her, asked if we knew her, then referred to her by her first name and said he was a wonderful person and we didn’t think so. again the inference that she had been sent by this director in an official capacity, representing our school.
relaxed on what became an increasingly obvious sales pitch. sold reference books for families “who prioritize education.” I asked her how she got our name and address and she evaded a couple of times before saying that she asks about the neighbors of other houses she visited. She gave the names of several of our neighbors, and indicated that the one next door told them that we had small children and that we had a particularly strong interest in her education.
The new next door neighbors don’t even know our names. they may know we have kids because they see us walking with them, but they can’t even see our house from where they live and they certainly don’t know anything about our educational priorities. they moved in less than 6 months ago and are on their own, we thought they were moving the house (because of all the work they immediately did to it) so we didn’t greet them when they first moved in. In short: she was lying.
I told him we don’t know those neighbors. she dodged some more and then said, “they know you have kids.”
then he told us: “I’m going to show you the books, then you tell me yes or no if you want them or not, okay?”. he seemed to be asking us to agree beforehand not to ask any questions about them that weren’t answered by his brief introduction.
He showed us the books. They apparently have selections for all stages of primary education. the sample he showed us was a vocabulary dictionary for children preparing for primary school. he used the entry “cow” as an example, while explaining that it had been developed in part by someone associated with Sesame Street programming. Turns out you picked a bad entry to begin with.
The definition of “cow” was (this is from memory): an animal that eats grass and produces milk in a way we don’t understand.
I said, “That’s really weird wording. Milk production is well known. That’s really weird. It sounds like a deliberately unscientific way of presenting information to a child.”
She had no answer for this, and closed the book. She seemed to know at this point that we were not going to spend any money on her products. she went through all that work to get into our house under false pretenses, then she showed us an example of her “educational materials” of hers that was the equivalent of “no one knows where the electricity comes from.”
here is the result of two minutes of online research – google: how cows produce milk:
I was curious to see more, but I knew it would be a waste of time, and Mom was eager to get her out to stop the craziness and awkwardness of the whole encounter. I wish I had taken a closer look at these so-called reference books.
turns out southwestern books are widely described as a scam. vendors can earn tuition money by working hard, away from home, dishonestly and deceitfully. The company was founded by selling Bibles door-to-door using these techniques, and its founder is a Baptist minister. Some student unions have banned Southwestern due to “improper business actions” and there is controversy over the terms agreed upon by its workforce.
I care less about students tricked into looking for a scam like a summer job and more about how they extract private information from neighbors under false pretenses.
learn about these guys. tell your friends about them. If someone is talking to you, whatever you do, don’t let them search you for private information about your family, friends, and neighbors.
my first impression was that he had someone announcing a religion at my door (he had a big cross on his necklace), he said otherwise and showed me some papers to make sure I was next in line on his list of families in our school district. she said that she was here to help us prepare for the upcoming school year, and strongly implied that she was in an official capacity not only endorsed by, but part of, our local school district. It turns out that she was selling a product, in a more insidious way than she had encountered so far, which represents that they are the standard in educational reference materials and implies that they are endorsed by our school district.
buyer beware!
some links to more information about the Southwest:
(from southwestern’s own website – Emphasizes how they rationalize what they do by saying they have the right to sell you things in a misleading but technically legal way. The comments are worth reading as they indicate that sellers are ultimately instance, the only ones being scammed)
I’m including this link to be inclusive…it’s a question “are southwestern books a scam?” on a homeschool site. with positive responses followed by “blessings” as a common place of departure, I think it’s clear that some homeschooling families are happy with them, particularly (?) religious ones. I can’t speak to the quality as well as I would like. the book i saw called milk a mystery beyond comprehension. If my son’s first grade teacher said that milk is a mystery beyond human comprehension, I would have to meet with that teacher and probably his supervisor. there are books on the southwest line that claim to explain why leaves change color; I can’t tell you what answers they give. I’m just guessing when I assume they say it’s unexplained (extrapolating from my abbreviated experience with the product line).
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I think this article is also of interest, again, from the Southwest site:
of the article:
“the headline read, “residents warned of book scam”. the article was actually the school district informing the community that the person selling educational books in the area was not endorsed by the district. With the misleading title, the article actually caused a problem for the legitimate college student who ran her business selling books from the Southwest Company.”
The next day, under pressure from southwestern, the paper published what amounted to a retraction, declaring the sales legitimate.
do you follow what happened there? Southwestern sales scripts push fast and hard to give the impression that the salesperson is working for the school district, without even saying so. the district wanted to warn that this was happening, but that fact doesn’t technically make the book sale a scam, it makes the sale technique technically legal while relying on misconceptions to entice the seller. the (apparently effective) hope is that you forgive the misunderstanding, attribute it to yourself instead of what the seller said (really misleading as the seller certainly guides you to fill in the blanks incorrectly), and then pay 400 dollars for a dozen books that appear to be shockingly poor educational materials, while pushing an agenda consistent with the motives of the founder and the (Republican) politicians the company funds.
In a few words: milk is magic.
no wait, long story short: a company can still be a scumbag if the way it cheats its customers is technically legal.
update 7/29/10 –
here’s someone else’s account – I’m pasting it directly from my comments:
I just had a visit and decided to google the company. thanks for posting this they approached me exactly like you said, making it look like they were employees of the school district. we are homeschoolers so I immediately assumed the district was looking for information. she asked very personal questions and I became skeptical. she wanted the specific curricula we use, what kind of grades my kids get. it just seemed like a very invasive line of questioning. I didn’t invite her in, but I forced her to give her speech on my front porch. I told her that she couldn’t make purchasing decisions without my husband and she wanted to come back. I finally got rid of her, but not before she asked me about my neighbors. I know who they are, when they are home, etc. but I just told him that I *think* they might have kids. Now I feel like I shouldn’t have said anything.
I just called my district’s public relations department and hope they can do something about people misleadingly using their name to sell books.
I’m really shocked by the description of a perfect stranger, posing as a school district agent, asking people about their neighbors’ kids and when they’re home – – I mean, how obviously outrageous you can be in this day and age? is this standard practice for a successful company? Obtain private information from neighbors? who’s to say they don’t then come to rob these houses, following the information shared (from well-meaning neighbors) about when people are and aren’t home?! really crazy.
thanks for the comment, and I will keep this post open for continuous updates as it is well traveled and informative about a company in serious trouble.
new update 8/9/11:
Beware of these people asking for a drink and using your bathroom. several people are commenting on this common behavior among their southwestern agents. It sounds harmless enough, but it’s clearly a way for an agent to further infiltrate your home and collect more private information about you and your family (the contents of your medicine cabinet, the layout of your bedrooms and windows, etc.).
If another southwestern agent comes to my house, I plan to call the police.
It’s not enough to kick them out: they take advantage of our communities and of gullible people who give private information about others. there is no way a business model like this will work in today’s world – it’s a testament to how lonely people are at home with their children, poor educational standards, and ignorance about potential abuses of private information . driving these underprivileged students out of their homes to make desperation their primary motive to dishonestly sell shoddy materials is despicable and should never be rewarded. any money spent on these materials is money used to continue this abuse, not to benefit poor students.
At the time of this update, over 6,400 people have come here to view this information.
update 3/30/12:
In response to some rude messages from vendors in the Southwest, I thought I’d share a few more links to help those who come looking for information.
History is repetitive. a family that takes offense at sales techniques and is rightly suspicious of people who come to them asking for private information about neighborhood kids and when their neighbors are home. They inform local parents and the police, and if the news does make it to the local media, Southwestern takes the time to do damage control that doesn’t address anything dishonest in its approach. apparently it’s still profitable for them to put out stray fires, and ultimately people don’t care enough to spread the word about the southwest for change.
helpful information about southwestern from better business bureau:
information for clients:
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By federal law, customers who purchase Southwest products from student distributors have three days from the date of purchase to cancel their order. Saturday is included by federal law as a business day. southwestern is a third party to the contract between the students and the client and can only act on behalf of the student within the three-day cooling-off period.
After ordering products, be sure to save the purchase receipt the student gave you. it is a contract with the student of their intentions to purchase the product. If in the event you do not receive the product you ordered, Southwestern will guarantee delivery if you have a valid receipt. call southwestern’s customer contact center at 888-551-5901 or email customercontactcenter@southwestern.com.
alternative trade names
the hadden group, southwestern company, southwestern publishing, southwestern business resources, sbr southwestern business resources, southwestern advantage
update 5/24/12:
A recent Southwest “inmate” posted about how the police advised her to leave the show. here is a sample of your post:
This is a horrible company that preys on young people. I am so grateful that the police talked me into leaving and I wish I had found this blog before I agreed to do so. At the very least, they need to find a way (perhaps a buddy system) to keep students safe and they need to be much more transparent about their operations and charges. it’s amazing that this company can get away with everything they do. it’s disgusting that they can work someone 80+ hours a week and not pay them at least minimum wage when that person doesn’t make a sale (which, other companies do, but because this is considered an “internship “, this does not apply).
“Interns” (they can’t legally be called employees, because then they would be assured of minimum wage) are all too often well-meaning college students trying to take the financial burden off their parents’ shoulders, while putting their parents in jeopardy. themselves in ways parents would never approve.
update 6/8/12
The Southwest company itself (or some of its enterprising “interns”) have been trying to post promotions for the company on this page. if the posts were responses to the op’s contents or comment threads, I’d be happy to approve their inclusion (minus the half dozen links to sw subscription/promotional sites online). they’re not, so it’s not happening.
Also, there is one particularly foolish person who has repeatedly tried to post the accusation that this blog is run by a competing bookseller. by all means, check out the blog. Find a single reference to any Southwestern sales network, publisher of educational materials, or other potential competition. she (assuming gender) yells to the rafters that it’s obvious, says to check the comment thread, etc. I did, and continue to do so every day despite claims that it doesn’t happen and that I’ve misrepresented something.
This person also claims that this is the only place online where someone has something bad to say about southwestern, ignoring the 20+ internal links that prove otherwise, and all the online communities dedicated to exposing this company for what it is. It is (some run by alumni, happy to describe how difficult it was to leave and overcome the lasting damage of SW’s influence on their lives). she says that her posts not including hers are mysterious, suspicious, proof that she is right. I hate to burst her bubble (just kidding, I kinda like that part).
Another asked, in an unpublishable tirade, why I would keep this web post after only one encounter with southwestern vendors. The answer is: because thousands of people visit each month to search for the information. I wish the information had been more easily obtained when I did my own web search the day my home was compromised by someone claiming to work for our school district. maybe one day it will make sense to you. when you have kids, maybe you’ll understand if someone comes into your home telling lies designed to play on your parenting instincts. it might annoy you when they show a disturbing amount of information dishonestly collected from your neighbors, about your kids, your job, and your daily schedule. It struck me then, as now, how destructive such an intrusion could be to someone less prepared to question the sales pitch. for someone who gleefully takes the seller’s word for it when he claims to be a friend of the director sent to talk to us about our children.
I’m surprised you even ask me why I find this page valuable. It’s a rare day when fewer than 50 people visit to learn what I’ve learned, often sharing that the exact same thing happened to them. for that.
update 7/28/14
hi, it’s been a while since I signed up and there was a huge backlog of comments to approve. As I mentioned earlier, the company has vendors who felt this is the place to promote the program (perhaps following the “there’s no such thing as bad PR” philosophy), and I don’t publish those posts. the posts come with positive experiences with the company (both from employees and customers), and I include those that seem genuine and are not insults. Okay, this takes discernment, and I’m not claiming it’s something I can do without bias, but I’ve tried to be fair.
Apologies to anyone who may have been interested in seeing their comments included, or to people looking to see more current comments. a new software development seems to be that they now have business cards. as far as I know, there have been other similar improvements. I found it hard to believe that such a sales model worked 4 years ago; the fact that it works today is fascinating. surely, they are adapting their approach to a more tech-savvy consumer base. if you want to post what these changes have been, in the comments, I encourage you. At a certain point, fooling people has to do more harm than good. especially in an era where claims can be verified on your smartphone while the seller is talking to you.
judging by nearly a thousand hits a day during some stretches of the summer, sellers are still around and people are still trying to figure out if they’re legit. I hope this page has continued to be a valuable resource for people deciding whether or not to engage with them as potential clients or employees.
update 4/1/18
again, I haven’t stopped to post comments in a long time. I’m sorry that those of you who take the time to write down a helpful experience or perspective may feel like it didn’t see the light of day, in the end it does!
I think* their business model is dying out more and more as people are doing background checks and becoming smarter consumers, but as long as this information is still useful, I’ll keep it up.
I couldn’t maintain this post and also continue the blog in a way that felt safe or responsible. the vitriol and attention make it clear that I could reasonably expect to face repercussions against myself and my family if the commenters saw an opportunity to attack us. indirectly, no doubt, the southwest has cost us that option.
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