Is Resorts360 Going Broke?
Big ticket travel membership company Resorts360 appears to be close to falling over and closing down.
After not paying commission to reps for months the above question needs to be asked. The company was unable to pay many affiliates in January and despite the fact they made some payments in March, as I write this there are still affiliates who have not been paid.
The root cause of the problem lies in a catastrophic drop in sales in 2014. Some of the reasons for this were due to their big performing Australian arm taking a downturn no doubt due to a lack of new initiatives coming from the company. CEO and founder Rodger Rutter appeared to go AWOL for much of last year.
‘The fish rots from the head’ is an old saying and is apt here – without sales leadership from the CEO, the troops will soon become demotivated and distracted. Indeed many of their best performers joined other companies including Dubli which in turn weakened their focus and passion for Resorts360.
Sales leaders in the business were unsettled to learn in July 2014 that the company had accepted a takeover offer from mlm travel biz, World Ventures. Once this decision was revealed to the sales leaders there was a palace revolt with many saying they would not be part of the new arrangement. The company backtracked and reverse their decision. But the damage had been done……
This decision betrayed an appalling lack of judgment by Rutter for this reason – World Ventures and Resorts 360 were very different businesses with very different business models. Putting them together would have been like mixing oil and water.
So despite the fact the decision was reversed the seeds of doubt were sown. The leaders were unsettled and some sought to shore up their exposure to this company by investigating and joining other companies. Everything seemed to unravel from there.
To compound the problems being experienced by the company, last year their exclusive agreement with their inventory supplier, Save On Resorts, lapsed due to Resorts360 not reaching pre-agreed performance (that is, sales) benchmarks. Because of this other travel oriented direct sales businesses were able to procure inventory from Save on Resorts, thereby negating the competitive position held by Resorts 360.
It’s a shame to see this happen to a once good company. But as stated the primary cause of the problem can be sheeted home to the CEO and founder, Rodger Rutter, who totally lost the plot.
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