Darren Campbell — The FBA Brand Builder: Five figures in, and the costs just kept coming

The joining fee was presented as the investment — everything you need to launch. It wasn't. Once you're in, there's software, there's recommended suppliers, there's sampling, there's ad spend, and every one of them is framed as essential if you actually want it to work. By the time I stopped I was well into five figures with a product that never got traction. The mentors assigned to me clearly hadn't run much themselves; the advice was generic and when I pushed for specifics on my numbers I got platitudes. The thing that annoyed me most was the community. Anyone asking difficult questions about results or refunds quietly disappeared from the group. I was removed after posting about my own numbers, which told me plenty. Ask for the full expected cost from joining to first sale, in writing, and ask what percentage of members reach it.