Kangen Water: Why the Secrecy?

When I see a Help Wanted ad in the newspaper or online, I want to know the name and type of company whose ad I am reading. I really don't think it's too much to ask, do you? Apparently, some companies don't want you to know who they really are and what their company is about until they feel they've got you hooked.

One group like this are the people selling Kangen Water ionizers, made by Enagic.

Enagic jumped on the "ionized water" fad that actually got started in Japan and spread over to the United States some years ago. For whatever reason, some people simply don't believe that ordinary water is enough and they want that glass with a little something extra. In this case, they want their body to be more alkaline than acidic, in the erroneous belief that they will prevent or cure numerous illnesses - including cancer - by keeping their body's PH on a more alkaline side.

For one thing, your body has its own internal mechanism for maintaining a healthy balance between acidic and alkaline in your bloodstream and tissues. Furthermore, none of the claims made by the people and companies advocating an alkaline diet or the consumption of alkaline water have been substantiated by science. In fact, this pseudoscience - sometimes referred to as the "Acid-Ash Hypothesis"- has its roots in the works of French physiologist, Claude Bernard, who lived almost 200 years ago. I'm no doctor, but I think it's a safe bet that medical science has improved quite a bit since Doctor Bernard's day.

I'm not going to dig into exactly why this whole thing is bullshit, since others have already taken care of that far better than I could. When the only people advocating drinking ionized water are the people selling you water ionizers, a wise person should be able to connect the dots for themselves.

No, what this blog is about are the extraordinary lengths people are going through in order to lure others into joining in on a multi-level marketing (MLM) scheme to sell Kangen water ionizers. Enagic itself touts the benefits of becoming a distributor very openly on their website. But, there's somebody or a few sombodies out there making it rather difficult for you to figure our who they are and what they're about until you've given them a chance to make their sales pitch.

Here's how these people are working this:
1) start with an ad on Craigslist that makes gigantic promises regarding how much money you can make without mentioning either the name of the company or what kind of product it sells;
2) the ad provides readers with a phone number to call;
3) you call the number and listen to a recorded message which, again, doesn't mention either the name of the company or the type of product. Instead, the company is referred to as "our firm" or "the firm";
4) the recording directs you to a website on which a YouTube-linked video plays in which, after several minutes, you finally learn the name of the company and product.

I found several ads posted on Craigslist in Honolulu in an attempt to recruit Kangen distributors, each with a different script, a different phone number and each of their recordings pointing you to a different website. This is an awful lot of trouble to go through, unless you have something to hide.

Seriously, Craigslist ads looking for Herbalife distributors are pretty upfront about it. Not so much with Kangen distributors.

The ads are posted on Craigslist sites all across the United States, with such headlines as:

• WORK FROM HOME & RETIRE IN 3 YEARS AT OVER $40,000/MONTH FOR LIFE!
• WORK FROM HOME & RETIRE IN 3 YEARS AT OVER $60,000/MONTH FOR LIFE! ($0 OUT OF POCKET TO START + $2,700/SALE)
• ONLY INBOUND CALLS - WORK AT HOME - NO OUT OF POCKET COST TO START (TO $2,700/SALE + LIFETIME PROFIT SHARING)
• WORK FROM HOME-EAGER PROSPECTS CALL YOU- EARN UP TO $2700 PER SALE (NO COLD CALLING, CUSTOMERS CALL YOU)

Here is a partial list of the phone numbers given in the ads posted that I have seen. You may notice that there are almost as many websites listed as there are phone numbers. That isn't quite true, since there are a few that repeat. But, an exhaustive list of phone numbers and websites would take a great deal of time to compile and make this list very long. I present this list of what I have found to date, the phone numbers posted in the Craigslist ads and the websites which the recorded messages tell callers to visit:

(202) 540-1918  theanswertosucceed.us

(215) 234-1001 asecureretirement.us

(215) 240-7494 theplantosucceed.biz

(215) 305-8909 planactsucceed.info

(303) 351-0567 theanswertosucceed.us

(312) 436-1463 thewinningplan.us

(313) 243-1121 apathtosucceed.us

(321) 203-1833 thiswaytosuccess.us

(360) 215-7340 yourwaytoretire.us

(602) 734-4424 yourwaytoprosper.us

(615) 212-6911 thewinningformula.us

(617) 209-4897 yourfreedomformula.us

(617) 245-0655 realfinancialsecurity.us

(626) 200-1845 wantsuccesswatchthis.us

(646) 217-4249 asecureretirement.us

(720) 263-5770 realsecurityishere.us

(727) 288-2427 yourwaytowin.us

(800) 470-4876 thiswaytosuccess.biz

(800) 691-3977 winninggameplan.biz

(800) 844-3290 thewinningsystem.biz

(800) 995-0785 yourway2succeed.com

(913) 232-2608 theroadtosuccess.biz

(916) 209-4326 theanswertosucceed.us

(919) 241-3132 thewinningformula.us

(949) 202-5606 successishere.us

(972) 338-9736 thestrategytosucceed.us

I have reason to believe that there are over 300 separate phone numbers, with over 300 separate websites. That reason is explained next.

All of the above-mentioned websites serve as redirects to a YouTube video on this channel: A Lucrative Income & Real Long Term Security, which does not show-up in a search of the site. The majority of the videos are simply copies of this one, though another video also has a few copies of itself on the channel.

It doesn't say much for the channel's confidence in his product that he disabled comments on any of his videos. Typically, people who do this have a rather thin skin when it comes to criticism. By comparison, I allow most comments to post on this blog, with the exception of posts in which someone is either advertising a product or posting racist commentary.

I believe that each of these phone numbers and their accompanying website are the work of one person: Donald Gillete. Mr Gillette owns Innovative Marketing Systems, Inc which is based in New Jersey. Mr Gillette has been quite the busy beaver, setting-up all these phone numbers and websites, as well as posting over 300 videos on a YouTube channel. In addition to posting Craigslist ads in just about every US city I can even think about, Donald has posted ads in just about every other forum he could get his greedy, little hands into. Mr Gillette actually does this sort of thing for a living and if he isn't doing this for himself, he's likely doing it on someone else's behalf.

Don't get me wrong: Donald Gillette hasn't done anything wrong or illegal. It's not against the law to litter the Internet with crap. If it were, the Internet wouldn't be the swinging place we all know and love. My only problem is that, aside from the non-existent scientific backup for water ionizers in general and Kangen Water in particular, I just find it rather dishonest not to come right out and say it plainly. After all, if Kangen were the cat's pajamas, like their hordes of loyal devotees claim it is, why would you need over 300 phone numbers and websites in order to sell it?

If someone is telling you that the best way for you to avoid dying of cancer is to use a product that they are selling, understand that they aren't doing it to help you, they are doing it to line their pockets with your money.


Duane Browning