Is Today's Version of the Tupperware Party Empowering For Moms or Just Plain Annoying?

Today, I attended one of many similar events I've been invited to in the five-and-a-half years since I became a mom. It wasn't a playdate or a kids' birthday party, though I've been to dozens and dozens of each. It was a 10 a.m. party thrown so a mutual mom friend could present the line of organic skincare, cleaning, and baby products she reps.

I usually dread this kind of forced spending (seriously, if you go, you know you're buying something), but I was pleasantly surprised by how fun the morning was. The products were actually pretty great and very reasonably priced (I can't resist an affordable eye cream), but more importantly, this mom-trepreneur seemed to be more driven by her passion for the product line, which according to her soft pitch, is a lot more natural and organic than any of the products I buy at Target that make the same claim, than by making money.

There wasn't anything contrived or self-serving about her pitch. She was just passing along information she found interesting and important in hopes that we might, too. If not, no big deal. Of course, everyone there made at least one purchase. I bought a few lotions and potions that were already on my shopping list, spent less than I would on the same kind of products at Target or Sephora, and left feeling pretty good about the whole experience. That, however, has rarely been the case at other similar moms-selling-to-moms events I've attended.

I've been pitched by mom friends and friends of friends to buy nutritional and diet supplements, essential oils, superexpensive skincare products that claim to be more effective than Botox (doubt it), costume jewelry, and yoga pants. I've dodged calls from friends asking me to host events for their products, not wanting to beg other friends to come purchase not-needed stuff from someone they hardly know. Hell, I've put whole friendships on hold until a girlfriend's obsession with selling her new line of this or that faded.

The truth is, as a concept, I am totally on board with moms picking up part-time gigs selling whatever floats their boat. I was lucky to pick a career with an insane amount of flexibility, and I've been even luckier to find as little or as much work as I want during the times when my kids required more or less of my day. I am well aware that most moms don't have that same advantage, and I understand the appeal of taking on a selling gig that allows you to make some extra cash and still pick up your kids from preschool every day.

But in practice, the whole thing of selling to your friends and then asking them to add their contacts to your potential client base can feel icky and intrusive. Sure, you see stories on social media about women making six figures working just a few hours a week selling anti-aging creams, but most of the women I know who started selling those same creams eventually quit because they couldn't handle pitching everyone they knew over and over again.

The pervasiveness of mom-selling doesn't just irritate me because it can feel like my friendships are being leveraged to fulfill the professional goals of what was previously a personal relationship. It irritates me because it feels like it is the best and only option for so many smart, capable, educated women who have decided that, once they became moms, the nine-to-five corporate life wasn't going to work for them anymore. I wish American businesses would catch on that just because a woman decides she doesn't want to work 40-plus hours a week after having kids, it doesn't mean she can't be an essentially valuable employee.

Selling serums and soaps is great, but it shouldn't be a mom's only option.