Monday, March 31, 2014

Kaiser’s Phil Marineau is Nuts about Brazilian Butts



Kaiser's Phil Marineau: "I love Brazil Butt"

Remember Phil Marineau?

He's the guy on Kaiser Permanente’s board of directors who recently said "I gotta go to the head” when workers asked him about Kaiser's repeated patient-care violations and its demands for benefit cuts from workers even though Kaiser is making billions in profits.

Why does Marineau spend so much time in “the head?” It turns out he’s developed a keen interest in butts… and, er, Brazilian butts in particular.

Marineau is the former CEO of Pepsi. After making billions of dollars by selling sugar-packed sodas to the public, he's now making a buck from the public’s rapidly expanding waist lines… by hawking weight-loss schemes!

And that's not all. Like many fancy-pants capitalists, Marineau is apparently just a two-bit huckster in a three-piece suit.

The folks over at UNITE HERE, who represent Kaiser’s workers in Hawaii, recently launched a website that outs the nefarious business scam perpetrated by Marineau and his buddies at a New York private equity firm.

The scam works like this.

Marineau’s latest business venture -- Beach Body, LLC -- is a fitness-product company that sells exercise DVDs, nutritional supplements and work-out equipment including P90X, Insanity, and Brazil Butt Lift.

Brazil Butt Lift’s website features tons of photos of women’s butts along with classy appeals to readers like these:

“Booty Makeover Guide”
"Holy Hottie! Get me that booty!”

“Want to get a supermodel sexy booty in just 60 days?"

“My butt lifted an inch and I ended up losing 20 pounds." (WTF??)


The centerpiece of Beach Body’s scam is a “Multi-Level Marketing” scheme. Basically, Beach Body signs up regular people to serve as so-called "Coaches" who sell the company’s products for a commission. These “Coaches,” who are considered “independent contractors,” sign a 14-page contract filled with tons of hidden charges, fees, taxes, etc that drain money out of each unsuspecting Coach’s pocket as quickly as s/he can sell product.

from Brazil Butt Lift's website. Phil is one classy dude.
According to UNITE HERE’s website, more than half of the “Coaches” don’t make a penny from selling the company’s products! But Beach Body makes wads of cash, of course.

It's a perfect business model for Marineau and his money-grubbing pals over at LNK Partners, a New York private equity firm where Marineau is a partner.

That is… until UNITE HERE outed all of the details behind Marineau’s Brazil Butt scam!

Here's a link to UNITE HERE’s website:  http://www.beachbodybummer.org/