Summary
CHALLENGE
- Move an established direct-sales community off a costly MLM platform and onto a Shopify affiliate model without losing the people who built it.
- The old platform carried a $2,500-a-month minimum on top of 25–35% commissions and bonuses paid up the chain.
SOLUTION
- Rebuilt on Shopify with UpPromote and migrated the existing community as affiliates.
- Kept a familiar tiered commission structure from 10% to 35% so the transition felt recognizable.
RESULTS
- A few hundred community members signed up in about two weeks, with no public marketing.
- Costs dropped sharply against the old MLM platform.
LESSONS
- Be honest with your people about what is changing, including what they stand to lose.
- Keep the structure they already know so the migration doesn’t ask them to relearn everything at once.
Tula XII Paper Co. makes customizable planners, journals, and paper-craft kits in the traveler’s notebook style.
Founder Natasha Corrigan started the business in 2015 and rebranded it to Tula XII in 2018. For most of the last decade it ran on a multi-level marketing model, with a direct-sales team earning on their own sales and their downline’s.
In early 2026, Natasha decided to change course. This is how she moved an entire community from an MLM system to a Shopify affiliate program in about two weeks, without a marketing campaign, and at a fraction of her old costs.
Why did Tula XII walk away from the MLM model?
When Tula XII left Shopify in 2018, it was for a specific reason. The brand needed multi-level functionality that Shopify apps couldn’t offer at the time, so it moved to a dedicated MLM platform and stayed there for years.
That system worked, but it was expensive, and it shaped a particular kind of team culture. By early 2026, Natasha wanted something different: a program built around people sharing products they genuinely liked, not chasing recruitment and quotas.
Early spring of this year, I decided that I needed to change direction.
Natasha Corrigan, Founder of Tula XII Paper Co.
Making that change meant rebuilding on Shopify and choosing an affiliate app that could carry her existing community across.
How did Tula XII bring an entire community across?
Natasha didn’t quietly launch the new program. She went to the members who had been part of her direct-sales teams and told them exactly what was changing, including that many of them would earn less than before.
I’m a very honest person. I presented all the things… And that’s why we had a flood of people sign up.
Natasha Corrigan, Founder of Tula XII Paper Co.
That honesty paid off. Within about two weeks of opening the program, a few hundred members had joined as affiliates, and Tula XII wasn’t even promoting the program publicly yet.
To ease the transition, Natasha kept a familiar tiered commission structure ranging from 10% to 35%, with most affiliates at the 10% tier. A small group of top performers from her old team sit at the highest level, earning a bonus for bringing their people over.
She also chose to approve every referral by hand for now. She knows the program can auto-approve them, but with so many people joining at once, she wanted to monitor it herself while the community settled in.
What made Tula XII choose UpPromote?
Before settling on UpPromote, Natasha compared several affiliate apps. What stood out was how few could handle the multi-level structure she was migrating from.
Most people don’t know there’s an app on Shopify that will even do levels.
Natasha Corrigan, Founder of Tula XII Paper Co.
When a competitor’s tool came up during her search, she found it wasn’t close to what she needed.
UpPromote gave her the tiered commissions that made the migration from her old team structure straightforward. It also fit the way she works with her affiliates, sending them free product with each new release so they can show it off to their own audiences.
Even though she had already decided to leave the MLM space behind, having the levels available meant she could bring her community over on terms they recognized.
How much did the switch save Tula XII?
The clearest win so far is cost.
Tula XII’s previous MLM platform carried a $2,500-a-month minimum, on top of commissions that ran from 25% to 35% on every sale, plus bonuses paid up the chain.
With UpPromote, Natasha pays a monthly fee and a percentage only when affiliates actually drive a sale. Most of her affiliates now sit at 10% commission, well below what the old model demanded.
Even though we’re paying your monthly fee and then a percentage on every referral, it’s a heck of a lot cheaper than I was paying.
Natasha Corrigan, Founder of Tula XII Paper Co.
She’s candid that she doesn’t earn as much in absolute terms as she’d like after the pivot, but on balance she’s in a better spot financially than before.
Fast support has helped the transition too. When something needed fixing, the team turned it around within a week and followed up to confirm, a responsiveness she called impressive.
Two weeks in, the program is still young, but the hard part is done. Tula XII moved a loyal community to a new model, kept the structure people knew, and cut its costs sharply along the way.
What’s Natasha’s advice for brands building levels?
Even though Tula XII is moving away from MLM, Natasha is clear about who should look hardest at a tool like this.
If anybody was setting up a fresh MLM company, they should definitely use you.
Natasha Corrigan, Founder of Tula XII Paper Co.
For a brand migrating a team-based structure onto Shopify, the ability to keep commission tiers intact while paying far less than a standalone MLM platform is what made the switch work.
