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Show FORCED SALES By THOMAS ARKLE CLARK Dean of Men, Univeriity of Illinois. - - T THINK of all the salesmen who come upon one unexpectedly and try to persuade one to buy, the book agent through all time has been the most unpopular. I suppose the reason is that Tew people have any innate lousing lous-ing for books and especially for such books as the salesman going from door to door is trying to dispose of. If lie is to be successful he must first create an interest and a desire and then attempt at-tempt to satisfy It. This requires tact, a knowledge of human nature and how it is influenced, and, of course, persistence, and this last quality is ordinarily all that the wandering salesman of books has developed. If he succeeds in making a sale It is usually a forced sale. Webster was telling me not long ago something of his experience while in college. He went out during his summer vacation to sell books. He. had never had any experience before and he knew nothing of salesmanship excepting to hang on when he got hold of a prospective customer. The territory to which he was assigned was a pretty barren rural community In. which the drought of summer bade fair to wipe out the corn crop. The book he was trying to sell had no particular merit The people to whom he was attempting to sell it did not want it, if they were persuaded to buy it in order to get rid of Webster it would most probably lie with the family Bible on the center table in the sitting room unread and useless. Anyway Any-way they could not afford 'to buy it, and Webster knew this as he looked about him better possibly than anyone any-one else. When he succeeded in making mak-ing a forced sale he felt as if he had robbed an orphan asylum or sandbagged sand-bagged a blind man. Webster got away with the Job, however. He hung on and haggled and argued the question ques-tion until in sheer desperation his victims vic-tims signed on the dotted line. He was broadcast as a salesman de luxe and his, picture was displayed in the advertising of the company for whom tie was working, and yet It was really poor salesmanship which he exhibited. A conservative Englishman, the head of a large retail establishment, is said to have announced that he would dismiss any . of his salesmen who sod a customer anything which he did not want. There were to be no forced sales in his establishment-No establishment-No customer who came into his store need fear being leadpiped and sold a gold brick before he got out. I have been called on once a year for more than a score of years by the most perfect salesman I have ever known, I heard a few weeks ago thai he was dead and I am truly sorry. He never urged me to buy ; he never even brought up the subject of my buying He made an appointment with me In advance for a definite time, and as reliable as clockwork he appeared then. He simply spread his wares before be-fore me, pointing out the particular merits of this or that, and he did it all quickly, courteously, and with a subtle appeal which I was n:'v;T able to resist, but it wasn't a forced sale. When he went away I felt that be had done me a service. ((cV 1928. Western Newspaper Union.) |