Bob
Batz
Read Bob's bio and previous columns
October 8, 2007
Door-to-Door Sales and
Loan Collecting Were Not For Me
I
did a bad thing the other day.
I
heard a knock at the front door and when I looked out the window to see
who it was, I spotted what I was sure was a door-to-door salesman
standing on my porch. I didn’t want to be bothered by a door-to-door
salesman at the time, so I didn’t go to the door.
But as I stood there gazing at the man through a small opening in the
window curtains I saw myself 45 years ago.
It was 1964, and my wife Sally and I had a baby on the way and no money
in the bank. I was working at the daily newspaper in our town, but my
weekly salary was something like $50, so I decided to supplement my
income by taking a job as a door-to-door salesman.
The product I sold came in a can and if you had a flat tire, all you had
to do was vigorously shake the can, then squirt the contents into your
tire and the tire would immediately inflate.
The stuff really worked and I was pretty sure I’d make at least a
gazillion dollars as a salesman and Sally and I would be rich.
I’d never been a door-to-door salesman, but I figured with my good looks
and charming personality, it would be a piece of cake.
So there I was on my first day on the job all decked out in a new $50
discount clothing store suit and wearing a Willy Loman shoeshine and
smile as I hit the streets of Flint, Mich. to make my fortune.
I
didn’t call on houses, but I did visit service stations with my product.
A
typical call went something like this: I’d drive my seven-year-old car
into a service station, grab my leather bag that was filled with cans of
the tire inflator and seek out the station owner or manager.
After delivering my well-rehearsed sales pitch that was always
accompanied by a huge smile, it was up to the station manager to decide
whether he wanted to stock any of the product.
Unfortunately for me, hardly any service station managers wanted to
stock it even after I showed them that it would actually inflate a flat
tire.
However, quite a few of them offered to take a free can and tell others
about it, but I wasn’t allowed to give away cans of the stuff, so time
after time I’d thank them for their time and trudge back to my car to go
to the next station.
After my first day as a door-to-door salesman I came home totally
depressed. Sally did her best to raise my spirits.
“Don’t worry,” she said, giving me a big hug. “Things will get better.”
Sadly, however, things never got better.
After three weeks of beating the pavement, I’d sold only two cans of the
product.
My first paycheck was $3.50. Before taxes.
Then, a week or so later, I spotted a classified ad in the local daily
newspaper for a loan collector. I quickly resigned my position as an
unsuccessful door-to-door salesman to be what would become an
unsuccessful loan collector.
The loan company for whom I worked made it clear from the start that
there were two things I wasn’t allowed to do in the performance of my
duties: I wasn’t allowed to go into bars to collect loan payments, or
hassle pregnant women when I went looking for people who were behind on
their payments.
So, once again, buoyed by my enthusiasm, I donned my cheap suit and hit
the streets to make my fortune. But, alas, once again my hopes were
dashed on the jagged rocks of life when I suddenly realized that if
people didn’t have any money when they took out the loans, they probably
didn’t have any money when it came time to make payments on those loans.
During the next three weeks, I heard enough hard-luck stories to fill a
book.
I
found myself feeling sorry for the people from whom I was supposed to
collect money.
Then, one rainy Tuesday afternoon, after listening to a particularly
heart-tugging story from a man who owed the loan company money, I pulled
$20 from my wallet, handed it to the man and told him “Here, make your
loan payment. Pay me back when you can.”
I
quit the job the next day.
© 2007
North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.
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