“JUST AS GOOD”
One manufacturer warns his customers against substitutes by advertising the fact that “You can teach the parrot to say ‘Just as Good’ but he won’t know what he is talking about.” The buying public has been taught to disrespect the man who preaches “just as good” and to have suspicion of the goods he is selling. Reliable dealers and manufacturers sell goods on their own merits and not by a false standard of comparing them with something else. The fact has already been pointed out that the salesman cannot afford to spend his valuable time boosting the business of his competitor by discussing with his customer the relative advantages and disadvantages of both lines. He sells his own goods on the basis of their merits and allows the man around the corner to do the same.
To mention the matter of “just as good” means that the salesman has invited comparison. Then he has the double task of proving his statement first, and later of selling his own goods. Even then the customer will probably not be quite satisfied until he has tried the other article, just to find out for his own satisfaction how they compare. One far-sighted business man said that “when a competing salesman talks about my line I consider him as valuable as a salesman on my own payroll.”
If a style is out of stock, the wise salesman will plunge right in to sell the goods he has on their own merits. To invite comparison with “just as good” arguments wastes time and stamps the man as an imitator. Be original.