Don't run down your competitor.
In talking of this point a furnishing goods man once said to me: "When I first went to travel in Missouri and Illinois I was green. I had a whole lot to learn, but still I had been posted by one of my friends who told me that I should always treat my competitor with especial courtesy. When I was on my first trip I met one of my competitors one day at a hotel in Springfield. I was introduced to him by one of the boys. I chatted with him as pleasantly as I could for a few minutes and then went up street to look for a customer.
"After dinner I was standing by the cigar case talking to the hotel clerk. Up came my competitor very pompously and bought a half dollar's worth of cigars. As he lighted one and stuck all the others into his pocket case he said to me in a 'What-are-you?' fashion, 'Oh, how are you?' and away he walked. Heavens, how he froze me! But from that day to this, while I have outwardly always treated him civilly, his customers have been the ones that I have gone after the hardest—and you bet your life that I've put many of his fish on my string."
Don't run down the other fellow's goods!
When a salesman tells merchants that he can sell them goods that are better, for the same price or cheaper than he is buying them, he at once offers an insult to the merchant's judgment. One of my merchant friends once told me of a breezy young chap who came into his store and asked him how much he paid for a certain suit of clothes that was on the table. "This young fellow was pretty smart," said my merchant friend. "He asked me how much I paid for a cheviot. I told him $9. He said, 'Nine dollars! Well, I can sell you one just like that for $7.' 'All right, I'll take fifty suits,' said I.
"About that time I turned away to wait on a customer and in an hour or so the young fellow came in again and said, 'Well, my line is all opened up now, and if you like we can run over to my sample room.' 'Why, there's no use of doing that,' said I. 'You tell me that you can sell me goods just exactly like what I have for $2 a suit cheaper. No use of my going over to look at them. Just send them along. Here, I can buy lots of goods from you.'
"'Oh, they're not exactly like these, but pretty near it,' said he.
"'Well, if they're not exactly like these I don't care for them at all because these suit me exactly.'
"With this the young fellow took a tumble to himself and let me alone."
Don't carry side lines!