"When I reached home," said he, "I handed my checks to a porter, slipped half a dollar into his hand and told him to rush my trunks right up to the sample room."
This is a thing that a salesman should do on general principles. When he has spent several dollars and many hours to get to a town he should bear in mind that he is there for business, and that he cannot do business well unless he has his goods in a sample room. The man who goes out to work trade with his trunks at the depot does so with only half a heart. If a man persuades himself that there is no business in a town for him he would better pass it up. When he gets to a town the first thing he should do is to get out samples.
"When I had opened up my line," continued my friend, "I went over to
Williams' store. I called at the window as usual and said, 'Well,
Williams, I am open and ready for you at any time. When shall we go
over?'
"'To tell the truth, Dickie,' said he, 'I've bought your line for this season. I might just as well come square out with it.'
"'That is all right, Joe,' said I. 'If that is the case, it will save us the trouble of doing the work over again.' In truth, my heart had sunk clear down to my heels, but I never let on. I simply smiled over the situation. The worst thing I could have done would be to get mad and pout about it. Had I done so I should have lost out for good. The salesman who drops a crippled wing weakens himself, so I put on a smiling front. This made Williams become apologetic, for when he saw that I took the situation good-naturedly he felt sorry that he could not give me business and began to make explanations.
"'I tell you,' said he, 'this other man came around and told me that he could sell me a hat for twenty-one dollars a dozen as good as you are selling for twenty-four, and I thought it was to my business interest to buy them. I thought I might as well have that extra twenty-five cents on every hat as your firm.'
"There! He had given me my chance! 'Williams,' said I, 'you bought these other goods on your judgment. Do you not owe it to yourself to know how good your judgment on hats is? You and I have been such good friends—Heaven knows I have not a better one in this country, Joe— that I never talk business to you and George, your buyer. Now, I'll tell you what is a fair proposition. You and George come over to my sample room this afternoon at 1:30—I leave at four—and I will find out how good your judgment and George's is when it comes to buying hats.' Williams said: 'All right, 1:30 goes.'
[Illustration: "To-night we dance. To-morrow we sell clothes again.">[
"I immediately left, having a definite appointment. I went to my sample room and laid out in a line twelve different samples of hats, the prices of which ranged, in jumps of three dollars per dozen, from nine dollars to twenty-seven dollars. In the afternoon I went back to the store and got Williams and George. As we entered the sample room, I said: 'Now, Williams, we are over here—you, George and myself—to see what you know about hats. If there is any line of goods in which you should know values, certainly it is the line you have been handling for six years. You have fingered them over every day and ought to know the prices of them. Here is a line of goods right out of the house from which you have been buying so long. The prices range from nine dollars to twenty-seven dollars a dozen. Will it not be a fair test of your judgment and George's for you to examine these goods very carefully—everything but the brands—for these would indicate the price—and lay out this line so that the cheaper hats will be at one end of the bunch and the best ones at the other? Very well! Now just straighten out this line according to price.'
"'Well, that looks fair to me,' said Williams.