On Sales

I bought a laptop a couple of days ago.

Well actually …at first………..I bought two.

First I bought a dell. It was efficient, ‘conservative and extremely well priced.’

Then I got home and I hated it, because it was ‘efficient, conservative and extremely well priced.’

It was definitely not me.

I felt like I was in that Mac commercial, and instead of getting the cute young guy, I had inadvertently bought the old man.

I panicked. I called and cancelled the order.

But it was in my blood. I wanted a laptop. Please note the word ‘want.’ I did not need a laptop. Truth be known, I do nothing on the computer besides blog with you sweet folks, surf the net for dirty stories, chat with friends on msn and obsessively check all four email accounts. Yet I wanted a laptop. My own personal Gigabites of space.

So first thing Friday, I go hunting. I walk into the apple store at the Eaton Center. If you have ever been into the Apple Store, you know that ‘Cool’ is the only adjective that perfectly describes the store. The lighting is a cool white, the people are dressed in cool ‘we are the shit’ uniforms. The attitude of the SAs is also cool….a little too cool.

(Listen up people in Sales, the next paragraphs are for you.

I am your perfect consumer. I dare say, Your target audience. I am the one you want to sell things to. Why? Well, simply I have the largest disposable income of any group around. I am young, I have a great job, I have no kids. My wants are endless. Target me.)

Do not do the following:

I wander the apple store, and finally engage an SA. The SA gives me the once over. I ask, ‘Why should I buy an apple.’ Truth be known, I wanted the apple. Why? Because I love my ipod, and if an apple works like an ipod, I wanted it. The SA gazed at me blankly and said, these are what we have. She rattled off numbers, she whispered prices and then she said, ‘Well do you want one?”

She didn’t sell me anything.

I went to the Sony Store. Vio’s have sleek designs, come in beautiful colors and all in all they look hot. Latino salesman, (who I was on the verge of making googly eyes to,) pointed me in the direction of laptops, rattled off specs, pointed to prices…..with out a smidge of enthusiasm. I half expected him to Yawn. Perhaps my youthful looks had dampened my purchasing power aura. I decided to throw in an incentive. I lowered my voice and said, “I want to buy one today, What’s the best deal you got? What else would I get with it.” The SA looked at me with his potentially cute face, and said, ‘What you see is what you get.’ All potential lost; the sale, as well as a few minutes of quality flirtation.

Sigh……Folks Remember those days when people tried to sell you their mothers as soon as you walked into a store? What happened to those days?? What’s with all this ‘no pressure’ mottos?? No pressure = Laziness on the part of sales people.

Despondent, I entertained thought of going back to work and giving in to all the Naysayers who said I didn’t need a laptop. But I decided to give it one last shot.

I went to Best buy. At Best Buy I met Waled. Waled was a cute boy, 23, from Saudi Arabia, raised in Canada. Waled was a sales man. Within five minutes, he knew where I worked, my favorite colors, where I went to school, and much much more. (You can’t sell something to someone without knowing a bit about them.) Waled sized me up as a frilly consumer. He began to point out laptops not only with their specs, but for their colors, their little gadgets, their size…..Waled then offered me a deal. He offered me a laptop bag, a mouse, a router, a free cd……the list was endless.

I ended up buying from Waled, not because the prices were better or the product was insanley good. I bought from Waled because he pretended he cared about how I spent my thousand dollars. In Sales, pretending you care about what I buy, is akin to making me fall in love with you.

On another note, I just got a pimple….a big red one, wassup with that?