Memorable: The Screaming “Sales Rep”

While at PRINT 13, a bunch of us went out to the old ballgame and watch the Tigers destroy the pitiful White Sox, 9-1. We had seats that were so good, any one of the six of us NAPL’ers could have been killed by a line drive. I’m talking that good.

During the game, the refreshment vendors walked up and down the aisles, hawking their wares and practicing a variety of styles of salesmanship. In between the three errors made by the Chicago third baseman, there was plenty of time to witness, assess, and compare their effectiveness. Sitting next to me was Mark Hahn of NAPL M&A Advisory Services. He correctly commented, “You see everything with the eyes of a salesman, don’t you?”

Yup.

First came a Bud Light vendor. By the way, this was the first time I’ve ever heard that word pronounced using an “r.” At Fenway, it’s “Bee-ah hee-ah” (Beer here!). But I digress. His was a persistent style. In the roughly 90 seconds it took for him to walk down the aisle and up, he must have said, “Beer! Beer guy! Hey Beer!” two dozen times. If he sold print, he’d be the type that would call every day for a month.

Next was my Don Juan type. This guy had a look of confidence on this face that can only be described by my typing what I thought he was thinking: “Every woman in this place wants me,” a look that he kept on his face all night. He’d definitely count on his personality to win business.

He was followed by a stretch of mostly forgettable characters who all blended, and even as I write this, just 16 hours after the game, I can’t accurately describe even one of them (and no, it’s not from my intake of “bee-ah”).