Few remaining door-to-door sales people
Photo of a plastic salesman (Image by Flickr user JD Hancock (cc:by-nd))
This story was originally covered by PRI’s Here & Now. For more, listen to the audio above.
A door-to-door salesmen is a bit of an oddity today, in the age of big-box stores and e-commerce. But Fuller Brush salesman Norman Hall is still out there knocking on doors. Though he’s been on the job for nearly 40 years, Hall says that many of his sales tactics haven’t changed:
Well, I dress properly. I always wear a bowtie. My father used to call it the sartorial smile. I’m sort of mirroring Willy Loman [from Death of a Salesman]; my shoes are shined, my trousers are creased, my collar is clean. Most of the time, because I have been doing it nearly 40 years, I’m calling on people who know me.
He spoke with PRI’s Here and Now about what it’s like being one of the few door-to-door salesmen still working.
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