F & D Associates
Kirby Vacuum Dealer Gimick Scheme Rip off Micromanaged Poor follow thru, Turnersville

F & D operates as a Kirby Vacuum dealer. They have an office on Fries Mill Rd in Turnersville but have moved to the office on the Black Horse Pike in Williamstown. They have shady and unproffesional business practices. I want to warn people not to get sucked in. First they post an ad on Craigslist offering a carpet cleaning job for $400 a week. When you get there they act impressed by you and say they want to certify you to sell asap because you're better than the others. They make you feel like you are better than other candidates to lure you in. Oddly the ad is for CARPET CLEANING but a VERY small part of your job is actually to CLEAN carpets. This job is actually sales and demonstrations. So your first weekend they have you "practice" at your friends and families home but still encourage you to make the sale. You have to call your boss when you get to each house from their home telephone and you have to call him again before you leave so he can push you to make the sale. At this point you are in your friends or family's home so who wants to push them to buy a vacuum for $2000.in this economy that is crazy. Later you learn that you can reduce the price significantly but that reduces or eliminates your commission. Back to the initial training... They tell you you get $400 a week guaranteed and $200 per sale... Sounds great right? Especially because jobs are few and far between. They train you on how to assemble it and how to sell it and how it's so great. Then they encourage you to get referrals from your family but say you don't have to because they send you out on appts to people who already called the call center and expressed interest... So you're not going into homes and shocking people with the price tag. Wrong again... You need your own leads primarily. Or you randomly knock at doors with a roll of paper towels or a bottle of soda so the people let you in to do the demonstration. Then you relentlessly try to get someone to buy even when they've said they can't afford it. One women told the first finance co she couldn't afford it so they wouldn't approve her, so they had her go to another finance co who charged her a higher interest rate... She couldn't afford the vacuum at 0% interest.

To cut this ripoff short... You work 10-12 hour days, 6 days a week and you don't get the $400 guaranteed. That is guaranteed only if you do 15 demonstrations... Which is tough when they give you no leads and people know Kirby's aren't cheapy vacuums so it is hard to even get in the door. It's all very deceptive. The call center tells the customers they are going to clean a whole room in your house— vacuum and shampoo... When they get there they say they are told do to a small section unless you buy it. Customers are promised they get put in drawlings if they give you referrals, there is no drawling. I imagine most people work there for a week, realize it's a lie and leave... Most likely with no pay. But you may have used 2 full tanks of gas and added hundreds of miles to your car and spent 50 hours of your time trying to sell a vacuum and get nothing. Or you may get a small check if you sold one at FULL price.

Company: F & D Associates
Country: USA
State: New Jersey
City: Williamstown
Address: 1024 Black Horse Pike

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