I was offered a lucritive career oppoprtunity with Superior Lamp that sounded wonderful as pitched by the employment recruiter. He said that they were looking for experienced sales professionals seeking a rapidly growing company. My sales experience spanned over 25 years in the laboratory instrumentation industry. When I asked about the sales approach that the company advocates, I was told "low pressure." I am accustomed to consultative selling and problem solving and the recruiter enthusiastically assured me that it was exactly how the company sells. Once I agreed to sign on, I was asked to send in $350 for extensive training and a demo kit. I'd get the $350 back after selling $6000 worth of product.
I was initiate by cold calling to get 100 prospects in 3 days. After achieving that mission. A few days later I recieved my sample kit and DVD's demonstrating the sales approach. I was appalled by what I saw and heard. It was the pushiest most obnoxious approach I'd ever seen - anywhere. Surely they couldn't be serious!
A few days later I was a assigned a "trainer" to work with me for 2 days. He was a local guy which cooncerned me because he wasn't involved in my interview. Nonetheless, the "trainer" was to show me how to be successful selling Superior products.
After the first day, I was phyically ill. The "trainer" would start each visit by giving the prospect a gift calcuator device saying, "it even has an alarm to tell you when to call your sweetheart." Then he'd insist on relacing two fluorescent bulbs with two from my demo kit. Often he'd climb on people's desks to reach the overhead light box. Each time he'd reply (according to the script), "Wow, taht's amazing, " as if he'd never seen the demo before. I was nausiated when he immediately took out his order form and say that he had the prospect down for a biox of 24 bulbs. When the prospects realized the the price per bulb was 4-5 times more than the existing bulbs, they all backed of. Then the "trainer" would say, "OK I'll start you of with our introductory offer of 12 boxes at half the price. The calclator was swiftly taken away from the prospect after several obnoxious attempts to close each prospect.
Having presented sales training workshops throughout the world, I had never experienced such a sleazy, unprofessional sales approach. I don't know how Superior can possibly sell many bulbs, but I sure know how they manage to con people out of $400. At least it gave me some good material for my recently published book citing examples of bad salesmanship.
Superior Lamp hurts all professional salespeople with their approach. The cmpany truly lives up to the dictionary definition of (to) sell - th HOAX, to CHEAT, to VIOLATE, etc.
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