After writing the previous entry, The Designated Bitcher, I had an epiphany. All these months of complaining about this and that has taken a toll on me. Because the green pea in me, the one who was so eager to learn the business, knows that the things I speak about are totally opposite of what I was taught.
I learned this business by trying to stay out of trouble. When I was a kid there were literally hundreds of ways to get into trouble. The business as I learned it was full of interlocking rules, and it was incredibly easy to break one. I grew up in an era when a write-up would be torn up if it weren’t done correctly. So in order to survive, I had to learn how to stay out of trouble.
I was taught to blindly write-up anyone and everyone that crossed my path. If the postman stopped inside the showroom to eyeball the sticker on a new car, I was supposed to try and sell it to him. Now on the surface this was good. Since I was more than dumb, how could I sort out the buyers from the strokers? And to be honest, if I were running a dealership (a very scary proposal) I’d do it about the same way.
So when I write these little pieces of car business journalism, I am in a way dismantling a lot of things I was taught to avoid. I recreated myself the anti-sales trainer, and it has made me feel a little guilty inside. A part of me feels like I’m about to be paged to the sales office and be chewed out. Not a good feeling.
But back to my epiphany. Humor (or my attempt at it) is what this blog is all about, and I should learn to accept that. As I have said, someone has to do it. I defy you to find another source of information about this business that hasn’t been prepared by a greedy bastard in a thousand dollar suit who is plotting how to get as much money out of the dealers he can. There I go again, bitching about sales trainers. I’m going to have to learn to control that.
I’ve have already donned the moniker of Smart Ass, a designation that truly fits my personality. But now I’ve appeared to have taken on a second one, The Designated Bitcher. And guilty or not, I like that persona. I have to learn to embrace my smart assness, and my bitching. I have to learn that in it all there might be a little truth that I’m sending out over the used car lots of America. How about that for being pretentious!
I just want you to remember that the rules of the business are tried and true. They have been hammered out over the generations and passed on. It is our great heritage. Following them correctly will lead you to making a decent living and a good life.
But that doesn’t mean you have to like it.
Talk to you later,
David
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