It took a long time, but some major changes in my workday activities are finally coming to pass.  Starting next week I will be at one permanent sales location rather than going to a different location each day.  While this location is not as close to home as some of the other ones where I now work, it’s not as far as some others, and in many ways the predictability will be nice.  Getting there will involve mainly Expressway driving, which would not be a good thing if I were to go during rush hour, but given my approximate noon-to-7 work hours traffic shouldn’t be an issue.

Another change involves an expansion of the types of products and/or services I sell.  It won’t be quite as big an expansion as I had hoped, still leaving me with a fairly limited portfolio, but it definitely will help.  The biggest and best change, however, is that after having worked on straight commission I now will be making a base salary.  It’s nothing that will make me rich, if I made no sales and got just the base I wouldn’t really be able to make a living, but it will provide a sense of security and stability that I’ve been lacking.  All in all, I’m quite pleased with the changes.

What with the transition process needed to effectuate the changes I didn’t work in the field either day.  That of course means no earnings for either day, the base doesn’t take effect until Monday, but it should be made up to me (exactly how, I’m not sure).

On Thursday I did a quick gym session, just some one-arm dumbbell rows, 5 x 8 x 85/85.

I really wish I knew what was going wrong this week. With the holidays in the rearview mirror I figured that sales should be picking up at a decent pace.  Indeed, when I went into Nassau on Monday morning for the weekly meeting I found out that the most of the people had done very well last week.  Friday and Saturday in fact were record-setting days.  What I figured, in my all-too-trusting manner, was that I was overdue for a big week and therefore would be putting up some terrific numbers.  Bound to happen, right?

Wrong.  Monday was sort-of-semi-somewhat decent, which was not good enough considering that many people had the day off for the Martin Luther King Day holiday.  I was in one of the busier sales locations, moreover, so there was a steady parade of potential customers.  My numbers should have been outstanding, but they weren’t.  As for Tuesday, well, let’s just say that it is a bad memory best forgotten.  I spent it in my Old Reliable nearby location, a location were I can always count on doing okay.  Not today, despite my very best efforts it was a disaster.  People were quite rude, too, which is completely uncharacteristic for that location.  Wednesday was slightly better, not that it could have been any worse.  Because I have to attend to some outside business matters on Thursday this will be a shorter than usual week for me.  For that reason I really had been counting on three good days to start the week.  Reality had other plans.

Thursday wasn’t a bad day as these things go.  I spent the day in a nearby sales location that always seems to work out decently enough.  When I’m in this location I seldom if ever have a good day, but I hardly ever have a bad day.  It’s sort of like an old pair of shoes that fit really well and feel fine but aren’t very stylish.  Actually, that was a lame analogy, but I’m not in an analogy-finding sort of mood and just took the first one that came to mind.  In any event, Thursday lived up to expectations, with a good if not spectacular day.  One thing I do like about this location is the convenience of working close to home.  In fact it’s close enough that I can take a mid-day break and head back home for a while.

Friday the 13th?  Suffice to say that I’m not superstitious, and in fact consider most superstitions pure bunk, but without going into unhappy details I’ll just say that it was a wretched day.  I was in a rather upscale location that one would think would be a prime territory.  It was not.  In fact, it was about as bad as it could be.

I may have spoken too soon in last week’s postings.  In them, I had noted how potential customers had become more pleasant now that the holidays and all their accompanying stresses and pressures were over.  Most people were actually being pleasant.  While I didn’t come right out and predict that this improved demeanor would continue, that certainly was the implication.

My experiences these three days make it clear that I was dead wrong.  On Monday and Tuesday especially, I encountered way more than my share of nasty and rude people.  I have not changed the way in which I approach potential customers, at least in no way that I am aware, so I have to attribute this to something in peoples’ attitudes.  It may be that the sense of relief at the end of the holidays was short-lived, and now people are regressing to their (unpleasant) normal states.  On second thought, that probably isn’t the case, as the people I’ve encountered have been among the worst I’ve dealt with in the several months I’ve been doing this work.  In other words, they haven’t regressed to normal, but rather to some sub-normal state.

I later found out some potentially good news.  While the time frame and details haven’t been finalized, it appears that before long there will be a significant expansion of the types of products and/or services I am able to sell.  A limited product/service line has been the main drawback of my work with JKL Sales, so any expansion will help, a lot.  I’ll find out more when I go to the Nassau office on Monday morning, which also will give me an opportunity to stock up on sales forms.

I did some back and shoulder work at the gym on Sunday afternoon.  One-arm dumbbell rows: 5 x 8 x 85/85.  Seated barbell shoulder presses: 2 x 8 x 95, 2 x 8 x 105.  Hammer Strength shrugs: 3 x 8 x 275.

Two pretty good days in the sales trenches.  Thursday I worked in what’s proven to be a reliable if unspectacular sales location, and that’ describes my results quite accurately.  Friday I was in one of the better locations, and – you guessed it – had good results.  Just like I noticed earlier in the week, people were friendlier than had been the case during the holiday season.  Understand, if a potential customer says “no” in a friendly manner the end result is exactly the same as if he or she had been rude, but nonetheless the former situation is less demoralizing.  Actually, I’ll amend that slightly.  A nasty and rude “no” can be somewhat amusing.  The situation I really hate is when a customer is not interested but is too chicken to say “no,” and instead says something condescending like “I’ll come back to [the sales location] later today and talk to you then.”

I made a gym trip Friday evening, just some bench pressing.  My results were distinctly unimpressive: 6 x 135, 6 x 165, 6 x 185, 4 x 205, 2 x 225, 6 x 185, 12 x 135.

During these last couple of very slow weeks I kept telling myself that things would pick up after the holidays.  In part this was wishful thinking, and in part it was based on what I’d heard from more experienced salespeople.  As you might imagine, I was harboring significant doubts.  Deep down I was concerned that sales would continue along their dismal path.

It doesn’t appear that my concerns became reality.  Monday was a pretty good day.  Because many people had the day off, what with New Year’s Day falling on a Sunday, customer traffic was much heavier than usual for early in the week even though I was at a sales location that isn’t among the busier ones.  Tuesday wasn’t quite as good, but Wednesday picked up nicely.  Another thing I noticed is that people seemed friendlier than they had been since at least Thanksgiving.  For all the incessant chatter about Christmas Spirit and Good Will Towards All, it is no secret that many, many people find the holidays a stressful if not outright unpleasant time of year.  I saw this in action, and the post-holidays contrast is quite stark.