When was the last time you saw a door-to-door salesman?

Never have I had a door to door salesman knock on my door.
I do remember a Vacuum Cleaner salesman back in about 1970 knock on the door in Tasmania.
My Grandmother let him in and he vacuumed the loungeroom.
When done, Nan said the man of the house makes those decisions and he is at work. I have no idea when he will be home.
The salesman never returned.
 

Not too long ago....
The sellers are usually young men who are dropped off en masse in suburban areas.. who go door-to-door selling household products at inflated prices. They will often claim to be working on behalf of a charity, to support their family, or that they are ex-offenders working as part of a rehabilitation scheme. often they are armed with a card which they hand over explaining they're deaf .

I always catch the deaf ones out because I have been able to use BSL since I was a child, being born into a predominately deaf family ..so as soon as I start to speak with my hands they grab the card , and beat it....

That said, I haven't had any doorstep sellers, now I think of it , since we installed the Video ring doorbell...
 
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Bretrick said:
Never have I had a door to door salesman knock on my door.
I do remember a Vacuum Cleaner salesman back in about 1970 knock on the door in Tasmania.
My Grandmother let him in and he vacuumed the loungeroom.
When done, Nan said the man of the house makes those decisions and he is at work. I have no idea when he will be home.
The salesman never returned.
Click to expand...
that would be the Kirby vacuum cleaner.. they were always sold by doorstep salesman back in the day because they were enormously expensive, and so the salesman would gain entry into the home, and demonstrate this Vac.. and often not leave until he'd got the resident to sign up to an expensive HP agreement
 
hollydolly said:
that would be the Kirby vacuum cleaner.. they were always sold by doorstep salesman back in the day because they were enormously expensive, and so the salesman would gain entry into the home, and demonstrate this Vac.. and often not leave until he'd got the resident to sign up to an expensive HP agreement
Click to expand...
I do remember it was very expensive. $600 comes to mind but that might be a false memory.
Nan knew what to say to get him to leave. :LOL:
 
I remember a time back in the early 50's, when my Grandmother was home alone on the family farm. I was outside playing at the time.

A salesman traveling out in the country stopped at the farmhouse, and walked right into the house! She looked at him surprised, and he said, "Oh! I heard someone say "Come In" . I walked in at that point, to see what was going on.

My grandmother, who didn't speak English very well, just looked at him ... I guess he got the point ... he left, before she could go outside and get someone to remove him.

I don't remember what he was selling...lol
 
Many in my area are more like casing homes then selling anything..
we had a cable company leave flyers on doors on Christmas eve.... If anyone was out of town etc and flyer just sat there it invites criminals to see no one home..... if we left 30 minutes earlier then we did that could have been my house.
 
hollydolly said:
that would be the Kirby vacuum cleaner.. they were always sold by doorstep salesman back in the day because they were enormously expensive, and so the salesman would gain entry into the home, and demonstrate this Vac.. and often not leave until he'd got the resident to sign up to an expensive HP agreement
Click to expand...
Wrote a little story in another thread about my experience.

Knock knock, who’s there

Back in the day, vacuum cleaner sales were enhanced by door-to-door folk.
One time, in the ‘70s, a hoard of ‘em attacked the little cul-de-sac we lived on.
They came in droves, piling outta vans and cars like locust.
Three were at my door, at dinner time.
But, hey, they were people tryin’ to make a livin’…..
The brains of the outfit began small conversation with me.

‘Hey, that’s a n-i-c-e ship, you build it?’

‘Uh, yeah…..please git yer vacuum nozzle away from it.’

‘Well, sir, we’re here to show you how you can be germ free with our state-of-the-art filtered systems.’

The gentleman commenced to suck the living crap outta our couch…..really….living crap.

Then he opened his bag-o-living-crap and spread it onto some newspaper…my sports page.

I played along.

‘Wow.’

‘Do you know what that is?’ (rubbing the amorphous gooey granules between his finger and thumb)

‘No.’

‘It’s human skin.’

‘Really?!’

‘Yes, human skin….wanna touch it?’

‘Naw, that’s a used couch.
Bought it from the widow of a diseased old man.’

Once back from washing his hands, super sales guy was back on task.

‘This attachment can remove the most stubborn stains.
I’m going to pour this ink on yer couch and….’

‘WAIT!
How ‘bout the stain under the doily of that chair?’

Man, that guy scrubbed for a good twenty minutes, and actually got most of it out, building up quite a sweat.

‘Well, sir, that is one stubborn stain. What do you think it is?’

‘Probably the blood of that dead guy, got the chair from the same place, I think he actually died right there.’

Once back from washing his hands, he was ready to wrap things up.


I felt sorry for the man.
He was quite dogged about getting this sale.
And his white shirt had rings of perspiration growing at a rapid rate outta his underarms….tie was loose…..and foam was gathering at the corners of his mouth.

The vacuum systems were $800…back when $800 was closer to what $800 should be.
And they were about $787.34 more than I could afford.

I didn’t have the heart to tell him how much I appreciated him doing my curtains, couch, carpet, and chair….but.

‘Let me think about it.’

‘Sir, we won’t be coming back this way.’

‘Good.’

‘You don’t understand. This deal is today only.’

‘Good.’

‘Perhaps I could discuss this with the lady of the house.’

‘Of course, only make it your lady of your house…about career choices…..and get the ef outta mine.’

‘Here Kemo.’

Patience.
I learned I don’t really need mucha that virtue at given times…..and Kemo, well he jus likes people.
 
They’ll show up at the door wearing a lanyard that you can’t read and say there’ve from the gas or home furnace or whatever city/company inspection team and have been authorized to inspect your home for leaks. Yah, right.

There have also been the ‘deaf’ collecting for charities.
 
Very old joke:

The vacuum cleaner manages to make it in through the door and dumps a bagful of dirt, sand and cinders in the middle of the living room.

He goes into full overdrive..."Now, Madam, you are going to see something amazing that's goin' to revolutionize your housekeeping. This here Hoover is the most powerful machine you can buy. With just a few strokes, all this debris will be removed from your carpet. Why, I'm so sure about its efficiency, I'll EAT anything left behind!"

The housewife then hands him a fork and says, "Better get started. They ain't bringing the 'lectricity down this end 'o the road til next year."
 
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We had a few when we still lived in the city....just gave them a "no thanks". We live in a very rural area, so that is no longer a problem. Perhaps the last "salesman" we've had was about 10 years ago when a couple of Jehovah's Witnesses stopped by. I usually told them I wasn't interested, but this time I was feeling a bit "playful", and I kept them in a long extended conversation, until they started acting like they were about to pee their pants. They haven't been back since.
 
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