E-text prepared by Barbara and Bill Tozier
Published by
Grand Rapids Show Case Co.
Grand Rapids: Michigan
COPYRIGHT, 1912,
GRAND RAPIDS SHOW CASE CO.
GRAND RAPIDS, MICH.
Sam Lambert had the best clothing store in Medeena County—a cornerstore on the main street of Medeena opposite the Court House Square.
Medeena had four clothing stores, not counting The Blue Front, down bythe Depot, with its collection of cheap watches in the window, ayellow guitar, two large accordions and a fiddle with a broken Estring.
Everybody in the County knew Sam Lambert.
As a merchant and a citizen he was a whole bunch of live wires. Abig-boned, free-hearted fellow—lucky enough to just escape being runfor sheriff, as some thought he was too good natured, the “gang” wasafraid he was not pliant enough, and Sam didn’t want to be away fromthe store.
Sam took great pride in his clothing business and kept pace with themost advanced ideas in the trade.
He was awake to the marvelous development of the ready-to-wearbusiness. He carried the best and took a positive delight in eachseason’s new models.
He recalled the old days of “hand-me-downs,” and he had lived to seethe two best tailors in Medeena take to bushelling “ready” garments,with less and less of that to be done—principally changing a buttonor shortening a trouser’s length.
Sam was broad-gauge in everything he did. He sold his goods at themarked price, for cash only—got a decent profit and told you so.
Why shouldn’t he? He had a sense of style. He was keenly alive to theartistry of clothes and his enthusiasm was contagious.
Sam was firmly convinced that a man has to spend money to make moneyin the clothing business.
He said that a part of the value you deliver to a customer consists in giving him a better opinion of himself: making himfeel like a king for a day and that the best is none too good for him.
“A store”, he would tell the boys, “cannot be run on the low gear. Youmust keep her keyed up. Relax when the store is empty, but when you goto meet a customer put on the tension—take a brace—get spring intoyour step—learn to bunch your vitality and get it across. But keepyour energy inside.
“Don’t bounce and don’t talk too much. Keep yourself in hand. Be quietbut alert.
“Concentrate! For the time being there is but one person inthe world and that is the customer, and the most interesting thing inlife is the thing he came in to see.
“You can size up your man while you are going forward to meet him. Butby all means take him easy. Undue interest might embarrass him.Suppose he only wants a pair of 15c. socks; if he does, there is atest of your ability that you may not realize.
“Many a clerk who can close a Twenty dollar transaction with tact anddispatch never seems able to handle a Ten cent sale so that thecustomer goes out feeling pleased with himself.
“Nine men out of ten who come into the store are self-conscious. The thing to do is to make your man feel that his requirement isimportant simply because it is his requirement.
“A good salesman keeps his own personality in the background: he keepsthe store and the sale in the backgrou