To the reader: If you have missed previous versions of Gus O’Shaughnessy’s sales exploits, go back and find them. In the written version of this post there are links to all five of the earlier episodes. S1E1, S1E2, S1E3, S1E4, S1E5. You can also find them at alligatorpublishing.substack.com
I think you will find them entertaining.
It’s just humor, nothing more!
S1E6
Email From: Gus O’Shaughnessy
To: D. Willoughby
April 3
Dear Mr. Willoughby,
Great news from the Ontario installation of that refurbished Omega 12,000 Digital 8-Truck Smokehouse that Shastaville Appliance installed for us at Woodland Caribou Smokers! Ernst’s crew arrived, unloaded the truck, and got it all hooked up and tested. It works great!
There was a little confusion about how to operate the microprocessor interface, as the menu was stuck in some Cyrillic mode, but Ernst’s bilingual guy (Dutch and Turkish) was able to Facetime with a factory rep in Kazakhstan and get it all straightened out.
That would have been an interesting conversation: Turkish to Dutch to English to French! Wish I had been there. Anyway, it’s all set up and cooking, so to speak!
But of course, I was unable to join them for that because of my flight to Europe. I got your email suggesting there may be someone more suited to handle these negotiations with the Kazakhstan manufacturer after I had already boarded the plane. And then I couldn’t reply while we were in the air.
I know you trust me to handle these delicate discussions, seeing that, as you pointed out, I am the only Willoughby Meat Processing Supplies employee with any knowledge of the Omega Smokehouse.
The meetings went great! I met with the owner of Qazltubljah Industries, a Mr. Nazrubyakan, and 6 of his staff. As it happened, none of them spoke any English, so I called that college girl in Ontario who helped translate the last time and put her on speakerphone on the conference room table. There may be some small cell phone roaming charges, as our meeting lasted about 4 hours.
Anyway, it seems that Mr. Naz is looking for a new North American distributor for his Omega Smokehouse line. I know you have had some minor concerns about us carrying that line, and I certainly did not want to exceed my authority by negotiating on your behalf, so I called the owner of our supplier who makes the Highland Smokehouses we sell, and put him in contact with Mr. Naz.
You may recall I had spoken with Ralph (the Highland owner) once before, and found him to be a real problem solver.
Ralph was ecstatic that I had brought him in on the deal, and he is flying his negotiating team to Astana next month to work out a dealership. While we were on the call, Ralph agreed to contract with Willoughby Meat Processing Supplies to service the 150 Omega Smokehouses already installed in the U.S. northeast!
Ralph would like to speak with you directly about this new arrangement and is waiting for your call.
Ernst, from Shastaville Appliance, was delighted to hear about our new venture and has already started working his Holland connections to bring more technicians on board for field service support!
You might need to have Purchasing, or somebody, reach out to Ernst to negotiate our maintenance agreement with him for all these new customers. Ginger in Customer Service tells me we are already getting calls for service from some of those Omega users. It seems they have had some problems with those machines in the past.
On more mundane business, I got a call from a customer in Pennsylvania who wanted to buy some vacuum pouches for his meat processing business. It seems that lots of butchers seal their fresh and smoked products in clear plastic bags for retail sale. Were you aware of this?
I found an entry in our Commercial Catalog for vacuum sealed bags and took his order for 12 cases of 8x12 3-mil bags. I left a voice mail for Ginger with the details.
The customer also asked me about repairs to the heat bar on something called a “vacuum seal machine,” which was all Greek to me but may mean something to you. I referred him to Ernst at Shastaville Appliance, who can probably get him straightened out. Do we sell vacuum seal machines?
I understand from Pierre in Ontario that orders are beginning to roll in for those tiger print gloves I sold the Ontario Department of Agricultural Inspection. You should see the wire transfers any day.
Apart from those wire transfers, and the completed Omega Smokehouse installation, and the pending field service agreement with Highland for the 150 existing Omega installations, I’m afraid I don’t have much to report in terms of sales.
My only sale this week:
· Vacuum pouches 8x12 3-mil, qty 12 @ 64.99 = $779.88.
Maybe next week will be better, once I recover from the jet lag. On that note, I wanted to come see you then, but I learned there is a meat processor’s convention in Pittsburgh that starts Tuesday. I knew you wouldn’t want me to miss it, as most of our customers will be there, so I called the association that is putting it on and arranged for booth space.
I was a little surprised you had not already told me about this event, but I am nothing if not flexible! I will represent Willoughby Meat Processing Supplies and am looking forward to meeting all those customers!
Your Man in New York (and Pennsylvania!),
Augustus “Gus” Rudolphus O’Shaughnessy
Reply
From: D. Willoughby
To: Gus O’Shaughnessy
April 6
Gus,
I do not quite know how to put this any more clearly: We DO NOT sell Omega Smokehouses. We DO NOT provide field service on ANY products we sell except in the rare case where we contract a local vendor to handle a problem, or the even more rare case where our Service Manager will make a field visit himself.
The reason Omega Smokehouses is looking for a new distributor is that their Omega 12,000 Digital Smokehouse line has been plagued with problems for years. Their users would be DELIGHTED if the microprocessor problems could be solved, and no doubt the Kazakhstan manufacturer would be THRILLED to dump that turkey on someone else.
Willoughby Meat Processing Supplies wants NO PART of that business. Every time an Omega fails, we have an opportunity to replace it with a far superior Highland Smokehouse.
I don’t know whether I am more shocked that you traveled to Kazakhstan to meet with the manufacturer, or that you called the Highland owner directly, or that Highland is seriously considering taking on that dealership arrangement.
As for the Pennsylvania order for vacuum pouches: Yes, Gus, vacuum sealing smoked products is a process as common as dirt in this industry. EVERYONE uses vacuum pouches and vacuum seal machines. Those products are essential to our business. This is something you will learn during your visit to the home office, which you have yet to schedule.
Please make that visit your HIGHEST priority. WE NEED TO TALK.
D. Willoughby
P.S.: I am told we just now received a contract from Highland Smokehouses proposing that Willoughby Meat Processing Supplies take on maintenance of 153 existing Omega Smokehouse installations in the Northeast. They are offering a 60-month agreement at a per-location price of $250 per month.
This has forced us into an unwanted review of what will no doubt become a tar pit for our limited resources. I do not know how you managed to put us in this impossible position with our premier supplier of smokehouses.
Come see me!
D.W.
Author’s Note
Gus is apparently all-in on this new salesman job, seeing only opportunities where others see only roadblocks. Unfortunately, the one identifying the roadblocks happens to be Gus’ boss. That might not bode well.
Join us for the next installment to see how Gus escapes the wrath to come… or maybe sinks deeper into it.
See you next time!
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