SELLING VEHICLES 20 YEARS AGO AND NOW.
Page 13
Page 14
Page 15
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
Some Reminiscences of the Difficulties of the Early Days of the Commercial Vehicle Movement.
By Henry Siurmey.
T OOKING back 20 years, it is possible to realize _Lithe enormous strides which •the commercial vehicle trade has made in that time and the vast difference there is between the trade conditions and methods of selling adopted ht the present time, and those whichpertained in the earlier days of the industry. The difference between what we had to sell in those days and the fine productions of to-day is as great as ia the-selling methods.
The early car makers knew very little about the special constructional requirements to make a successful commercial vehicle, but they all visualized the possibilities of the motorcar in industrial work and endeavoured to get the new form of vehicle adopted in the service of industry. Even from the earliest days this was so, and, had it not been for a contract for 100 vehicles from the London Van and Wagon Co. —a company which was formed to acquire and work them—our pioneer ear-making firm, the Daimler Motor Co., would have come to grief in the first year of its existence for want of purchasers for its productions ; so that although the enterprise of these pioneers of commercial-vehicle use was doomed to failure, it can truly be said that the commercial vehicle saved the car industry in its days of callow youth, for the Daimler were then our only manufacturers.
When the Vans Were Disguised Private Cars.
The " vans" and " wagons " with which the new company had to work were, however, only commercial vehicles so far as their bodies were concerned. All cars in those days had solid tyres, and, although, I believe somewhat heavier springs were used, these " vans" and " wagons" employed just the same chassis as was used for the touring ears with different bodies, so perhaps it is not to be wandered at that the company failed to succeed, although it is only • fair to the producers to say that some of those old cars made by both the Daimler and the Motor Manufacturing Co.—which succeeded the ambitious but unfortunate Great Homeless Carriage Co.—when intelligently looked after, did put in a lot of very useful work.
Ten years afterwards—about 1908—I was in Bournemouth trying to sell vans to Bright'a furniture stores. I was told they had had their two M.M.C. vans 10 years that although they had trouble at first, they
had none then, since they had got a couple of good. men and had the matt-tines thoroughly overhauled once a year ; and I was told if I came round in another 10 years "very possibly they would then be worn out and I might get an order "
As the years went on, and with the opening of the present century, new firms came into the car trade, they all, or nearly all, followed the same lines, and endeavoured to get purchasers for their chassis for commercial purposes, although those said chassis were really quite unsuitable for the work, the only ,difference in them being heavier springs and a lower gearing. No wonder they failed, and their failure did much to retard the commercial car movement. I reMember once trying to sell a Lotis van to the South Australian Railways, of which a relative was manager, but he told me he had already had an made by one of our rivals, and it had broken down very badly and proved to him that "motors were no good "
Letting the Customer Down.
A year or two after I mentioned the incident to the manager of the firm who built the vehicle and which had, in the interim, came to grief, and he said " Yes, I remember that car. We had had it back half a dozen times from other customers, so we just put on new tyres and painted it up and were jolly glad to see the back of it. I told Mr. X—the proprietor—it would not do the work, but he Would do it. We were very nearly on our last legs, and wanted that money badly1 " This was the sort of thing those of us who were trying to make and sell real commercial vehicles were up against. The trouble was to get business firms to consider a business motor at ail. " Oh, no l " we would be told. "Some friends of mine had one and it was a failure." Even men who were themselves motorists took the same view that motors were of no use for industrial purposes. One friend of mine who had a car and also a large lansiness, declinedeven to consider a commercial car. He put the matter this way : "If my car breaks down and leaves me stranded ten miles from home, or I don't get home till midnight, I don't mind. It's all a part cif the game and I'm doing it for my own amusement. But the routine of my business can't be interfered with in that way."
Then, again, .we had to contend with the general lack of knowledge of motors on the part of the public and the doubt as to their reliability, and, even when commercial ears had begun to be used successfully here and there, the individual manufacturer—and especially the new aspirant to fortune in the van field —had to meet the scepticism of the-" prospect" as to the reliability of the particular Make of ear he was offering. I remember once calling on a large grocer in Salisbury, who now has quite a fleet of ears, and the way he gave expression to his hesitation was this : " Oh, yes, I know they've got to come. But, you see, I don't know anything about motors. I know all about horses and know how they should be treated if they won't go, but motors—no ! Why, I have a friend, a doctor, who has one. He knows all -about motors and I know he often has to crawl right under the car in the morning before he can get it to go. Well, I couldn't do that, you know I" Doubts on the Score of Reliability the Stumbling Block.
Doubt as to the reliability of cars and fear lest they should "break down" was, however, perhaps the most common obstacle to securing sales. It was of little use telling a man that So-and-So's, of London, Messrs. X. Y. Z., of Banbury, or Mr. A., of Edinburgh, had cars'of your particular make and to produce testimonials from them. London, Banbury and Edinburgh were far away. One might just as well have adduced evidence from Timbuctoo.
The cautious business man wasn't taking any risks if he could help it. Time and again have I had it put to me something in the way one shrewd Yorkshireman put it. "You tell me," said he, "that your vans are all right. But how am I to know it? If, now, my neighbour over there "—pointing to another shop on the other side of the street—" had one, and I saw it coming and going every day and could have a -word or two with his man now and then, I might bring myself to have one."
This feeling of scepticism proved such a stumblingblock, that many makers and agents fell in with the suggestion that they should submit one of their ears for a-trial, which, indeed, was quite general, and vans were often sent a couple of hundred miles to do a. day's work in the service of the prospective buyer. As,,however, the reason for requiring such demonstration was most generally stated to be to prove the reliability of the vehicle, it did not take much argument to show that reliability could not be ascertained by a day's use, so that the bait of "a week's free trial" was held out. Where large and important business houaes using a number of horsed vehicles were concerned (who, of course, became the special quarries hunted by the commercial sadeamen), some of them were astute enough to ask that the trial should beextended to a month ! Indeed, at one time, one very well.known firm of wholesale grocers—who now have a very large fleet of vans, but who at that time had no intention of buying at all—played upon this string so successfully that they 'got the use of vans to do their work free for a month from very nearly every firm in the trade !
Where the Early Salesmen Were Lacking.
Salesmen, too, in those days, and particularly the agents, often floundered very badly when trying to sell commercial vehicles. They had not studied the requirements of the " prospect ' at all, and had not the remotest notion of presenting the advantages of their vehicles attractively ; their only connections with motors having been with the pleasure-car side of the business, in which, at that period, speed had become the principal attraction. The sober tradesman, whose horsed vehicles delivered his goods at 3 ra.p.h. or 4 m.p.h., was told quite fantastic stories of speed, which he did not want, and I recollect on one occasion attending a demonstration before the n30
directors of a large hospital near Leeds, of ears supposed to be suitable for ambulances, when one aspirant to success explained very carefully and impressively to the chairman that his vehicle " would go 60 miles an hour," and another, who had a car with exceptionally easy springs—perhaps the really most suitable chassis there ; nobody had an ambulance body on, as motor ambulances were hardly known—tried to convince the committee of its suitability by rocking it violently from side to side. An attendant who was looking on remarked to me : "That's no good! Fancy shaking a poor patient about like that! "
In those days the trouble was to find "prospects," as the Yankees say, who would look at a motor at all. All large businesses naturally were " gone for " by most of us. For one thing, we knew they could pay for a car if they could be persuaded to buy one. But, for the most part, those in charge were either hopelessly conservative, having grown up with horses, or were afraid of the venture, largely owing to stories of failure which were current both in the general Press and out of it, or feared the expense. In this connection I was told as a reason for refusal upon one occasion that the speaker had heard that Lord X. paid his chauffeur Z5 a week (!) and he could get a horse-van driver for 25s. or 30s. Much of the effort of the salesman, therefore, was propaganda work pure and simple. We threw our bread upon the waters, and hoped it would return to us, even if "many days" had to elapse before it did so.
The Advantages of the Commercial Motor Now Admitted.
What a mighty change has come over the commercial-motor vehicle trade since then! No longer have the advantages of the motor vehicle as such to be descanted upon. Even the most conservative oldstagers of the business world have been convinced on
• that score, even if only in the spirit of an army man about 20 years ago, who, when ordering his .first car, confided to the sales/Ilan "I hate the darned things —lout I've got to have one, and I might as well have one of yours."
Whilst the task of the salesman is still to find firms amongst the commercial community that have not yet purchased a car, it rather resolves itself into discovering small firms whose business has only just reached the stage when such a purchase would be justified, although, with Ford vans and sidecar outfits obtainable nowadays so cheaply, it is astonishing what small concerns one finds who have started on their, upward career as van owners. The sales effort, therefore, has rather to be directed to finding out firms whose growing business justifies, or will soon justify, an addition to their rolling stock ; or, on the other hand, whose present vehicles are nearing the end of their tether and will soon need replacement, are giving dissatisfaction, or could be replaced with advantage by larger, more powerful, or more suitable Machines.
Nowadays, a Question of Choice.
To-day the question is not so much whether a car shall be purchased at all, as upon which the choice shall fall, and the manufacturer nowadays spends what .would, in earlier years, have been deemed almost fabulous sums in advertising. We now have not only special journals, like The Commercial Motor, catering for the wants of the tradesman, but the pages of the daily and weekly Press are also devoted to doing missionary work in the commercial field and helping the van and wagon advertiser to spend his advertising appropriation. I take it that, apart from special propaganda work in the sending out of literature through the mails, the work of the salesman to-day much more largely consists in following up inquiries obtained through the means of advertise
meats—and hence the more likely "prospects "-rather than in endeavouring to dig in virgin ground and to discover new outlets for the disposal of the products of the factory.
For the most part, the advertising is in this country done by the manufacturers, and just what system different agents have for getting business I cannot say, although many, I fear, lack any regular system at all. They advertise in the local papers, perhaps, and follow up inquiries, and also—if they are duly enterprising—follow up any hints they obtain as to the possibility of "Jones's proposing to add to their fleet.
iii America, however, where systematic salesmanship is, I believe more widely developed than it is here, very complete and thorough plans of campaign are put through. With us, particularly so far as agents are concerned, the employment of a regular staff of outdoor salesmen is. certainly the exception rather than the rule. In the States manufacturers employ staffs of " roadmen " running into hundreds and agents into tens, and one of the most successful commercial car agencies systematically divided up their " territory " into districts and put a graded staff on to work each district thoroughly. Thl method aimed at was to economize the time of their best salesmen as much as possible, so that the first pro
ceeding was to put on juniors to make a door-to-door canvass amongst business houses, with notebook and pencil. These young men made no attempt to make sales. They did not even talk about sales unless a mighty good opportunity opened up, and even then they made no effort to secure an order. Their mission was the obtaining of information. They inquired for and obtained particulars of the volume of goods sent out and what means of transportation was employed, the nature of the goods, what difficulties, if any, were encountered, how many and what makes of vehicles were now employed, if they were satisfactory, and if more were contemplate& and so on, and they made their reports.
The information so obtained was carefully tabulated, analysed, and filed in the office, and then, acting on the information so obtained,. the salesmen were deputed to follow up every possibility thus made known, and, having first carefully studied the particulars of the business and goods and other data which had been secured, they went to their " prospects " with something definite to talk about, and generally. managed to secure what business was going. That firm, although not in an exceptionally favourable locality for trade, have been averaging sales of about 30 cars a month ever since they systematized their work in this way.