Empire Strikes Out

Last night, The Perfect Man and I met with a sales representative from Empire Carpet and Flooring. Those "perfect" sales techniques they insist their reps use are the very reason I will never deal with that company. I'd suggest if you don't like to get the "runaround" and hear incredible stories about other people choosing the very carpet you just pooh-poohed, then don't ever make that 1-800 call.

We told the rep that we were selling the house and wanted cheap, cheap, cheap. The rep absolutely refused to tell us which of his sample books was the cheapest product. I finally had to tell him straight out that our meeting was over unless he told us. He grudgingly pointed to one book. Two seconds later, we had our carpet picked out.

Then came the pricing. Oh my god! I don't need to know what the MRSP is. I don't need to know what private deal your not "authorized" to give me but will anyway and I certainly don't need to know about your friend that doesn't have a car so you had to drive him all the way in from Kitchener. I just want the bottom line.

Finally, we get the his "absolute, I promise you" bottom price. $5,400.00 including tax. We hadn't done any research yet, so we had no idea if that was a good price and we told him so. I actually saw sweat pop out on his forehead. "How much were you thinking of spending?" he asked. I pulled a very low figure out of my head and said, "$4,000.00". "Well, let me make a phone call and see what I can do."

WHAT THE HOLY CHEESE CRACKERS ARE YOU DOING?

He made his phone call and came back with $4,600.00 but he could give us another $350.00 off if we agreed to put a sign up outside out home for seven days. Then he leaned in close like the spies from Alexanian Carpet and Flooring had bugged the place and said, "Don't worry. As soon as the installers leave, you can remove the sign from outside. We'd never know."

HUH???

So, now we're at $4,250.00, down $1,150.00 from his "absolute, I promise you" bottom price. I wanted to try to get him down a little lower just to see if I could. Alas, The Perfect Man was tired and hot. He said, "We're not making any deals tonight. Leave it with us to do some research and we'll get back to you."

Then we got a sob story about how this guy gets a commission (aha, so there is room to go down more -- these are the company offered incentives and we haven't even touched your commission yet - oh but it's late and we're tired) and he drove all the way from Kitchener and he doesn't get any of his expenses back for that.....blah blah blah. So, he asked if we would sign the deal then do our research so he wouldn't have to come back again to do the paperwork "Not that I don't like you nice people, but the gas, you understand." So, we signed the deal to shut him up.

Today, The Perfect Man called and cancelled.

That's another two hours of my life I'll never get back. Between that and Ghost Ship, I'm watching my life float away.....