17 OCT 07: PUMP THEM UP?
There's Columbus Bank and Trust. There's Citizens Trust Bank. And then there's the man who knocked on my door Tuesday from the "Pumppers Trust." It sounds like it ought to be a retirement plan for old gas station attendants....
The man who came knocking belongs to a dying trade -- the door-to-door salesperson. Telemarketing likely hit that profession hard. But with more and more people putting their names on "no-call" lists, you'd think it might make a comeback -- as long as the Jehovah's Witnesses don't spoil everything.
The man showed up with a bright red dress shirt and a loosened tie, offering a cleaning fluid called "Mrs. Clean Pump-it-Off." I told the man I'd heard of Mister Clean -- but Mrs.?! Is this an oppressed wife, finally coming out of hiding? Did I miss a corporate version of Dr. Phil's "Man Camp" or something?
The salesman gave me a list of 104 different items that Mrs. Clean could remove. The folded piece of paper also showed it was sold by Pumppers Trust of Sumter, South Carolina. The question of the moment, of course, was whether this pump was worth my trust at all.
"What do you use to clean your windows?" the salesman asked. He correctly guessed I had a glass cleaner from Winn-Dixie. But he didn't seem stunned when I told him I only clean windows once a year. Dust on a computer screen can become a natural eyesight protector, you know....
"Do you have a carpet?" he probed further. Yes, but there's no real ugly stain on it that needs Mrs. Clean's attention. That's one advantage of a dark-brown carpet. The disadvantage is that cockroaches blend in too well, so you can't create ugly stains by stepping on them.
"Do you have a pair of white tennis shoes?" the salesman continued -- and he actually asked me to show him one of the shoes. There didn't seem to be any spots on it, either. When I ate a Hardee's ThickBurger the other night, the spillage fell on my shorts instead.
The salesman wants to spray, oops pump, Mrs. Clean on that tennis shoe. When I declined to open the screen door and pass it to him, he was disappointed -- and said something about being paid by the demonstration. So he works a bit like some civil rights leaders....
"I trust your cleaner does what you say it will do," I explained to the man. Maybe I shouldn't have. I did a web search for "Pumppers Trust" later, and found a few articles where customers claimed the product didn't really work. How could Mrs. Clean treat people in such a low-down dirty way?
My words of trust sparked the man to ask: "Then are you going to buy four?" Four?! That loudmouth in the OxiClean commercials only asks me to buy one.
If I bought two bottles of Mrs. Clean, the salesman offered me two more free. Four bottles of cleaning solution for a single guy?! Maybe if I had Howie Mandel's obsessive compulsive problem, but....
I told the salesman I wasn't interested in even one bottle of Mrs. Clean. It would join several partially-used bottles which I already have for cleaning. There's Winn-Dixie Glass Cleaner, a sample or two from Sam's Club -- and a bottle of Lysol all-purpose "Fresh Orange Breeze" which sits on its side, because flimsy plastic bottles which break on the floor can't even be healed with packing tape.
The man had told me he'd been with Pumppers Trust six weeks. This also concerned me, because I recalled other cases where young people did door-to-door sales under the control of demanding and abusive supervisors - although at least they weren't lugging heavy briefcases full of encyclopedias.
"Pardon my French, sir," the salesman said interrupting me as I mentioned those cases. "I've been doing this for five years, and that's bull***t." Why didn't people stop using that word a few years ago, along with French fries?
The salesman tried his best to get me to buy Mrs. Clean from him. I kept asking him for a web site to check on the product, and he wouldn't give me one. "Why go online when you can buy it right now?" I didn't say I'd go there to buy it -- I'd go there to know how long and detailed this post of warning needed to
be.
The man also told me how Pumppers Trust takes young people off the streets, and gives them productive lives. "Did you ever come home to find your mother doing dope and sticking needles in her body?" Thankfully, I did not. He says he did. But come to think of it, his mother could have been diabetic.
If I needed Mrs. Clean, I might have considered buying a bottle or four from the salesman. But I told them it wasn't a need for me right now. Besides, the only people doing "spring cleaning" right now live in the Southern Hemisphere.
Because I'm early to bed and early to rise for TV, we'll hold an e-mail item for another day and quickly wrap up some Tuesday news:
+ Phenix City began overnight construction work, which is closing parts of Broad and 13th Streets for ten hours at a time. I've never felt more sorry for a downtown Piggly Wiggly store in my life.
+ A public hearing on the impact of base realignment at Fort Benning was held in Talbotton. If all goes well and military families move to town, the city may have even more money to mysteriously lose.
+ The "Phenix City Beautiful" organization announced its new office on 21st Avenue will open Thursday. Landscapers who are losing business to the drought can begin lining up outside the office at 5:00 a.m.
+ WRBL meteorologist Bob Jeswald returned from a sick day, explaining he was "dealing with this crud." His absence Monday meant viewers had to deal with Teresa Whitaker handling the weather forecast - showing Phil Scoggins remains the emergency sports reporter, and Chris Sweigart needs to come out of his hiding place.
This blog has thousands of visitors each month, from people in Columbus and around the world. To advertise to them, offer a story tip or comment on this blog, write me - but be warned, I may post your e-mail comment and offer a reply.
BURKARD BULK MAIL INDEX: 2416 (+ 103, 4.5%)
If you mention this blog in public, please be polite enough to let me know.
© 2003-07 Richard Burkard, all rights reserved.