Door-to-Door Sales

If you are a student in college chances are you have heard about summer sales. In fact, you have probably been approached by a student who has done summer sales before inviting you to participate in a summer of sales. You may have seen flyers promoting the fact that students just like you are earning big money during the summer selling pest control or home security systems. So is there any truth to these claims?

FACT: Thousands of students make well over 20,000 dollars each summer going door to door selling products and services. They will sell pest control, security systems, satellite and cable television and a variety of other products and services. These students are above average sales representatives who work 8-10 hours each day.

FACT: It is estimated that each summer over 100,000 students participate in selling products door to door during the summer, not all of these students will walk away from the summer with
big money.

Brigham Young University's 100 board is a place where anyone can submit any question and receive an answer in 100 hours. A search of the 100 board's archives using the search term "summer sales" yielded the follow relevant results:

QUESTION

Dear 100 Hour Board,

Last Summer I worked in California selling pest control and I plan on doing something similiar this summer as well. I was wondering if you knew which companies pay the best, are most honest, have the best incentives, etc.? - Point me in the right direction...

ANSWER

Dear Pointer,

Some people are less than friendly to salesmen, that's obvious. But if you can get inside their heads and try to understand them then it can help increase your success with everyone. The following article is advice given to the Missouri Attorney General on how customers can deal with door to door salespeople.

Unscrupulous door-to-door salespersons
Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon

Unscrupulous sellers try to victimize consumers in their own homes,