People are quick to judge when you don’t fit perfectly into their categories.

So, what would you do if a man walked into your store looking and smelling terribly? Would you walk away and let security handle it?

Or would you take the time to help him find what he needs because a sale is a sale?

In the following story, a Circuit City salesman finds himself in this exact situation and opts for the latter.

Here’s what happened next.

Sales Sucks

I (now 53m, then around 20m) used to work for a now-defunct electronics retailer called Circuit City in Southern California.

The staff was paid on a commission basis and was pressed daily to sell our extended warranty packages to increase revenue.

To explain how the “Extended Warranties” work is to explain how the company made most of its income by scamming not only the customers, but also its suppliers.

The store’s “repair center” wasn’t what you would expect.

How it worked is thus.

When customers come in and wish to purchase a product, they are offered an “Extended Warranty.” If anything happens to the product, they simply bring it back, and an on-site department will ” repair ” it. If it cannot be “repaired,” it will be replaced.

The room for the repair department was a 5×5-foot closet with a shelf.

Customer service was instructed to carry the product into that room, put it on the shelf, and return 15 minutes later to pick it up. They brought it back to the customer with the unfortunate information that it could not be repaired but would have to be replaced.

The retailer was making money off both the supplier and the manufacturer.

The customer would then leave the store with a new product, and the store would send the product back to the manufacturer as defective, never having inspected it in the first place. At the same time, the store would take full credit for the product and receive full credit for it.

So, the company was able to minimize the cost of labor while simultaneously receiving income from both the supplier and the manufacturer.

Anyway, I worked as a salesman on the floor in the department that sold the items that could not be clumped together neatly, such as sections for televisions, stereo equipment, kitchen appliances, laundry machines, refrigerators, etc.

The man didn’t look like much, but he still needed help.

At the time, this included Walkmans (the precursor to the iPod, which utilized cassette tapes), Minidisc players, CD Walkmans, Desktop computers, and accessories such as monitors, printers, and various other items that attached to computers.

This was prior to laptops being ubiquitous, so all these items were bulky and heavy.

One day a guy came in in ratty clothing, sweating from head to toe and stinking like he hadn’t showered in a week.

The other salesmen and women decided he was not worth their time, and I was instructed to “help him” while security was called to escort him off the premises.

Luckily, the guy was able to get out of there before security showed up.

I found out he was in the shop to get a replacement Walkman, as while out for a run, the one he had had failed.

I walked him over to the shelf that had all the portable music devices.

After listening to what he was looking for, I did not direct him to the most expensive product we sold, attempting to upsell him, but instead provided him with the most affordable option.

He even asked about the “Extended Warranty,” and I told him not to bother with it.

He paid for the Walkman and left before security could arrive, and I made maybe $2 on the sale.

Then, the same guy showed up again.

For the next two weeks, the other salespeople and managers hounded me about not pushing the warranties enough, depriving myself of the sales income that comes with them, and thus losing money in the process.

About two weeks later, when I arrived at work, I was told a customer had come in, asked about me, and left, telling them he’d return when I did.

After a few minutes on the floor, a man, the same one who had been sweaty, arrived in a full suit—expensive at that—flanked by two others in business suits, asking for me.

He had a large purchase he needed help with.

It turns out he runs multiple private schools and was looking to purchase “a few” computers for them without all the unnecessary extended frills.

Now, the computer sales, at the time, were the crown jewels on the sales floor, and if a salesman sold one, they were king of the hill of the salesforce that week.

This guy wanted 10 of them for his students to use, and he personally requested that I make those sales.

I walked him through what we had, and the final bill was over $15k, blowing away the next biggest sale that year by $10k!

This was the end of the line for him at that store.

When it came time to pay me and hand me the biggest check that the store had written that year, the staff decided to hold a ceremony in my honor and asked me to speak to encourage others that there was money to be made.

I said only four words: “Thank you. I Quit.”

I walked out of the ceremony, got into my car, and drove home, never to return to that store again.

Wow! That just goes to show that you should never judge someone too soon.

Let’s check out what the readers over at Reddit think about what happened here.

The story made this reader feel old.

For this person, high-pressure sales are the worst.

Yet another person who feels old at the mention of Circuit City and Walkmans.

Here’s a story about another name from the past.

He did the right thing! You should always be honest and never judge customers based on their appearance.

If you liked that post, check out this post about a rude customer who got exactly what they wanted in their pizza.