The New Hire

A young guy from North Dakota who got tired of the hard and long northern winters decided to move to Florida. The day after he arrived in the Sunshine State, he immediately went to the town's humongous "everything-under-one-roof" department store hoping to land a job.

The manager asked, "Do you have any sales experience?"

"Yes. I was a vacuum cleaner salesman back in North Dakota," came the reply.

The manager was initially sort of hesitant, but for some reason he took a liking for the fellow. So, he decided to give the guy a break, and hired him. He told the young man, "You can start tomorrow. I'll come down after we close and see how you did."

His first day on the job was long and rough, but the new hire got through it. After locking up the store, the manager went to see the fellow, as promised.

"So, how did you do today?"

"I had one customer and one sale," he reported.

"One customer the entire day? Our sales people average 20 to 30 customers a day. That will have to change, and fast, if you plan to continue working here. We have very strict standards for our sales force here in Florida, and especially in this store. One customer and one sale a day might be acceptable in North Dakota, but this is Florida and definitely not in this store!"

The guy swallowed hard and stared at the floor. Looking at the fellow's reaction, the manager felt kind of bad for being sort of hard on the chap's very first day. But just out of curiosity, he asked, "So, how much was your one sale for the day?"

The young man looked up at the boss and very simply remarked, "$101,237.65."

The manager's jaw almost got unhinged, and incredulously queried, "Did you say $101,237.65? What the heck did you sell?”

The young man matter-of-factly replied, "Well, first, I sold the man some fish hooks. Then I sold him a fishing rod to go with the hooks. Then I asked him where he was going to fish and he said he wanted to go fishing in the coast. After I asked him if he needed a boat, we went down to the boat department where I sold him a twin engine Chris Craft. Finally, he said he didn't think his Honda Civic would be able to pull the boat, so I took him down to the automotive department and sold him a Ford 4x4 Expedition."

After taking several seconds to recover from shock, the stunned manager finally managed to say, "A guy came in to buy some fish hooks and a fishing rod, and you sold him a boat and a truck, too?"

The young chap in his usual nonchalant way then further said "No, the guy came in to buy some Tampons for his wife. So I told him, 'Dude, your weekend's probably shot, you might as well go fishing...'"

~Contribution by Ralph