Monsieur est bien carré

On Sunday me and Flori went to check some kind of a furniture depot not far from our place. Reason was a series of bizarre phone calls - in French - that we received on our fixed phone last week. We always thought that our fixed phone was a nondisclosed number - which is why we are pretty confident to always have Alexander answer it (assuming that either my parents or brother in law know that number).

So, imagine my suprise (annex irritation) when a French-speaking (avec l'acca du Sudde) last week cheerfully announced that I won a BBQ set, inquiring afterwards the age of the couches in my living room. We would receive a voucher with the instructions to claim our little suprise within 2 weeks at a depot nearby. The voucher was accompanied by an apologetic letter announcing they are still hiring Dutch-speaking salesmen.

The famous voucher came in by post last week. Last Friday they even found it necessary to follow up on that with a call to subsequently (1) my six-year old son, (2) my brother-in-law (babysitting the former), and (3) myself (annex more irritation). "Yes I got it and I will see when I will pass by - au revoir merci - have a nice life"

Unhealthy curious about which French company even considers distributing BBQ's to Flemish prospects one week before elections, we went to claim our BBQ set on Sunday.

We arrived at a large garage-like depot with several living rooms installed. A slick, young, charming, dark tanned sales guy greeted us and invited us to take a look around (we excused him his French) - chaperonning us softly throughout our journey. The Marseillaise roots of the sales staff was obvious as was their sales talent. We got a live demo on how to spill Coke on a leather couch, and how it survives the flames of a lighter. "Just so you know our products when you are up to renewing the living room - one day". The catalog price was ostentatively put (10,000 is a scary amount), and then.... came the trick - after some hasty running around with some papers - "didn't the lady on the phone mention you have a 2000 euro discount because the random number you provided proved to be... the winning number" - We supposedly shared this privilege with a fireman and a military from the neighborhood -  "Est-ce que ca vous fait plaisir ? " - well euh, ..., I'm not buying. 8000 is a lot of money.

Then came the boss (slick, less young, dark tanned, but less charming'), asking further what style of leather we like. Take a seat, did you try that couch,... Obviously they know how to play your emotions and after hopping around in 2 more sets of couches, the sales process really came to cruise speed : half of the catalog price for 'any set you see here', delivered next week, to be paid in monthly slices (a vicious sales trick), no interest - provided that I would distribute some business cards. ... all this in a perfectly casted good cop/bad cop game in which they played sophisticatedly on our previous facial/verbal expressions of interest ("but I thought you said earlier that.."), our reluctance to just walk out of there (Flemish tend to be too modest and polite), etc.... I felt in a Turkish bazaar.

This is where the consultant came in. I had enough of the BS and explained them that financial planning is about discipline, and that a business opportunity is as much as jumping on a train, as on avoiding to jump in front of one. Bling. Surprise on face. "Monsieur est bien carré - ca se voit" was the reply. The manager came sitting next to me, tried to lure us in with a final offer, but thanks guys - Roma locuta, causa finita.

My key learning - it is not because you understand what is happening, that you immediatly act accordingly. It did take us time to find a way to stop the process in a culturally polite, transparant and waterproof way. Obviously, we were also gathering information on a possible future purchase.
But it amazes me every day how we can be 'drawn' into situations and how social context influence our actions.