A car radio, please!
02/16/2013
The classic car fairs are always a Mecca for us car enthusiasts and therefore an annual pilgrimage destination. Not least because of the parts and accessories on offer there. I needed a radio-cassette player for my old Porsche. I pored over brochures and price lists and found the right type, complete with exact description and photo. The necessary small change had already been withdrawn from the cash machine.
Armed in this way, I came to the stand of a radio dealer. He was talking to customers. I could only catch snatches of words: "...customers don't pay anything today and would prefer to have everything for free! ...the trade fair organizers are full of rip-offs... how expensive such a stand is... every year it gets worse...!"
So I waited patiently until he had got his message across. Then he finished and turned - away. Great! I called him back and waved my shopping list in the air. He asked me what I wanted. I asked back if he happened to have this radio here and shoved a photo and description under his nose. Instead of a friendly sales pitch, I was given a proper harangue.
"Listen to this! What do you actually think? I have 4,000 to 5,000 radios in stock. Do you think I can take them all with me to the trade fair?" No, I didn't really think so... "And anyway, customers don't want to pay anything these days and would prefer to have everything for free! It's not worth it for me. And the trade fair organizers are rip-off artists. They have no idea how expensive such a stand is. And it gets worse every year...!"
Then I carefully tried to turn the conversation back to my car radio. But all I got was a leaflet pressed into my hand: "My email address is down there somewhere. Please write to me. I want to see if I have anything. But I can't tell you like this!" And turned away again.
There I was with my unfulfilled wish. I hadn't gotten rid of my money either. But I had to hand it to the oh-so-evil trade fair organization. They had put nice garbage cans everywhere. That's exactly where the leaflet ended up, and I'm not afraid that the nice radio salesman will be back at one of the next trade fairs. Stingy customers and evil trade fair organizers have surely hunted him down in the meantime.
By the way: I found the Porsche Club at the fair, and a member actually had the radio I wanted in his cellar, and a short time later I had it in my letterbox. Since then, it has been happily humming along with the engine. The world isn't that bad.
