I drove my truck to a high end audio shop in a rather upscale neighborhood 27 years ago, dressed down in blue jeans and a flannel shirt. I was initially going to show up with my wife , who is quite attractive, in her car; a car was more "respectible" than a truck in 1993. I just wanted to see if it would make a difference in how I was treated.
In a word I was ignored. It was around December 10, so the store had more traffic than usual. After almost 45 minutes, despite 3 salespeople in the store, I was not even spoken to. Finally I walked out, and wound up at another shop a couple of miles away, a direct competitor roughly the same size, where I was greeted at the door,despite a similar Christmas rush. I called my wife and had her meet me. We spent two grand that day on our first "audiophile"2 channel system, and another thousand on a subwoofer and power conditioner within the next few months.
Over the next 10 years I sent several of my wealthy clentele to that store, and helped my close friend , a neurologist, and our female real estate agent purchase home theatre systems. Just those two spent around 15,000.My total referrals were easily in the 6 figures.
I went over to the store that looked past me and inquired about some speaker wire. It was about 2 years after being ignored and watching other people who walked in after me being served. I spoke to the owner about what happened. He asked me who ignored me. I responded "you for one". I then told him who profited from his condescension, and how many referrals he lost. He apologized, and said the Christmas rush was to blame. I told him it didn't seem to affect his competition. I bought the speaker wires, Audioquest type 4, which I still use to this day, and on another visit a moderately priced set of Grado headphones.
When I opened my own business some years later, I remembered my above experience, and applied its lessons. My clients are all by referral. Other than an inexpensive and rather neglected website, which I had done just to say I have one, I have never had to spend a dime on advertising. And incidentally, one of my longest and most lucrative referral lines, now over 15 years old, started with a single mom on a limited budget.
