Complaint Review: Kirby - Connecticut

Several years ago I worked for Kirby and I will discuss some of the horrors surrounding this organization for both buyers and sellers. The below statement is from my experience at the local Connecticut office I worked at in the 90's.

First, at the time (and perhaps now) "employees" were actually independent contractors who had no benefits, salary or expense reimbursements. Salesmen only earn commissions if units are sold above a set price, not a percentage of the total sale.

I would estimate that 80% of what I sold was sold UNDER that price and I was never compensated. Sources tell me that actual dealer cost was somewhere around $280 , so this would mean that while the office made somewhere around $700, I made nothing at all.

Every morning there is an "inspirational" meeting where each and every "employee" must answer, one at a time, how many units he sold the previous day. Since you will be treated poorly but all if you cannot answer, you will sell Kirby machines at any price the boss tells you just to avoid embarrassment the next day.

And that is where it gets even more interesting. As you negotiate with your customer, eventually you will have the boss on the phone and play middle man. Since everything you are selling is in the box in front of you, the only negotiating tactic is to lower the price. So, here is where it gets interesting. He / she will tell you to sell at a price that is below what you get paid at in the interest in making a sale for himself - and full well knowing you make nothing. It will really surprise you the day that you sell one for 50% of the retail too...

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Secondly, when a salesman sells a unit, They will be instructed to ask for referrals (sales leads) from your customer. They will be bullied into handing them in and will be treated poorly if you do not return with sales leads (referrals). This is what will happen, and here is the scam:

a) when the leads come in, the "sold" price is written at the top. Leads from a sale that yielded no commission will be handed back to you as sales calls - or to chosen "suckers" around the office. It will never be disclosed where the lead came from and if it was from a referral, what the selling price was to the original customer. This means you'll go place to place meeting friends of the people you sold units to that know the price their friend paid and won't pay a dime more. Customers reading this are probably feeling terrible for their salesman while also feeling ripped off - and rightfully so.

b) The high commission lead sheets will be handed to new guys to get them hooked into the scam and also for more senior guys who have a trainee out for the day so new guys can get all excited about how much money the will "be making". This point is evidenced by the fact that nearly all of my multiple commission sale days were made while I had a trainee "on board".

For buyers: I would recommend INSISTING that only your salesman call and present to your friends. First, you don't want the office to rip him off. Second, and take this point seriously, there are some very shady characters around the office that you might now want in your home... They weren't criminal background checking for starters - and I doubt they are now either.

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Third, the trade ins. Now, remember how I told you that something to the tune of 80% of my sales earned me no money? Well, we also took perfectly good trade ins - like Electrolux or Hoovers that were nearly new and worth good money and handed them over to the boss. Thing is - the bosses were turning those in and selling them for more money to local vacuum stores and I wasn't earning anything on that either.

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OK, if you read this far, what's below gets even worse..

Fourth: You will be ripping off your customers.

The Kirby office will expect you to go on appointments and teach you to clean your machine each time so that it looks brand new. Some of these machines go on dozens of appointments and are sold as new machines. While 12 uses doesn't seem like a big deal - sometimes it's worse.

At times, we were sent out to repossess machines. Some failed credit in some late stage or bounced the check, some were returns within the "3 day cancellation clause" and some were burnt out units that were reconditioned and put in boxes and sold as new.

Our office had, at the time, an employee who worked full time taking terrible, badly treated machines and refurbishing them into new-looking Kirbys. Thing was.. we never knew a new Kirby from a reconditioned one either. So you never really knew for sure if you were lying... about whether the machine was new or not..

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Fifth: You will lie daily. You will be instructed to pretend, each an every morning that there is a special $100 bonus (for example) for the first sale of the day called in. The bonus didn't exist in my office and I never received one. You will lie about vacations and how "close" you are when in fact you aren't even close. You will lie at conventions when you are told to tell people you are selling more than you actually could - you will like when you accept sales awards that you didn't achieve.. basically they will turn you into a total Shill and you won't be compensated as one... which will probably leave you feeling really bad - and you probably should.

And if you stay long enough you will discover that there are probably one or two ACTUAL paid Shills. Upon hearing that I had quit, One individual told me.. with a Devilish grin.. that he got $350 a week salary to stick around and pretend he was getting rich selling Kirbys.

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Sixth: Your nicest customers, the ones who are like your Mom and Dad or your Grandma, the ones who serve you a slice of cake and just like to chat - those nice people who make you feel good about yourself: Those people will pay hundreds more than the rude customer who wasn't very nice to you at all and made you feel like a real loser for selling Kirby.

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Seventh: Management. There was such CRAZY amounts of profit in Kirby for the bosses that drug use was very, very common. The owner of the office I worked at went out of business when he became addicted to drugs and wound up on the streets. Later later went to prison for forgery of travelers checks. Today he is at another Kirby office. The fellow who trained him had frequent and lavish cocaine parties and prostitutes. Evolving into Heroin, HE wound up a male prostitute to support his habit and died of AIDS.

So, after reading my story, do you think you would like to work for people like this? Would you like to invite them into your home? It's a shame really - excellent product. You can always turn to Ebay like I did this year - and get a great Vacuum shampooer without any of the shenanigans for somewhere around $300 reconditioned.

Eric

Oakville, Connecticut

U.S.A.