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While working for WHOK in Lancaster, Bill Emery our Harris salesman at the time
was planning to leave his job with Harris. He thought I'd make a good salesperson for Harris and
encouraged me to apply for his position. Up until then, I had only worked in the electronics side
of broadcasting, but had heard comments throughout my life that I should be in sales. I knew
I'd have an uphill climb because the requirement for employment was a four year degree, but with Bill's
encouragement, I sent Harris an application for the position of District Manager - Radio Sales. I was surprised when I received a call from Harris asking me to fly to Quincy, IL for an interview, and even arranged for a airline ticket at the Columbus airport. I took a few days off, and flew to Quincy for a series of long interviews. After a week or so I was called and asked if I could leave WHOK early so I could attend a sales meeting being held in Florida. My wife Paulette and I then flew to Florida where we met with other salesmen and their wives. I also attended several sales meetings and later returned to Quincy for a few months of sales training and product education. While training, Harris sent out a letter to all the radio stations in my territory which consisted of Ohio, Western PA and Eastern KY. I soon found myself driving from radio station to radio station meeting with chief engineer's, station managers and a few times with the actual station owners where my job was to explain why they should buy the Harris line of broadcast equipment, which in most cases, were always more expensive than my competition, but my love of the company, equiptment and my job, I always got the order. I found that selling was something I was born to do. I often had customers call the competition's office's after hours often proving that after five, they couldn't reach anyone even after being told they could. In broadcasting, its sometimes imperative that you can get help 24 hours a day. One Saturday, I was once called to Fostoria, Ohio where WFOB-AM had burned to the ground. After they realized that the current price for a new transmitter was not inflated due to their situation, and no other company was going to show up, they signed my proposal which put them on the air on Monday morning. This was in thanks to their great Chief Engineer, nearby stations, a mobile home dealer and of course Harris who worked all night to re-tune a transmitter and deliver it to Fostoria on Sunday. I'd like to share one more story of my time with Harris. Just coming down from Cleveland, I met with an older couple somewhere in Kentucky who was re-building an old radio station. I carried a full proposal amounting to over a hundred thousand dollars. After looking it over, the man told his wife to write a check for the total, but just coming from Cleveland where your pencil has to be so sharp it tears the paper, I asked if I could use their phone. I called my boss at Harris telling him if I could get a discount, I might be able to get the order that day. Doing this saved the couple over $15,000. I just couldn't let them pay list price, and in the end, word got out that I was honest. Orders from Kentucky increased dramatically along with Harris profits due to a simple act of kindness. People often ask why I quit a job I loved so much. Well it's like this, during my job at Harris, I traveled three states, worked at least six days a week, sometimes seven and my kids were growing up without a father. I knew I had to leave for a normal job where I could be home each night for dinner. |
