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Discover Mid-America — September 2006
Some dealers are like some doctors
Ever wonder why a simple medical appointment — which, chances are, you had to book months in advance — should take most of a day out of your life while some triple-booked doctor is seeing more patients than he or she can possibly fit well into a day? Well, some dealers are like that. They don't understand why everyone else doesn't just step aside and defer to their overbooked schedules as they flit from mall to mall in search of resale merchandise, ever consulting their watches that they may squeeze in just one more stop before the 5:00 PM witching hour when all the shops close.
Now, the vast majority of antique dealers, like the vast majority of doctors, are good, sensible and courteous people. But the trade does have that noisy minority who seem to think their needs and demands trump everyone else's. You may well recognize the "types" that — at the risk of offending those whom the show fits — are described in this month's column.
The Pusher: cutting and butting
Whatever a shop owner or staff member is doing — talking on the phone to a customer, opening a case for a customer, assisting with customer checkout — this dealer just knows that what he or she wants at that very moment is more important than whatever the staffer is doing. This dealer is not above going to the head of the line in lieu of waiting in it. The smart response, though hardly the path of least resistance, is to put such dealers politely but firmly in their place. Otherwise, bad behavior is rewarded with deference, a sure-fire recipe for reinforcing the behavior.
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| This large cast iron figure of a cougar or mountain lion graces a side table in my living room. (You might want to defer to the real animal if you met him by surprise, but most badly behaved dealers are not nearly so scary.) This exquisite item is, astonishingly, unmarked. Were I able to make something of such singular beauty and power, I'd surely want my name on it! Age unknown, it was acquired from an antique shop and came to me several years ago as a gift from very dear friends. (photo by the author.) |
Another incarnation of the type is the dealer who, in the middle of the busiest weekend of the year or during a special sale, calls or comes up to the desk demanding an unscheduled report on his or her sales for whatever period the dealer may choose. Is the staff member wrapping packages? Waiting on customers? No matter: The pushy dealer just knows you have sufficient time to drop whatever it is you're doing to give him/her a blow by blow description, complete with inventory number and sale price, of every single item he/she's sold in the last little while.
These folks are like stock market junkies who have to call the automated number to check their mutual fund performance every couple of days to see how it's doing — or like the online auction sellers who have to check in every hour to see if there's another bid on their auction.
The Privileged Character: ‘I just know that doesn't apply to me.’
It's customary for multi-dealer shops to ask dealers not to restock their cases during special sales events or on summer weekends when customer traffic is heaviest. Seems a reasonable enough request. There will always be the rare exception whose particular circumstances require cutting him/her some one-time slack. But most non-conformers are habitual offenders who just know the request doesn't apply to them. So picture it: in the middle of a busy weekend or special event, one of these self-absorbed dealers (whose display is in a prime, high-traffic area, of course) stocks his/her booth and disrupts the traffic flow.
Likewise, you can say "no repros" until you're blue in the face, and there will always be someone trying to sneak in that faux crystal, circa 1990s butter dish. You can beg people not to stock their booths with junk, yet there will always be one or two dealers who seem to use their display booths as a sort of landfill for the left-over trash from their auction box-lots.
The Wheeler Dealer: Making an offer you won't refuse
This is the dealer who never buys anything at the dealer price if he can help it. This is not about the occasional "offer" that we all make at some time or another when the item seems a tad on the high side and we hope the seller will do better. No, this is the dealer who comes in, stockpiles merchandise at the front desk, and expects staff to call with offers on every single piece.
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| This close-up of the head of my cast iron cougar shows its wonderful modeling detail. And, yes, those separately articulated fangs are as sharp as they look! (photo by the author.) |
One especially egregious example of my own acquaintance was generally surly and insulting toward other people's merchandise, making me wonder why on earth he'd be so interested in buying it. He'd make appallingly low offers on items, even though he habitually boasted, whenever his offers were refused (which, trust me, I encouraged as often as I could get away with it), that the item was already ridiculously under-priced and that, furthermore, he was going to buy it anyway at the dealer price to make a killing on it on resale.
This type views the dealer price as essentially meaningless. Dancing to his tune reinforces his belief in dealer-pricing's arbitrary nature
Dealing with the demanding dealer
The demanding dealer is not just a person with standards who expects other people to have standards, too. That's not being demanding, it's just having legitimate expectations. We're talking about people whose inflated personalities suck all the air out of a room.
The very worst way to deal with bad behavior is to put up with it. Demanding dealers consider themselves alpha animals as it is, and as long as others knuckle under to them like a troupe of scared orangutans, they'll continue their posturing and intimidation.
Such behavior can be dealt with effectively and politely, humanly and humanely. After some initial unpleasantness of the kind to be expected when they suddenly encounter the stiffened backbone of others, the best of unruly dealers will respect some honest setting of limits and will humanize very quickly. As for the rest of them, the trade and its reputation don't need them.
Peggy Whiteneck is a writer and collector living in East Randolph, VT. If you would like to suggest a topic she can address in her column, email her at allwrite@sover.net.
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