CREATING A SELLING ATMOSPHERE
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
Sin,—May I add a line of comment on your masterly and comprehensive article on " Facing Trade Realities " ? Many, indeed, are the factors, as you truly insist, of the problem---need Of realizing our changing geographical position, of marketing as well as manufacturing our goods, of selecting our best men as commercial " missionaries," of getting our -Universities and leading business men to put their heads together, and finally the need of studying not merely foreign languages but foreign countries and, above all, their peoples.
For years America has been alive to the fact that selling as an art implies a knowledge not merely of the goods but of the seller. And practical courses in business psychology are common in that country. This is just the weakest, point in our system of foreign trade. We can make the goods, we can get them to the market, but we don't know how to sell them. If the number who are acquainted with the languages of our foreign customers is few, the number who have an adequate knowledge of the " make-up " of the foreign people concerned is still fewer. The latter have their ways of doing business which are often remote from our own. A commercial traveller in England knows thit his customer's time is money, and that anything in the nature of " palaver " is out of place. Birt in France, where the hours are far longer, time is of less account. We might say that time which in England is money, in France is only /a monnaie (small change).
" The wise traveller, therefore, will discuss anything but business,admire the position of the shop, the display of the goods (every Frenchman is an artist at heart), and if he has been there before, he will inquire about the health of Monsieur or Madame, or the wel- fare of the children, if there are any, and only by degrees approach the real object of his visit. In this way only can he create a proper selling atmosphere." [See Modern Language Teaching (University of London Press), pages 237, 238.] Surely it should not be impossible to arrange for future com- mercial travellers abroad in our own institutes and in our universities lectures on the institutions, manners and customs of the peoples concerned, with practical hints, on the hun- dred and one " do's " and " don'ts " that facilitate or militate against creating the proper atmosphere for doing business. In a word, foreign commerce has its diplomacy and the rudiments, I believe, can be taught.—I am, Sir, &c., CLOUDESLEY BRERETON. 9 Highbury Terrace, Highbury, N. 5.
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