Ray Kroc – Is Persistence Enough?

If you have not seen the move “The Founder,” I highly recommend it to anyone with two hours to spare and a will to learn a little bit about the history of McDonalds, because that is what the movie is about – the founding of McDonalds, and how it was taken over by a traveling salesman with a mind for money. This post will be a critique of Mr. Kroc’s sales strategy, and a possible explanation for his inability close deals.

This scene characterizes the next 10 minutes of the opening, as it shows Mr. Kroc traveling from restaurant to restaurant, peddling his multimixer machine to their owners. These scenes show failure after failure as Ray attempts to convince the owners of these stores that without his multimixer machine, they will continue to not sell their milkshakes. As we can see here, what Ray is not doing, is asking questions. Ray is “spilling the candy in the lobby” so to speak. And what is the result? The buyer is completely turned off and takes no interest in the sale. By not asking what the buyer wants, probing for pain, and trying to build trust with the buyer, he alienated the the buyer, and failed to build enough rapport.

The rest of the intro is this way. Ray is exemplifies the classic “fuller brush man.” A traveling salesman who pushes product to the total chagrin of everyone he has the un/fortunate cause to meet. This is the classic, and unfortunate image that salesman have adopted, and does not accurately represent what a good salesman ought to be.

While one might be tempted to say that, although he fails to ask questions and build trust with his buyer, he remains charismatic, flattering, and focused on the needs of the buyer. Unfortunately, these things just aren’t enough. A salesman doesn’t just need to be in control of a buyer, he needs to understand the buyer fully and what he is thinking. Ray doesn’t even seem to realize that his buyer is completely uninterested, because he keeps peddling the same routine and never changes. Clearly it is not working.

I will say, one thing that Mr. Kroc does well, is an acceptance of failure. Ray is not scared to be turned down, and he moves on to the next client without getting emotional about it. Unfortunately, although he might be able to handle failure, he is incapable of learning from it, and continues to use the same tactics time and time again.

If one is looking to become major corporation CEO, or to take a company over with manipulation and hostility, or if one is simply wanting to learn how to scale or franchise a business, this movie may be a good resource for you. However, if you are looking for help in refining your sales routine, I would go looking somewhere else.