Tommy Boy “The Guarantee”

In this clip, Tommy can be seen trying to win back a former customer in hopes that he can save his families auto-parts business. While a comedy movie, this scene has many good sales tactics that can apply to the real world. At first the customer does not seem enthusiastic about the brakes, emphasizing that the box does not have a “guarantee” written on it. However, Tommy (Chris Farley) stays persistent. As the customer walks away, Tommy follows his up the stairs, refusing to take no for an answer. This is a very common sales tactic in which the seller continues to sell their product despite a “no” from the customer. They believe that if they stay persistent, the customer will inevitably break. Next, Tommy begins to degrade the competition by saying “If you want me to take a dumb in a box and mark it guaranteed I will I got spare time”. While Tommy is joking (I think), He is saying that Quality products don’t have guarantees, ones that do, know that their product will fail. By degrading the opponents’ products, he is enhancing his own. Tommy also mentions the customers daughter, bringing a personal aspect into the selling process. By bringing up the daughter, the customer is unknowingly thinking about more than just the product. Tommy intentionally adds another aspect to the customers thought process in order to persuade his into buying his product instead of the competitors. Finally, the customer buys the product on the spot after Tommy’s monologue. Tommy was persistent, personal, and light on his feet, all things that make for a great salesperson. While it is a movie, we can learn a lot from Tommy’s sales tactics and how we as students can use these in our own lives. Highly recommend this movie to anyone who has never seen!