I would consider my first job was a golfball salesman. Years ago at the age of 8 or 9, I spent two weeks with my grandparents in Wisconsin. Since Wisconsin isn’t the most exciting place to be for two weeks, I got a little bored. One day, my dad, uncle and granpa were going on a day golf trip so I decided to tag along. I would consider myself an alien to a golf course but I was an adventurous kid. After the first hole, I noticed my dad hit a ball into the woods. Quickly I darted into the woods looking his white ball. Upon entering the woods, my sharp little eyes quickly started finding balls lying “everywhere”. I was quick to pick them up and bundle them up in my soon to be very dirty shirt. Before long, I had close to 100 golf balls rolling around the cup holders and ledges of the golf cart. I knew that I wanted to sell them since I wasn’t a golfer. Knowing I wouldn’t be able to sell them since they were super dirty, I rushed to the ball cleaner and scrubbed them all up. My last step was advertising and selling. I created some signage and set up a table along the roadside. Before long I was selling single golf balls left and right. After a few hours, I got some competition. My sister and cousin though it would be a good idea to take my grandpa’s golfballs and sell them. So I had to think quick on my feet and change my price. I lowered my prices and even made a two-for-one deal which was a real hot seller. Before long, I sold nearly half of my golfballs and made quite a profit.
In the end I learned a lot of valuable life lessons and sales lessons. I learned that you have to work for what you want. I also thought of ways to compromise when sales weren’t as good as would have liked them to. In a way, this “business” helped me catch the “bug” for sales and a love for business.
testacr22
I really love this story. I grew up golfing a lot and saw stands at houses and would always buy some golf balls from the little kid usually at the stand. But as of recently I took this to the next level. I worked on a golf course, and days after tournaments were hundreds of golfers golfed in one day I would begin collecting. I would go to every pond and every “sweet spot” that I knew people hit into and would collect multiple 5 gallon pales full of balls. I would then power wash them and sell them. Some days finding upwards of 500 balls this was a great way to make money growing up.