PPB November 2019

sample bag into their office and was directed to the meeting room. The conference room was well appointed and each beautifully crafted product sitting on the shelves around the room acted as a trophy for a job well done by the sales staff. The branded products were unique with beautiful decoration. This was not your average showroom. After spending a moment taking it all in, I pulled in my overstuffed bag with the intent to lean it against a wall to access my samples. The wall I zeroed in on had a skateboard propped up against it and a rolling apparel rack. As I was positioning my bag, it nicked the skateboard which fell into the rolling rack and suddenly there was a loud crash. The sound of breaking glass resonated through the room and the smell of wine permeated the air. Unbeknownst to me, there were about a dozen bottles of wine stored near the rack. The whole corner of this pristine showroom was now covered in glass and merlot. I was mortified! I apologized profusely to my very gracious client and offered to pay the cleaning bill. I had not left the first impression I had intended to. A few weeks later, I was at lunch with another client from the same office who did not attend my disastrous meeting. I told himmy embarrassing story of broken glass and wine- soaked carpet. When I got to the part about knocking over the skateboard, he looked at me and said, “Oh, you’re the wine girl! That was my skateboard!” “Dang, dude!” I replied. “This whole incident could have been avoided! Didn’t your mom ever tell you to put away your toys?” The Moveable Beast Kim Reinecker, MAS Regional Sales Manager, SW Starline USA Houston, Texas One of my previous employers had converted two older RVs into mobile showrooms. As territory reps, we were assigned to one of the RVs for about four to six weeks twice a year. We were trained to operate them, as well as keep them stocked with products and keep them housed at a storage unit near our homes. For the duration of time that we were tasked with these monsters, we used them to travel our territory to meet with distributors and their clients. The number of mishaps each of us encountered with the beasts would fill an entire book but my most memorable experience took place as I was returning from a trip to Victoria, Texas, where I was visiting customers. At the time, I was obsessed with vanilla-flavored Dr. Pepper from Sonic, and that day the call for one was pretty strong. While on the road, I saw a billboard for the fast-food mecca and happily exited the highway. I turned left on the road I thought would take me to my intended destination, but soon realized I was instead on a two-lane country road. I had to turn around. I finally saw a gravel driveway that appeared long enough to turn the beast and I pulled in. After looking both ways, I put the transmission in reverse. It was then I realized I had not pulled far enough into the driveway to give myself room to back out the other way. The next thing I knew, I had backed the beast into a ditch, blocking both directions of this two-lane country road. Panic set in when I could not drive forward. I was stuck! To my relief, an old farmer came along in his big dually [a standard truck with an extra set of rear wheels] with a dog in the back. He pulled over and began directing traffic around the front end of the RV and over the gravel driveway. Eventually the farmer’s buddies showed up (one of them in a tractor) like there was a barn-raising and they helped direct traffic. The farmer then pulled some chains out of the bed of his dually and hooked them to the chasse of the RV. With ease, he pulled the beast out of the ditch and cleared the road that was now clogged with vehicles. Then he pulled the RV much farther onto the gravel driveway and got beneath it to disengage his chains as his buddies looked on. That was when I began crying tears of embarrassment and joy. The farmer stuck his hand out from under the beast to hold mine and said, “You’re a concrete girl, aren’t ’cha?” Through my tears I confirmed his suspicions. After the beast had been disconnected from the dually, I thanked the farmer and his buddies and asked, “Would you like to come into the RV so I can offer you some samples?” They looked at one another and said, “No thank you, ma’am. We’re married men.” Kim Reinecker, MAS, is the southwest regional manager for supplier Starline USA and has been a supplier rep based in Texas for over 30 years. Tales From The Road | FEATURE | NOVEMBER 2019 | 25