Back when I first started at UPS ... the Northeast sales rep resigned. So, they threw me into the breach. I'd get up on Monday morning at 5:00 to get a plane to Manchester, NH or Baltimore. Then ... armed with my sales kits I'd start driving from town to town to see newspapers.
I saw a lot of places I'd never seen ... probably won't ever again ... and it was fall ... so it was a pretty time to drive out there.
But ... I can't tell you how difficult a job it is to sell syndicated features ...typically, the first things editors wanted to do was go over their bill to see where they could save.
So after playing defense for the first 10 minutes you'd then try to pitch the new features ... and the routine was almost always the same. OK, thanks. I'll check it out and get back to you. So you'd leave your kits and hope that the editor would read them. You'd follow up of course, but they can skirt your calls and e-mails if they're not in the mood to talk.
After 12-15 of these calls during the week, I'd fly home on Friday afternoon ... getting home about 11:00 on Friday ... then Monday it would start all over again.
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