Aggressive Brand/Store Reps
 

not sure if "aggressive" is the right word or not, but many (not all) of the reps i personally have talked to who sell wake gear can be as bad as the boat salesmen. You would think they were getting a commission on the boards they sell from the negativity they sometimes voluntarily spew about other brands.
(... none of them do get commission do they???)

I don't want to hear why brands ______, _____, _____, and _______. suck...
stick to why your represented brand ______ is great...
...unless asked of course...

to give some of these guys a benefit of a doubt: sometimes they might be just poking fun and joking around, but i still don't think it professional when we just met.

I mean, even the Pros whos names are on their boards don't VOLUNTARILY talk trash about the competition... at least i have not met one yet that has. every pro rider i have ever talked to (ex. Murray, Watson, Andrew A., Byerly, Brian Grub, Vandal, Parks) about their board talks the same way you might hear if you watched the respective description video online. If asked their opinion about another brand/board, sure all is fair game, and they will share that too upon invite, which is cool. and when they do share negative things it is in an enlightening manner and not to just talk trash.
SO PROPS to all you PRO riders out there!!!


with all that said, i must apologize for being guilty in the past of the same, of being a pot and calling the kettle black... however, i am not sponsored or am a rep. But its still no excuse. treat others how you'd like to be treated. hopefully i can continue to learn from these experience lessons and control my biases and bridal my passions... a hard thing to do sometimes.

Uhhhh.......

soo is that a "YES" to my assumptive question that store reps do indeed get commission from sales?

either way, it doesn't serve them, the store, or the brand(s) any good in my point of view.

...again, may i find favor in the sight of the wakeboard gods despite my over-zealousness in the past and discouraging any one or group :banghead::)

Talking trash about another brand to sell yours, says more about you as a person, rather than the brand you are bashing or selling.

Most sales reps are not on direct commission. If they happen to be in a shop and talk to you when you buy a boat/board/bindings/whatever they don't see that on their paycheck. They're usually on a bonus structure based on the performance of the brands they represent in their given geographical region. That is often several adjoining states or more, depending on how many dealers are in each state.

That being said, if all the shops in their region start seeing increased sales in the lines the represent, their numbers (and corresponding bonuses) go up. This leads many reps to be very aggressive and often causes them to badmouth other brands. Any sale of another brand hurts their numbers.

Meanwhile, the guy who works in the shop on commission gets paid regardless of what brand you buy, as long as you buy from him. They might try to push you one direction or another based on sales incentives like spiff promotions/higher margins etc., but they're not as likely to be super aggressive.

Wow, I feel very lucky after reading all of that. I own a shop and not one single one of my reps act like that!!
Here's a little story....... I am very brand loyal, 3 weeks ago I received a phone call from a LF rep named Tyler. I told him that I only carried brands that I had a personal relationship with. He understood that and away we went on our separate ways. This past weekend at the Ice Breakerfest in Indiana that Zach Lear put together who did I run into.....Tyler. Met the guy, Awesome dude and he didn't talk **** about Hyperlite......our main line we carry. Needless to say we hung out, introduced me to his GF, who is the Hurley Rep and guess what.....we will be carrying there brands......the one thing that all of have in common isOur love for wakeboarding, Surfing anything to do with a boat. I am glad to have "non-agressive" reps and maybe that's why we have a loyal following for "our" brands.
Shout out to my awesome reps - Thad@hyperlite JoeG@oakley JBell@Spy&DC Chelsea@Hurley Tyler@LF&Headhunter AdamW@Nautique