IMAGINATION 439I learned afterwards that the merchant who owns the little shop
where I made these purchases pays a monthly rental of $500 for the
small store and makes a handsome income from the sale of nothing but
shirts, ties, and collars. He would have gone out of business, with a fixed
$500 a month for rent, if it were not for his knowledge of human nature
which enables him to make a very high percentage of sales to all who
come into his store.I was once walking down Michigan Avenue in Chicago, when my
eye was attracted to a beautiful gray suit in the window of a men's store.
I had no notion of buying the suit, but was curious to know the price, so
I opened the door and, without entering, merely pushed my head inside
and asked the first person I saw how much the suit in the window was.
Then followed one of the cleverest bits of sales maneuvering I have
ever observed. The salesman knew he could not sell me the suit unless I
came into the store, so he said, "Will you not step inside, sir, while I find
out the price of the suit?"
Of course he knew the price all the time, but that was his way
of disarming me of the "thought that he intended trying to sell me
" the suit. In less than two minutes I found myself standing in front of a
case, with my coat off, getting ready to tryon a coat like the one I had
observed in the window.
After I was in the coat, which happened to fit almost perfectly (and
this was no accident, thanks to the accurate eyes of an observing sales-
man) my attention was called to the nice, smooth touch of the material.
I rubbed my hand up and down the arm of the coat, as I had seen the
salesman do while describing the fabric, and, sure enough, it was a "very
fine piece of material. By this time I had again asked the price, and when
I was told that the suit was only fifty dollars I was agreeably surprised,
as I had come to believe that it might have been priced much higher.
However, when I first saw this suit in the window, my guess had been