In 1995 after I got out of the Army, I spent about six months of my life as a car salesman. At the time I really didn’t have a care in the world. I had only a small apartment with no wife, no kids (I had plenty of money) and I played golf almost every day. One particular day in September of that year, a beautiful college student came to the dealership shopping for a new car. As soon as she got out of her car, I raced past three other salesmen and began the sales process.

After about fifteen minutes, we headed out for a test drive that would last almost three hours and included a trip to the ATM and a lunch. When we finally returned to the dealership we made plans for her to come back later that afternoon and take the car home overnight.

When she returned I told her, “I don’t care if you buy this car or not, but you have to buy some car before Saturday night.” “Why?” she asked. “Because I don’t date my customers and you and I are going out this Saturday.” Two hours later she was driving off in a brand new Mazda Protégé that she had paid more than the sticker price to get. On top of the inflated price, she bought the scotch guard treatment for $300 (which was me and a can of scotch guard), credit life insurance, gap insurance and any other miscellaneous charge I could come up with. Two days later we drove her new car to dinner and a movie that I gladly paid for with the fat commission check I got from her purchase.

While I would love to think that my charm, charisma and devastatingly good looks were the reason I was able to close the deal on the car, the truth is she had been to four other dealerships and talked to four other salespeople that treated her like an idiot and put the hard sell on her. She was thrilled to have finally encountered a person, any person, who was upbeat, confident and friendly who didn’t try to force her into a decision that she wasn’t ready to make. (Closing the deal on the date on the other hand, was definitely because of my charm, charisma and devastatingly good looks.) Ten months later, she would become Mrs. Castleman and I began making those car payments.

I bought a new car for the same Mrs. Castleman last December as a Christmas present. I surprised her with this car on Christmas Eve for three reasons. One, the last time she bought a car she ended up with a date. Secondly, our finances couldn’t afford her negotiating another new car. Third, Christmas was closing in fast, and I couldn’t think of anything else to get her.

The salesman that I bought it from sells an average of two new cars a day from a dealership that is still selling 300 cars a month (so much for a bad economy). The process took me to the dealership five different times over a three-day period. Every time I walked in the dealership, I was greeted by people who were smiling, happy and generally in a good mood. I talked to several different people including the owner, my salesman, the finance manager (who called in a favor for me with his buddies at Ford Credit – wink, wink) and the service manager. All of them were fun to talk to, excited and very skilled at convincing me of what a great deal I had negotiated.

The point here is simple. Your customers and potential customers encounter depressing people with depressing news all day long. If you are depressed, you had better become good at faking a positive attitude or your sales will continue to decline with the lumber market. If, however, you can manage to stay positive, you will find your sales growing in spite of the market conditions. Be careful though. You might end up with 60 payments at 11-percent interest.