Police: Two Traveling Salesmen Beat Up St. Cloud Man [Minnesota]

WCCO/CBS ^ | July 14, 2012 6:14 PM | unattributed

[Hunton Peck]

No joke. They used the hard sell approach.

[End Times Sentinel]

A couple of weeks ago, I was in the nearby Lowes.

A young man approached me “Excuse me sir, can I have a moment of your time? I’m selling subscriptions to magazines so that I may win a college scholarship...”

“Uh, dude? I’m SURE you’re not supposed to be soliciting in here.”

“Sir, my boss told me to just switch between here and the IKEA.”

“Boss???”

How many people subscribe to having paper magazines delivered to their houses by the Postal Service anyway? I’d rather they offer to recondition my buggy whips.

[Hunton Peck]

This almost sounds like some new scam sweeping the country.

I can’t remember the last time I had a subscription to something printed on paper.

[I see my hands]

Two things:

• Got to love the wife. She woke me up this morning telling me two clean cut guys in short sleeved white shirts were knocking on our door She had her S&W Bodyguard in her hand, I grabbed my PDX1 loaded Public Defender Poly from the nightstand and we just waited. After a few minutes they left.

• Years ago when I lived in a citesh often some earnest leftist would approach me on the street and ask if he/she could speak with me for a moment. I always answered 'sure' and kept waking. LOL! They expected me to stop. Right!

[factoryrat]

Kinda takes “high pressure sales tactics” to the extreme, doesn’t it?

[dr_lew]

I came close to this just a few weeks ago. Perhaps this is unfair, since the man was never physically threatening, but he did show anger. He rang the doorbell, and when I answered he introduced himself and said he was an ex-convict seeking to improve his life, and showed me ID from the state of Tennesee. He had a folder with some kind of cloth cover, which had been folded into squares. There was a signature sheet, asking you to evaluate his politeness etc. I asked to look at it and leafing ahead, I saw this was all lead-in to the magazine pitch, since he would not get “full credit” for the evaluation unless I bought magazines. Meanwhile, he was asking me if I would be willing to help “someone like him”, and I said “sure” ( “willing”, N.B. ) Of course, when I preemptively told him I wasn’t going to buy any magazines under any circumstances, he accused me of lying; using that word, as I recall. It was very much like an affirmative action meeting from the ‘80’s. I noted that the last signature was from Strongsville, Ohio, and he said that’s where he was last. It’s about 350 miles east of the Chicago area where I live. I found the whole thing rather disturbing, needless to say.

[Wally_Kalbacken]

I have heard of the Ben Franklin close, would this be the Chuck Norris close?

[bigbob]

I suppose in retrospect he wishes he’d have just taken Sports Illustrated for a year...

[Krankor]

Mmmm. Sounds like you deserved a good beating.

[JoeDetweiler]

“By the time police arrived at the 300 block of 17th Avenue North, the two assailants were restrained and the homeowner suffered only minor injuries.”

It sounds to me like St. Cloud Man Beat Up Two Traveling Salesmen....

[Major Matt Mason]

I'm surprised to hear that they still do this. There has been controversy around the door-to-door magazine salemen for a while. In fact, there was a murder case a few years ago in this area related to these folks (I think one offed another, not a homeowner). Pretty shady stuff, for the most part.

[dog breath]

Hard to get repeat business that way.

[Gene Eric]

>> I’m surprised to hear that they still do this.

Yeah, but back in the day, traveling salesmen had the guts to beat up the prospective customers on their own without the help of a buddy. Boy, talk about the new Castratti.

[Hunton Peck]

The “reporting” does leave something to be desired...

[ClearCase_guy]

No pictures. No description.

I'm going out on a limb here -- the two assailants might be magazine salesmen, but they might also be black. If so, it begs the question: did they resort to violence because they are magazine salesmen, or did they resort to violence because they are black?

Of course, if they aren't black, then I'm just jumping to conclusions. But the odds are in my favor here.

[Parley Baer]

“Of course, if they aren't black, then I'm just jumping to conclusions. But the odds are in my favor here.”

I think the odds are in your favor. When I see these stories I always bet on it being one of Obama’s sons. I am right over 80% of the time.

[PhxTM06]

LOL....”Roundhouse kick your sales success to a new level!”

[Free in Texas]

Buy or die!

[PowderMonkey]

“Excuse me sir, can I have a moment of your time?"

No. Stopping people dead in their tracks with a question is a highly effective technique. Time of day? Spare change? A few survey questions? Caught off guard, they freeze. Easy pickins' from there...Magazine subscriptions? Get off my lawn.

[PowderMonkey]

"There was a signature sheet, asking you to evaluate his politeness etc."

Another effective technique: You've been outmaneuvered and manipulated at the start, by getting something into your hands. Now you're stuck with whatever they've handed you, and you're anchored in place, under their control. They won't accept it back until you've "answered some survey questions" with a view towards separating you from your money.