SELLING LUMBER 



387 



formation on the subject. Once we have an interested prospect, 

 we do not let him rest. We have a follow-up system that regularly 

 keeps in touch with the prospect and we attempt to arrive at a point 

 where he can see nothing else but a wood block floor. We have 

 instances on file of a four-year campaign before we finally closed 

 the business. But we got it. 



There was a time, when we first started on our floor business, 

 that we had to go at a man with certain set arguments and secure 

 his attention through sheer force of salesmanship, but I am happy 

 to say that today we do not find one in fifty who is not familiar 

 with a wood block floor and generally readily admits its perfection. 

 Price is the largest stumbling block and one that is not easily sur- 

 mounted, and we must demonstrate to our prospect where the ulti- 

 mate economy warrants the additional first cost. Then, too, we 

 freouently find some men who are confirmed concrete advocates. 

 In that event, a walk through their plant with them gives us oppor- 

 tunity to point out his cracked and patched floor surface, which 

 invariably is to be found where heavy material is handled by hand 

 or on trucks. Should his plant have large,, expensive machinery, 

 we call his attention to the fact that the dusting of a cement floor 

 is a poor lubricant and rays of sunshine give graphic visual proofs 

 of the dusting of his floor. This, however, has to be handled diplo- 

 matically, or in place of gaining a convert, you will make an enemy. 

 Every crow thinks its chick the blackest, and plant superintendents 

 do not vary the rule. 



Cold wearing surfaces are hard on labor, and in the winter you 

 will find machinists with lengths of board, a piece of carpet, or a 

 burlap sack under their feet, and in one case a plant went so far as 

 to provide cocoa mats for their men to stand on. All this litters a 

 floor, furnishes a means that frequently causes serious accidents, 

 due to men tripping and falling into moving machine parts. A 

 \concrete floored plant requires a larger consumption of coal to 

 neat than does one with a creosoted wood block floor. Wood is 

 a ^non-conductor. Oil will not damage a creosoted wood block 

 floor. Neither does it show stain from oil drippings and is im- 

 pervious to water or acids when properly laid. Being black, a creo- 

 soted wood block floor does not reflect light nor does it radiate 

 heat. We have installed a creosote wood block floor in a plant 

 where the temperature of the concrete floor slab is 145 degrees, 

 an impossible condition for a man to work on, except for the insula- 



Price the 

 Only Obstacle 

 to Wood 

 Hock Sales 



Points of 

 Superiority 

 of Wood 

 Block Floors 



