Hi, Francisco blogging here. In my last post, I discussed the success I enjoyed while being my own boss and selling clothes to neighbors, friends and relatives.

At 1 point, I purchased 30 pairs of men's trousers.  While these trousers were not the latest fashion, because they were so cheap, they still sold well.  At first, I sold lots of these pants, but after a while, I found myself stuck with more pants than I could sell.

 It was at this point that I changed my sales strategy and started selling clothes door-to-door.  So, with a new partner (my friend Marcos) we went from house to house, selling clothes for children, women, and those “ not so popular” men's pants.

 As expected, the children's clothes sold very easily.  While the women's clothes sold well, they required extra work.

 Customers were allowed to take various items of clothing home and try them on.  The trouble with that was when they brought them back, the clothes that were neatly folded in their bags were returned in a disorderly mess.  What was even worse was the fact that  customers  rarely purchased anything.

 However, all things considered, sales were pretty good, with the exception of those pants.

 Selling clothes in an unfamiliar neighbourhoods and to people I didn’t know required a lot of orientation and mobility and good cane technique.  It also required many hours of extra work, along with good physical conditioning due to all of the walking involved.

 With me being 16 years old, a swimmer, and a football player, physical fitness was no problem for me.

 What proved to be more problematic was selling those last four pairs of pants and being able to recover the money I spent on them.  At this point, this had become a matter of honor.

 Selling clothes on the street also had its quirks.

 For example, at times, we would ringthe the doorbell at a house, but no one answered.  This is despite the fact that  we heard noises from inside that house.

 Soon, we realized that some people saw two young men with canes and bags in their hands, the closed the door and pretended not to be home.

 We also discovered that there were those who would open the door and just stand there without saying anything.

 The strategy in those cases was to simply say:

 Could you come here please?

 We are selling clothing for adults and children.

 This usually worked fine.

 The person would either come to us or say they weren't interested.

 When that happened, we always had some clothes to display and stimulate the customer's curiosity.

 At other times, however we heard nothing, that was because there wasn’t anybody at the door. To be sure, we would recite our lines:

 Could you come here please??

 -We are selling clothing for children and adults.

That was done because before the silence, we had know way of knowing whether or not anyone was at the door.

One time, after waiting at the Gate of a particular house, we decided to move on to the next one.

 At this point, a lady with a very high-pitched voice said to us:

 "I was here all along.  I just wanted to see if you were really blind or were just pretending to deceive poor, innocent ladies like me."

 That shrill voice scared us to death, as we no longer expected to hear anything coming from that particular house.

 In fact, I jumped in fear.

 But it was what she said that made both Marcos and I burst out laughing.  That lady didn’t sound innocent at all.

 In fact, we only stopped laughing at the situation after we got at 4 blocks away.

 And even after that, we would laugh at the situation whenever we thought about the fright I got.

 Another frequent situation we encountered during our sales was when someone, usually a child, came to us with some coins, explaining that his or her mother, father, or aunt told them to give it to us.

 At that point, we explained to them that rather than begging, we were selling clothes.

 We then returned the money to the child.

 Those customers usually didn't buy anything either.

 Since this blog is already too long, I'll just tell you this last story.

 It was close to lunchtime.  Marcos and I were already hungry.

 We had sold very little, so we decided to visit another house.

 As we walked along that street, our noses were bombarded with the most delicious smells.

 When we randomly chose that house, after waiting a reasonable amount of time and not hearing any noises, we heard the door open.

 It was then that a little boy approached us and said:

 "My mother sent this food for you."

 From the plate drifted some mouthwatering smells.

 Despite our hunger, we stood firm:

 -We are not asking for food.  Thank your mother for the food but tell her we are selling Clothes.

 The boy returned the dishes to the house and, after a while, he shouted from the door that his mother didn't want to buy anything.

 After that experience, we decided to look for a restaurant where we could have lunch.

 It took us 30 Minutes to find food.

 It turns out that the neighborhood we were in was residential so it took forever to find a restaurant.

 The lunch we eventually had was not nearly as good as the one we refused.

  During the 10 months I wpent working in sales, I learned a lot, primarily, that if you are a person with a disability, people tend to see the disability first and the person second.

 So, the next time you encounter a person with a disability, see the person, not the wheelchair they are sitting in;  when you look at a person with a disability, see the person, not the cane they are using. 

 In short, see the Person with a disability and not the person's disability.

If you liked this post, feel free to ask me questions. It will be my pleasure to answer them. Also, please give a thumbs-up or leave a comment.