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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Burton Strauss III, post: 2164069, member: 59677&quot;]Dealers go to shows for many reasons. A lot - maybe most - of the business is dealer to dealer.</p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;I&#039;ve got too many Barbers, but X is a specialist and can take them off my hands. Maybe he has some general stuff for my store.&quot;</p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;Y has the coin my customer is asking for.&quot;</p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;I took in this junk to buy the collection - it was all or nothing - somebody needs it. Who?&quot;</p><p><br /></p><p>So the &#039;social hour&#039; is often meeting dealers you know and asking &quot;who handles z&quot;.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>All good.&nbsp; But it IS billed as a retail show and it&#039;s inexcusable not to break off the chat for 5m to price a couple of items for a retail buyer. Stupid too... by the time you pay $400 - $500 for a table, a couple of those $20 sales can be the difference between Sirloin and Tube (steak).</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Retail customer service is where it&#039;s at in a retail environment.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>At the PNNA show, I found something I wanted from a dealer who I consider a friend. I run into him all over the country. His wife was manning the booth and pointed at him (literally 12 feet away) and said &quot;I&#039;ll call him&quot; &quot;Not necessary, just hold it for me and I&#039;ll catch you on the next lap&quot; &quot;No, I&#039;m calling him&quot; and she did.</p><p><br /></p><p>Second half of the story is that I ran into him again 2 weeks later at the Elk&#039;s club (small) show. And picked out a nice 185?O Seated Liberty 25c - and he looks at me and says &quot;no, I sold you one two weeks ago&quot; ... sure enough both our records showed it. I wanted the dime.</p><p><br /></p><p>Then he says &quot;I have a couple new 3 cent silvers for you to look at.&quot;</p><p><br /></p><p>And when I grabbed the split planchet 1852 he says &quot;oh yes, sweet piece&quot;.</p><p><br /></p><p>That&#039;s customer service... and that&#039;s why I buy a lot from him. Not big stuff - but he&#039;s somebody I know, trust and visit again and again.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>So, be like a cat - remember the good dealers and patronize them and remember the bad dealers and skip them &quot;You weren&#039;t interested in selling to me last show, I&#039;m not interested in spending money with you&quot;[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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