Remark at the
beginning: The original post is in German in the Blog "Almuts Anekdoten" from 2014 and I did my best to make it
understandable to non-Germans here 😊.
As a self-employed exhibition assistant including
demonstrating products of different manufacturers and interacting with
potential clients I have a lot of contact with different people from all over
the world.
During the “Ambiente” exhibition in Frankfurt
- trade fair with the areas dining, living and giving- I worked for a French
manufacturer who specialized on natural algae products. He wanted to introduce his range of soaps and
other Thalasso-products like bath essences and shower gel in Germany. Although
speaking fluently English and a little bit of German it was important for him
to have a German native speaker who translates the needs and wishes of
Bavarian, Swabian or Saxon customers. Together with the local dialect of
Mannheim these dialects sounds to him like Chinese.
This time we have the pleasure to meet somebody which
I never met before. Like many customers a very elegantly dressed woman with
perfectly coiffed shoulder length blond hair looks at our booth very
intensively. As advising another customer at that moment I don´t see her face.
My French boss slowly approaches the woman and seems to exchange a few words.
He waves at me with his hand. The woman seems to be a “dialect candidate”. I close my conversation and focus my
attention on the new customer.
The first time I see her face I think spontaneously: ”Ouch!
This seems to be painful.” Her lips are extremely swollen under the perfect
make-up. It looked like if somebody had stretched the skin of her face like a
membrane on a drum. Sometimes you see such faces on TV but I have never seen
before such a woman in face-to-face contact.
Normally I treat everyone with respect regardless of who the customer is and the way the
customer looks like. This is why I don´t show my compassion for this
obvious painful situation.
Due to her minimal opening of her lips it is a
challenge to understand what she wants to say. I have the impression that any movement of the
mouth could be painful: “Gees give e grice oa there.” It takes a while until I
understand the meaning of this sentence:
“Please give me price over there.” She means the natural sponge besides
the soaps. This sponge is only decoration,
my French boss is surprised that in Germany the customers want to buy
not only the products but even the decoration. In France this demand is
uncommon, he doesn´t want to sell his special decoration. I explain to the
woman that the sponge is unsaleable.
The woman´s finger points to the shelf unit containing
the shower gel and bath essences without saying anything. I tell her more
details of the different qualities and
properties, give her the price per piece and let her smell the various
fragrances.
After each sentence she nods her head without facial
expression, so that I cannot guess which fragrance is her favourite or if she
is generally interested. Where is the hidden camera? If she hadn´t moved her
eyelids I would have had the feeling to talk to a mask. Her wording is limited
to the absolute necessity:”Oger.” (translated: order). While taking the order
forms my boss tells me that there is a minimum order quantity and various
packaging units as well. All customers before only ordered samples, she is the
first one who wants to place an order immediately. I translate the packaging
units in German. I ask myself: From which region does she come from? How old is
she?
Not long ago a former head of department of cosmetics
told me that you can “read” a person´s age at specific areas of the body. First
some areas cannot be operated or lifted respectively the operations are very
seldom made in this areas. It is the neck (a scarf covered the woman´s neck
completely), the elbows (the woman wears a long-sleeved silk blouse which
covers the elbows), feet and knees (it is winter, everything covered) and
hands. Whereas the latter was the only
exposed area at this moment. The woman wears rings at each finger in various
sizes and has got red fingernails. As everybody knows jewellery attracts the
attention first to the jewellery itself and not to the skin or person who wears
it. Madonna and Karl Lagerfeld often
wear fingerless gloves and a lot of jewellery. They know why.
In my case it was really impossible to estimate the
woman´s age. Meanwhile the woman goes back and forth without saying anything.
She seems to think about the packaging units.
In order to simplify the conversation I start a new
strategy by asking questions. So she has the possibility to nod: “The package
unit of this shower gel is 6 pieces. Do you want to order them?” She nods. I
continue: “Do you want also 6 pieces from the blue relaxing version?” She nods
again. She starts to point at the products she is interested. I comment on the
package unit: “For that type you need to order 12 bottles per box.” She
hesitates to nod, I explain the advantages to dispose of a complete range of
fragrances. She seems to be convinced and nods. No additional questions from
her side. I comment on the rest of the
products of the shelf until her view goes back to the top. I guess: “You want
to add this bath essence to your order.” She nods again, I note the product
down the form.
She gesticulates with her hands, as if she wants to
have copy of the order form. I remark: “I need your name, address, tax number
and signature.” Quickly she picks a stamp from her bag in order to press it on
each page of the order form. Then she takes the ballpoint pen and signs the
page with a very creatively curved signature exceeding five lines. Wordlessly
she takes the copy of the order form and leaves the booth. My French boss is
impressed. In his experience customers who don´t discuss and don´t ask many
questions are profitable large customers. Does she deal with perfumery,
cosmetics or dispose of a chain of stores? In which business it is so important
to have such a perfect look? And where does she come from?
Solution: our first guess is completely wrong. She
comes from Austria and manages a camping site. This camping site disposes of a
shop where the products are sold. We call her Madame Botox. Our booth neighbors
want to know details about the mysterious woman because she stayed a long time
at our booth. I tell them her background. Spontaneously I riddle my counterpart
by imitating two sentences with a motionless face and frozen lips. The audience
starts to guess and to laugh at the same time. Afterwards I ask myself why this painful
plastic surgery was necessary although she already has got an outstanding
charisma that draws the attention of her environment.
Perhaps nobody told her
about her attraction before.
