[salad-tycoon]

Went to one once, one of the kids pooped. It was a bad one. The sales team wanted to keep going even as they enveloped by an incredibly thick stinky pungent hazardous stench. Real focus, reminded me of the movie quote “ABC always be closing.” Was interesting to be on the receiving end, a lot to study and not just the offers of “amazing places” but more so in terms of presentation and tactics. Leave your pocket book at home but everyone should experience one. (Oh yeah, didn’t sign of course, the rental locations were all on air bnb but cheaper and with none of the extra fees that they would have charged forever. Ha. Woops.)

[ecshafer]

The ABC thing is very evident when you are on the end of it. Every excuse to keep you there and try to get you to sign, they have a response for it. No money? We have loans. Bad credit? Lets get a cosigner. Anything to keep you there or to sign.

[JoshTriplett]

I've had door-to-door salespeople go "I see you have a no-soliciting sign but ...". They don't get to finish that sentence before the door closes.

[silisili]

Not sure about other cultures, but Americans lives in general I think would be a bit less stressful if there wasn't some weird aversion to just saying 'no' to things you don't want to do, rather than reaching for excuses. Is it seen as rude? I much prefer the directness of it on the receiving end, but maybe I'm weird.

[nicholasjarnold]

> the rental locations were all on air bnb but cheaper and with none of the extra fees that they would have charged forever

Exactly! Came here to echo this. I have family that got roped into this arrangement and the annual maintenance fees (and other misc fees at every turn) coupled with the up-front cost is absolutely ridiculous when compared to just booking an AirBnB/VRBO/etc for a couple weeks.

Also agree on sitting through one with zero intention to sign, once. It's a unique experience, and I feel like most people not already doing sales/marketing professionally might learn something from it.

[bombcar]

I’d be vary wary of going even if you have zero intention of being sucked in. They’re literally trained and adept at exactly those kinds of people - so don’t go unless you can sign over a durable power of attorney to someone offsite for the duration.

[pdonis]

I ran a similar experiment many years ago, not with a timeshare but with a multi-level marketing scheme. The tactics they used were very similar. I kept saying no and they kept inventing new reasons for me to sign up. I finally got bored and said no, thanks, I'm done, and walked out--but even then they were trying new reasons on me until I got out the door.

[interludead]

A classic experience!