One of Sara’s odd jobs is to sell FM radios at Rugby matches around London. The company pays a fixed allowance of GBP40 for selling a minimum of 100 and additional commission for everything over. Last weekend Sara had a good earning of 50 pounds, but then she lost her bag at a shopping mall with all the earning and other valuables. That’s like losing a quarter of your monthly paycheck! She was obviously quite depressed, but only for a little while, until somebody reminded here that there was nothing in that bag that couldn’t be replaced. She hoped for another Rugby match to make up for the loss.

This weekend, the group was taken to a small Rugby match in Coventry. The company didn’t expect to sell many, so they offered a commission of 1 pound per radio – no fixed allowance, no minimum target. There were about 15 students in the group and everyone thought they’d be lucky if they sold 20. That’s what the company expected too. But Sara saw a real opportunity and aimed to sell 50. Just before they arrived at the venue, the weather turned nasty – rain, hail, snow and all! The turnout of the spectators was very low; nobody wanted to listen to a student trying to sell a 5-pound radio; the sellers were freezing with cold! The group ended up selling about 300 pieces, as opposed to a 1000 at regular matches. But Sara had sold 67 of these! That means the rest of the group had averaged 15 pieces each. This was perhaps the first time the company had paid a commission of 67 pounds to an individual at a match in Coventry! We can learn quite a bit from this 22-year old student.

Please feel free to leave your comments for Sara right here.