Kirby Vacuums – Not a Fan of Their Sales Approach

How many of you have had your doorbell ring and had a person offer you a free carpet cleaning?  How many of you got suckered into it, not realizing that there was a HUGE CATCH attached to the whole thing?

Well, yesterday around lunchtime my doorbell rang.  The funny thing is that I was still in my pajamas and had no make-up on.  I had a baby on one hip and my other 3 children following behind me.  It must have been pretty chaotic for the person who was outside going through a whole shpeal about how they were opening up a carpet cleaning business in my area.  They apparently had a business about an hour away and were looking to expand so they were going door to door offering a free carpet cleaning.

I was hesitant at first and asked several times what the catch was.  The woman assured me that there was no catch and that they just asked for me to share my experience with friends and family.  It seemed fair enough and being a small business owner myself I even mentioned what a great strategy this was to get new clients.  The woman left and said the carpet cleaning crew would come by in a few minutes.

I ran around the living room straightening things up and moving the smaller pieces of furniture vactually getting a little excited that the carpet would be cleaned.  The woman even mentioned that they could clean the upholstery in my furniture as well.  I declined and said that I would prefer just the carpet to be done, after all I was busy as can be trying to give lunch ready for my 4 kids.

About 30 minutes went by and an unmarked minivan pulled up in my driveway.  I thought it was very odd because I was expecting at least a van with the carpet cleaning business info on the side or something like that.  Then I saw the woman who had offered me the cleaning – she was driving and 2 men came out of the van and they were definitely not dressed as if they would be doing any cleaning.  I was immediately concerned and made up my mind NOT to let them in even before they got to my door, after all, my husband was not home.  It was just me and the kids.

When I opened the door to let them know that I had changed my mind, I saw that one of the men was carrying a box with”Kirby” marked on it.  All of a sudden I was flooded with memories of an experience I had with a Kirby representative a few years ago.  They had promised the same thing – a free carpet cleaning.  But that was definitely NOT what they had come for.  I was totally suckered into letting them into my home.  And they did this whole presentation about the Kirby vacuum being the best in the world.  It had an engine built from the same material as a jet engine.  They scared the heck out of me by telling me that my home was infested with dust mites.  They even had this whole write up with close up pictures of dust mites.   It was like they were SCARING me into buying this vacuum.

They went around vacuuming different surfaces in my home with these dust catcher things where you could actually see the dust.  The guy must’ve laid 25 different dust filled pads all around and he didn’t even clean them up before he left.

The Kirby salesman was SUPER nice to me when he first came in, but once I said “No” to buying the vacuum – he made me feel like a piece of crap.  It was horrible.  I even cried after he left because I felt terrible that I could not afford a $1500 vacuum.

From then on, I was TOTALLY turned off to their company.  I really felt betrayed that they were not up front with what their intentions were.  The woman that came to my door saw that I was frazzled dealing with my children and she still set the whole carpet cleaning thing up knowing that this was going to be a presentation to sell me a vacuum.  Not cool!

Have you ever been suckered into this whole thing by Kirby?  Did you sit through their 2 hour presentation?  Did they make you feel bad when you declined their vacuum offer?  I am sure their product is great, but I am not talking about the quality of the vacuum itself.  I am talking about their deceptive sales approach.  I just feel like it is totally inappropriate to sucker someone into coming into their home and offering a free carpet cleaning just to sell your product.  Maybe it worked back in the day, but in this day and age – I think they should find some other way to sell to people and get new clients.  What do you think?

I want to close by saying that this was not a review of the actual Kirby vacuum.  From the presentation, I did see that the vacuum really was amazing and would’ve loved to buy it if I could.  It sucked up dust 100 times better than my Eureka.  I don’t want to talk negatively about the company or the product itself.  I am just sharing my own personal experience and opinion of their sales approach.