Fast food, anyone?

Hi all,

This is Sean. Recently my job has taken an interesting turn -- instead of sitting at my desk making sales calls all day to low-level food company employees, I'm using any means possible to try and reach executives at the major supermarket and restaurant chains. This includes sending out emails to random company email addresses that I find online; calling in to the company's hotline and asking for an executive by his first name, as if I were an old friend ("Hi, is Hank there? OK, tell him it's Sean -- yeah, just Sean -- he'll know who it is"); and/or cutting the brakes on all the company cars. Ok, that one's more of a last resort. I'm actually just trying to set up face-to-face meetings for my sales manager, but simply getting the right person on the phone is like pulling teeth. Nobody wants to take a random, shot-in-the-dark call from a sales guy in the middle of their lunch break anyway, and the fact that I'm contacting company bigwigs probably doesn't help. Recently I called the Vice President of Procurement for the Dr. Pepper/Snapple Corporation, and our conversation went something like this:

(Me) Hello, is Richard there?

(Richard) Speaking.

(Me) Hi Richard, this is Sean from iCiX.

(Richard) Who?

(Me) Sean...From iCiX...have you heard of us?

(Richard) How did you get this number?

(Me) Oh, your assistant Cindy gave it to me.

(Richard) Well, maybe you should be talking to Cindy.

(Click).

Ha ha. What a jerk. Despite the occasional potholes like my pal Richard, it's a lot more fun that just making sales calls all day -- I feel like a detective, trying to figure out how to contact these secretive, powerful, pompous men and women who want nothing more than to be left alone in their corner offices so they can pretend to work.

Oh, and to explain the title of this post, my boss and I met with execs from the companies that own Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut last week. Summer was mad that I didn't bring home any coupons. My bad.