Have you ever learned something useful at a sales presentation?

[Quilter]

We checked in yesterday at Canyon Villas. Of course the concierge had a nice coupon book to pass on to us if we just stopped by her desk. It's all a catch to get you to sign up for a sales chat. I declined. But do I know about the DC? Yes, and I still decline. So you're comfortable knowing how to use your weeks? Yes, and I still decline.

Now I'm thinking maybe they might have something to tell me. But wait--have I ever learned anything useful from these presentations? Can't say that I have.

Have you?

 

[billymach4]

Really now.. C'mon.

With all of the experts here, we can dazzle them with our stuff.

You know we can tell them the truth! Most of those people are just simply rookies!

In fact I would not be surprised if they study Tug before learning how to sell for real.

 

[rickandcindy23]

I learned about TUG from a sales presentation on Maui for Fairfield points (it was Fairfield still back then) in May of 2005. Changed my life.

 

[Mamianka]

We have learned two things:

1. There are desperate and seemingly decently-educated people who will choose to LIE for a living, repeating the "company line" about how we own a FABULOUS product - which is all of a sudden terrible, because we do not have Extra Super-Duper Magic Points to add to it.

2. No amount of points, money or cheesy gifts will entice us to have our ire rankled again by these shysters. I would rather remove my eye with a rusty spoon that sit through one of these again. We leave for Ocean points in less than 2 weeks - so we expect the hone to ring any day now, with a chirpy young lady who will try to schedule us. we will be polite - but FIRM. Than answer is NO - now and forever, to quote Porgy and Bess.

It seesm that a few of us here had had the singular good fortune to have PLEASANT people meet with them. However, it seems that a significant portion of those also had tainted information. The dear Sisters that taught us Religious Ed decades ago, would warn us to "avoid the near occasion of sin". We intend to do that, by staying away from liars.

 

[jimf41]

Can't say I learn too much anymore but I can't say I've ever had a salesrep lie to me either. I really don't understand all the fuss about salesreps. Their job is to sell. In order to do that they have to do two things.

1. Make the product desirable.
2. Create a need, make you think that you have to have it.

It's not their job to explain all the negatives to you. Would you expect a washing machine salesrep to tell you that the machine really doesn't wash clothes all that well? Do you believe the butcher when he tells you that what he's selling is a really prime cut?

To get back on track and answer the OP's question, yes I have. A guy named Greg Delo sold me my first timeshare at Ocean Pointe. Two things he told me that have stuck with me since then. First he asked about 1/2 hour into the presentation if I was interested or did I want to go back to the beach? That told me he was reasonably upfront about the product he was selling. The second thing he said was that timeshareing was not the cheapest way to take a vacation but is was in his opinion the best way. I've found that to be true.

The second time I learned something was from a guy who is not with Marriott anymore. It was he who told me that at the time I bought my MFC Plat+ week I had access to the whole plat season. He followed up with a memo from Marriott to help me prove it to the VOA's who never heard of any option like that.

 

[hypnotiq]

I've learned that my time (hourly rate) is worth significantly more than the 'gifts' they offer to attend these presentations and Id much rather spend my time enjoying my vacation.

 

[Ann in CA]

I learned about TUG from a sales presentation on Maui for Fairfield points (it was Fairfield still back then) in May of 2005. Changed my life.

We also learned about TUG (from our Waiohai sales rep Karen...retired now) when we said we would not buy more Marriott weeks unless we sold Shell. She told us about TUG as a great place to sell. Just wish we had done it then! However, now with Shell exchanging though II, at least we have more Marriott options.

We've also had some great travel conversations, and often restaurant recommendations.

 

[rthib]

I have always learned something during my presentation.

You do not have to sit there like a lump for 90 minutes.

I find out about restaurants in the area, events.
Things going on at other resorts in area or hotel.

Any great trades they have made, hotel locations they like.

Most of the sales folks I deal with usually have good information.

I am still surprised with people who go there to either argue with the rep (they don't care) or sit back and get nothing.

 

[EducatedConsumer]

I've learned how precious our vacation time is, and that it belongs to me and my family (and not Marriott).

I've also learned not to taint our vacations by having to give even one iota of consideration to whatever "special, time sensitive offer" might be offered to us during a sales presentation. I can remember way too many people being distracted during their vacation by what they heard during a timeshare sales presentation, and becoming fearful that they'll lose something by not reacting to Marriott's timetable.

Finally, we've learned that the person who offers you a discount card, coupon book, maps, etc. at check-in, is often a Marriott sales or marketing person in disguise, and we are polite to them, but will not engage in any conversation with them. And when the phone rings in our villa, we know exactly who it is - - they won't or don't generally leave messages - - they keep redialing, and we share an occasional giggle each time the phone rings, and we don't answer it.

I realize these people are doing their job, but I think Marriott has pushed the envelope way too far on using every opportunity they can to market to us on, before and following our vacations. For what we have paid Marriott, we should be allowed to be left alone.

 

[dougp26364]

We checked in yesterday at Canyon Villas. Of course the concierge had a nice coupon book to pass on to us if we just stopped by her desk. It's all a catch to get you to sign up for a sales chat. I declined. But do I know about the DC? Yes, and I still decline. So you're comfortable knowing how to use your weeks? Yes, and I still decline.

Now I'm thinking maybe they might have something to tell me. But wait--have I ever learned anything useful from these presentations? Can't say that I have.

Have you?

Nope.

I've even had sale people tell my wife when I stepped away to get a refill or go to the bathroom that I know to much. Maybe that's their way of calling me a know-it-all.

Anymore we try to avoid the owners updates and sales presentations. We own more timeshares than we can use efficiently so there's no need to spend another $25,000 to $50,000 to own another week. I have no intention of spending $9 to $12 (or whatever Marriott is charging), just to get in on the "great deal" being a trust owner presents. I'll live happily with my illegitimate legacy weeks/points.

 

[BocaBoy]

I have always learned something during my presentation.

You do not have to sit there like a lump for 90 minutes.

I find out about restaurants in the area, events.
Things going on at other resorts in area or hotel.

Any great trades they have made, hotel locations they like.

Most of the sales folks I deal with usually have good information.

I am still surprised with people who go there to either argue with the rep (they don't care) or sit back and get nothing.

I agree. I have learned something new in most of the sales presentations I have attended. Most sales people are honorable people just trying to do their job. They are not lawyers and this stuff is complicated, so mistakes sometimes happen.

I am not saying that sales people never lie, but why is it that whenever a Marriott sales person makes a mistake he is LYING, but whenever someone on TUG makes a mistake while bashing Marriott that he is not? I'm just sayin'......

 

[Quilter]

I learned about TUG from a sales presentation on Maui for Fairfield points (it was Fairfield still back then) in May of 2005. Changed my life.

I learned about TUG from an article on timesharing in USA Today while staying at the Marriott in Chicago. This was in 1999 shortly after we bought our first 4 weeks. Changed my life too. I spent months with a dial-up connection reading and reading and reading. Tried to figure out ways to creatively spend the slow connection time between tread pages by moving some hand weights to my desk and then setting the ironing board up by the computer. After some years the family finally thought I might need a high-speed laptop. It's sitting on my lap while I wait for the sun to rise over the mountain. (Time zone change )

Two more owners learned about TUG tonight while sitting around one of the fire pits here at MCV. It still surprises me when I find long-time owners who haven't heard about TUG.

I have always learned something during my presentation.

You do not have to sit there like a lump for 90 minutes.

I find out about restaurants in the area, events.
Things going on at other resorts in area or hotel.

Any great trades they have made, hotel locations they like.

Most of the sales folks I deal with usually have good information.

I am still surprised with people who go there to either argue with the rep (they don't care) or sit back and get nothing.

Thank you rthib. This was helpful suggestion for the time spent in a presentation.

 

[sarahtme]

In a roundabout way I learned about resale. We said no to our first presentation, but asked for his card in case we decided to jump at it after discussing it between ourselves. His response was that once people left, they never bought. I had thought it was a pretty good deal, but don't make big decisions like that on the fly. I then figured if nobody buys after doing research, must be a pretty good reason. If he had not made that telling comment, we may have bought. Hubby was very interested. Found resale and he is going to get me completely addicted, I know it.

 

[Old Hickory]

I've never had a bad time in a sales presentation. But then we go in wanting to learn something new and will share and exchange information on travel.

Our sales presentation in St. Thomas got us some great insider information and contacts for the annual International Rolex Regatta.

 

[tiel]

Up until the DC was born, I'd say we learned SOMETHING new at each presentation we went to. Just had to pay attention and ask questions. Frankly, if we hadn't gone to some of the earlier ones, I'm not sure we would have figured out how to use our weeks effectively. We didn't know about TUG early on in our ownership, and when we did discover it, we found it daunting (info overload) and hard to sort through...getting the opinion apart from the "fact", if there is such a thing. Anyway, we usually had nice unstressed sales reps who made the experience tolerable, and we felt the extra info learned was worth the visit.

With the coming of the DC, though, we feel the sales presentations have gone down hill. At the beginning, the reps didn't really know the new program, and some didn't even understand the weeks system. As a result, they couldn't tell us anything we didn't already know. After about a year into the DC, we went to a couple presentations where we felt we knew MORE than they did, based on the incorrect/misleading statements they made. On one occasion, the rep walked out because we disagreed with what she told us...not a good move. We haven't been to a presentation since, and I'm not sure we will go again. We have all the weeks we need, we are enrolled, we have ZERO interest in purchasing trust points, AND, we no longer feel like WE can learn anything by attending.

 

[JimIg23]

Never went to one, never will.

 

[Passepartout]

Yup, I learned that a better use of my time would be trimming my nose hair. Sleeping. Calling my Ex. Watching paint dry. Anything!

Jim

 

[capjak]

Yup, I learned that a better use of my time would be trimming my nose hair. Sleeping. Calling my Ex. Watching paint dry. Anything!

Jim

Wow you must have a lot of nose hair any timeshare presentation I go to last at least 90 minutes and I usually learn that I know more than the sales rep about their product.

Sometimes I will learn good information on the area and what activities to do and what not to do.

 

[m61376]

Wow you must have a lot of nose hair any timeshare presentation I go to last at least 90 minutes and I usually learn that I know more than the sales rep about their product.

Sometimes I will learn good information on the area and what activities to do and what not to do.

I've found that the person who calls to offer us information with the intent on getting us to come to a presentation is usually very happy to tell you all about the area, activities, restaurants, etc.. You can spend 15 or 20 minutes on the phone with them and get all your questions answered without being subjected to a sales pitch or giving up vacation time, and then politely tell them you'll think about it/talk to your husband/wife, etc. and get back to them. They'll usually follow up with another call, which is a good opportunity to ask any other questions about the area you may have.

I have to admit, that sales call in the guise of a concierge call for trip planning was great when we went to MCV. Never having been to the area I was kinda scrounging to figure out what to do only a couple of days before leaving. After 20 minutes on the phone I had a great itinerary planned, knew where to go, when to go, and how to get there. It saved me hours of research and we had an absolutely marvelous trip despite questionable weather.

You can't offer my DH enough point incentives to sit through a presentation (which is probably a good thing, since I'll admit I would probably waste my time for the points or the incentive offers).

 

[AwayWeGo]

They Did Their Job.

Their job is to sell. In order to do that they have to do two things.

1. Make the product desirable.
2. Create a need, make you think that you have to have it.

That's pretty much what they did at the eye-opening sales pitch where we caught the timeshare bug in 2002.

We still did not spring -- price was too high & we never buy expensive items on impulse.

A funny thing happened afterwards on our way back to the dinky motel where we were staying on that trip. We spied a big highway billboard that said . . .

TIMESHARES -- BUY RESALE
--- SAVE THOUSANDS ---​

. . . and that's just what we did. The rest is history.

-- Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.​

 

[Quilter]

We went to a presentation yesterday. I needed the 17,500 MR points. I had repeatedly said we wouldn't do it. . .but we did. Didn't have any expectation of how it would go but when he asked why we were there I thought I'd ask how to use our legacy points. (I didn't try for restaurant/area information. We've been here 11 years and I have lots of friends to get that from.) The guy would have none of it. When I asked if he could explain the timing rules with the points, similar to a recent shuffling thread, he got to the point and said this was a sales presentation for the new Trust points and Owner Services could tell me about the rules of the legacy points. Or and the end of the presentation someone else could come in for that type of discussion. In the beginning with introductions DH asked where he was from and that gave us a bit of background on him. He asked some info on us. Said he didn't bother looking up our profile ahead of time. Later I figured he wasn't interested in what we had, only interested in what he could sell. There was a bit more discussion where TUG and flyertalk came up where he said you have to be careful what is said. I figured he was referring to the difference in Legacy and Trust points but I didn't want to have that argument and let it go. So.. .we let him get on with the recitation of memorization and got out of there between 90 & 120 minutes. Stopped him for a few questions but knew it would only drive up the time.

Here were a couple things he mentioned (well this is the way I heard them) I thought interesting. Can't say how factual they are so please don't think I trust it's all true:

--the people who sign you up get $50 a person. They are extremely aggressive this year at OP.
--they will not be so aggressive in future years since we didn't buy. They are weeding out the non-buyers.
--legacy points people don't get to see the same things on their my-vacationclub.com webpage as the Trust owners. i.e., when legacy owners book one of those tour type packages Trust owners get first pick and legacy get what's left.
--platinum premier status doesn't matter with solely Legacy owners because I won't be able to reserve 13mo in advance for Trust properties.
--he does 3 presentations a day and sells about 1 out of 3 (didn't ask how many rescind)
--Marriott recruited him with his degree in marketing. 12 years. Only job he's ever had. Given him lots of opportunity to travel. This intrigued me. Do all the sales people have college degrees? Is is necessary to do this?
--he threw out the carrot of incentives for purchases but when I asked what they were it was such a quick explanation I couldn't tell you what he said. U could have asked for clarification but didn't really want to. By that time it was evident it didn't matter what incentives there were, we wouldn't be buying and he could sense it. He wasn't giving any more information than he had to. But I've got to hand it to him, he did it with a smile.
--Marriott is aggressively recovering inventory through ROFR. Now that was the one statement that tweaked my interest. Could that drive up resale prices?

After the presentation we had to wait for someone to come in to give us receipt for the MR points. He asked if we understood, was the person friendly, things like that. I take care of "managing" the travel accounts so most of this was new to DH and he was taken with this young man's ability to recite the program beginning to end without hmm's, haw's and umm's. I had a different opinion but that's the difference in personalities. I let DH's opinion answer the questions because in the end what does it really matter.

The 3 times a day really stuck with me. 3 times a day, recite the same thing over and over. 3 times a day 12 years. Never done anything else. 3 times a day. 3 times a day. Sometimes I get tired of the subject of trading/DC points coming up over and over at the pool and dinner when on vacation. Oh the drudgery of 3 times a day, day after day after day. . .

 

[falmouth3]

The 3 times a day really stuck with me. 3 times a day, recite the same thing over and over. 3 times a day 12 years. Never done anything else. 3 times a day. 3 times a day. Sometimes I get tired of the subject of trading/DC points coming up over and over at the pool and dinner when on vacation. Oh the drudgery of 3 times a day, day after day after day. . .

I guess he's good at what he does and he makes a good living. He may enjoy what he does if he sells 1 out of 3. But I don't think I'd like that job. I'm not a sales person.

 

[falmouth3]

In a roundabout way I learned about resale. We said no to our first presentation, but asked for his card in case we decided to jump at it after discussing it between ourselves. His response was that once people left, they never bought. I had thought it was a pretty good deal, but don't make big decisions like that on the fly. I then figured if nobody buys after doing research, must be a pretty good reason. If he had not made that telling comment, we may have bought. Hubby was very interested. Found resale and he is going to get me completely addicted, I know it.

Many years ago, we got roped into a sales presentation and timesharing didn't fit our mode of vacationing at the time. But during the "negotiations" I was amazed at how fast the asking price dropped.

About 7 years ago, we went to a presentation on Cape Cod. The salesman told us that engineers almost never purchase. Then he told us that all the salespeople had timeshares, but they buy the cheapest properties to get them into the exchange system. With those two comments, I was quite sure that buying from those sales people wasn't the best thing for us.

Then I happened to look at ebay and put in an bid, never thinking I'd win. Then next thing I knew, I was a TS owner, but at thousands less than what was offered at the presentations.

 

[FractionalTraveler]

I agree. I have learned something new in most of the sales presentations I have attended. Most sales people are honorable people just trying to do their job. They are not lawyers and this stuff is complicated, so mistakes sometimes happen.

I am not saying that sales people never lie, but why is it that whenever a Marriott sales person makes a mistake he is LYING, but whenever someone on TUG makes a mistake while bashing Marriott that he is not? I'm just sayin'......

Wow! Well said indeed.

 

[windje2000]

I am not saying that sales people never lie, but why is it that:

whenever a Marriott sales person makes a mistake he is LYING, but

whenever someone on TUG makes a mistake while bashing Marriott that he is not?

I'm just sayin'......

Why is it?

Because a professional salesperson ...

selling anything ...

who spends 100% of his or her working hours. ..

with the ins and outs of one product . . .

should be getting the facts right.


When they don't, those errors become things that make you go . . .hmmmmm.

Why do you think the contract states explicitly that anything the salesperson(s) represented to you orally that is not in the documents is null and void? Because it happens so infrequently?

A TUG poster? Just a bit different. Moreover, TUG posts are open to peer review. A person posting in a place where clearly erroneous information is challenged is a whole lot different than the uninformed buyer/Marriott salesperson relationship.