E-magzine: Character Sketch: A Vegetable Seller (Ms. Lin)

Hsin Chuang Food/Day Market
Character Sketch: A Vegetable Seller or Another family care-taker
Ms. Lin has sold vegetables for more than 20year, so she is a master of sale. Gaining the experience of sale is not easy. While people are getting their sweet dreams in the beds, she has to get up to wholesale a variety of vegetables from Pan Ch'iao terminal market at four clock every morning. In order to compete with other vegetables sellers and please the customers, she chooses merchandise of quality very carefully and set the price as lowest as she could.

In addition to making a balance between quality and price, Ms. Lin also adopts several strategies of marketing to promote her merchandise. First of all, she tends to call her female customers below their age such as younger sister, young lady, beauty, miss, or ms and calls the male customers “young brother, young guy, handsome boy or mister. Second of all, she would intend to call everything is final sale in order to promote her merchandise. Third of Ms. Lin’s strategies of marketing, Ms. Lin would not force the customers to buy a lot. Instead, she would encourage her customers to buy the amount that he or she needs. If the customer only needs a small amount, Ms. Lin would also like to do this deal. Fourthly, if the customer wants need certain vegetable to be peeled with a knife, she would provide this service without any additional pay. Fifthly, Ms. Lin would give green onion, ginger, or cayenne pepper as a present if any customer buy vegetables above 100 dollars. Sixth of all, customers can buy vegetables at a cheaper price in Ms. Lin’s stall. The price is more flexible. Ms. Lin accepts bargain and she would count the total price into a round number. For instance, if things that you buy are 23 dollars, it’s very possible and easy for Ms. Lin to tell you the favored price is 20 dollars. Seventhly, Ms. Lin would like to chat with her customers because she cares about them. Besides, Ms. Lin regards what is between her and her customers are not only dealing, but also a relationship. Eighthly, she thinks “customers are always right”, so she is always trying to be nice with her customers. She communicates with them in a soft attitude. Ninthly, she would offer her customers each thing’s clear price again before turning in customers what they bought. Finally, she would try to provide services to meet customers’ needs. For example, if a lady of younger age comes to her stall and looks confused about what to buy, Ms. Lin would love to provide recipes for vegetables and suggest the lady what to buy for the recipe. For another instance, we found out Ms. Lin provides knowledge of regimen and recipe. While interviewing with Ms. Lin, an old lady about 50 years old standing by the stall hesitated whether to buy gumbo which she has never bought or cooked before. Aware of her customer’s problem, Ms. Lin told the old woman that how gumbo helps to keep the health of stomach and how important the health of stomach is for every family members. She also provides the best way of cooking gumbo. In the end, she persuaded the old women to buy and to try to cook gumbo for her family’s own good. According to her experience in providing recipes and selling vegetables, Ms. Lin found out customers of young age focus much more on the flavor of vegetables and customers of old age would pay much attention on healthy vegetables. I guess Ms. Lin can win her customers’ heart and trust because she tries her best to observe the customers’ needs with care and help them out with passion and patience.