MEN WE MEET In The Motor Trade

NZ Truth, Issue 1237, 15 August 1929, Page 19

MEN WE MEET In The Motor Trade

WILLIAM. BURGESS

TN these days of rapid transport, it is hard to visualize the times when the motor-car was a thing unknown to mankind. After all, ' however, that is not . so very long ago, and the motor trade belongs exclusively to the present century. -

An association of twenty-one years with cars is a long one and can be laid claim to by few. William Burgess, of the sales staff of the Todd Motor Com-, pany (de Soto cars are his speciality) , has been actively! engaged m the motor- business during that long period Of years, and he is probably the doyen - . ' of motor salesmen ' ■ ' ■ • ■ m. this Dominion.

In 1908 he was engaged m the sale of car and motor accessories, and has continued m that line down to the present time,: although as the. niotor retailing trade increased he gradually dropped, the ac-. cessory part of the ganie and special-, ised m the motor retailing side of the business.

That he has made a success of it is shown by his sales record and the fact that he was a prize-winner m an allNe^V' Zealand.. sale's contest conducted by the biggest motor corporation m the. world. ........ ■ .- '■;■. " ■ ■•■,'

It is true, indeed, that a good car might lose its prestige on the market if indifferently handled by salesmen, and therefore no small measure of the success of. a. niotor product depends upon the integrity and motor 7 sense of those men placing^ it upon the markets of the" Avorlcl. ; " ' . . - :

Above everything, ,' "Bill" • Burgess is thorough. To say he knows inside out the car he sells is merely speaking, the truth.. He knows the particular. job as though he had been present „at the factory vor assembly plant when it was put- together. "Know the car you sell,"/ is his slogan.. , ■ ' ' '#>

None of Bill .Burgess's friends (and I they are leg-ion) has ever seen him glunV. He looks at the' world through" ,coloi;ed glass,, as we have, portrayed him m the photograph; but the only color he appears to see through" tnem is thai of an everlasting bright blue sky, with not a cloud on the horizon to mar life's joys. ■ , .'.." '„'.,. : ■• -• Bill's smile "and, breezy manner are infectious, so we introduce you to him here. ' :•-:;' ' .., "'•...•■ '..-.*>,