NCJ Number
178716
Date Published
1998
Length
275 pages
Annotation
Based on the author's 9 years as a "participant-observer" in telephone sales, this book examines these operations both as work settings and as deviant operations.
Abstract
Chapter 1 examines the "boiler room" as a work setting. The tools of the boiler's trade include a craft orientation toward the work and a pitch, which are used together to vend products or services. The work day is spent using standardized procedures to overcome objections to sales. Chapter 2 addresses the product houses: boiler rooms from which all manner of inferior and/or overpriced goods are vended. Sales are made by crafting a pitch that caters to psychological needs and certain economic desires and by the use of techniques that are empirically proven to have value in a given market. Chapter 3 explores some implications of the boiler room's marginality. Because it is a deviant enterprise, its fraudulent nature must be concealed from both customers and the sales force. Chapter 4 discusses the service shops, which offer a program of some kind that involves a single or sequential cash outlay that entitles customers access to a wide range of intangibles. Chapter 5 explores boiler room techniques that any business with a product or service to sell can use. The book concludes with speculation about the future of boiler rooms by examining the core characteristics of all telephone operations and the trade-offs and dilemmas facing owners. Chapter notes, 100 references, and a subject index