67. Vertrouwen

Een kort verhaal van Arnold van den Berg over de transformerende gave van vertrouwen.

Well, there was a job. There was a couple of kids at school that had a flower route, and what they would do is they would recruit kids from the high schools and put you on the corner, and you’d sell flowers. What we learned is that some corners really were good because they were in good neighborhoods and people made a lot of money, and there were other parts of town that were tough and people didn’t have that much money and you didn’t do it.

So, when you were new, they put you into the worst corner, and that is so you could prove yourself. If you proved yourself, they knew what was a good job and what was halfway. So, they had a quota for each corner. So anyway, the way to move up to the best corner is to continue to outperform the quotas in the bad neighborhoods.

And then you’d move up to the one. Well, I worked for months to work myself up to the best corner, which was in Bel Air near Beverly Hills. I even had Tony Curtis buy flowers for me. He came up on his Cadillac with his wife and so forth. But anyway, I was really excited because it was hard work and the neighborhoods that weren’t too good.

You just stood there for hours sometimes, not sell very much, and it gets discouraging. But anyway, finally worked up to the corner and as I was so excited getting up in the morning, knowing that I’m going to be in this great corner. So anyway, I was there about an hour or so, and then it started raining, and it got really bad.

It was a real downpour and I thought, “Oh my god. I’ve worked all this time to get up to this corner and now, I’m not going to be able to do very good when it’s raining.” As I was thinking about it and going back and forth, people kept stopping in the rain and I was selling the flowers and I thought, “Well, I’m already wet and people are still buying, so I’ll just keep selling.” So, I kept selling. Finally, a lady pulls up and says, “Young man, what are you doing in the rain?” I said, “Well, I’m selling flowers, 35 cents apiece, and three for a dollar.” She just looked at me and shook her head and she whispered to her husband and she says, “How many flowers do you have?”

I said, “Oh, I got plenty. How many do you need?” She says, “No, no. I want you to count exactly how much you get. I want to buy all the flowers.” I said, “What?” She says, “I want to buy them all!” I said, “What? What are they for?” She says, “Young man, would you just count those flowers?” I said, “Okay,” $16, so I said, “$16.” That’s like a hundred dollars today, or even more.

So she said, “Okay.” She pulls out the money and I hand her flowers and she says, “Now get in.” I said, “What do you mean?” She says, “Young man, I’m buying you those flowers to get you out of the rain, so get in. We only live a few blocks from here. You’ll get dried out and I’ll get you some soup, and so forth.” So, I was just shocked.

I never experienced anything like that. So, I said, “Okay.” I got in the car and went home. She made me some soup. The husband came out with a beautiful shirt and he said, “Here, put this on. “After I was dried out, I said, “Boy, that is a beautiful shirt.” He said, “Okay.” So, we sat there and I watched TV with him for a while, and then things went by and I said, “I’m going to have to get back to my corner pretty soon because my boss is going to come and pick me up.” So, they said, “Okay.” So, I went to take off the shirt to give him the shirt, and he says, “No, no, that looks so good on you. You keep it.” I thought, “Where am I, in heaven or something?” I couldn’t believe people doing that. So, they drove me, dropped me off, and my boss came by and he said, “Where’s all your flowers?”

I said, “Well, I sold them.” He said, “You sold them in the rain?” I said, “Well, let me tell you what happened. This lady came by, wanted to get me out of the rain, and she bought all my flowers.” He goes, “You’re kidding.” Yeah. He was shocked. I said, “Yeah.” He says, “Well, all right. Well, that’s great.” So anyway, that really was an amazing experience.

I’ve never forgotten it, and it has influenced the way I think because at that time, I didn’t think there were people that cared about other people and wanted to help people and all of that. That just didn’t – in our neighborhood, people didn’t do things like that. It was totally out of character.

It has influenced the way I think.

Dat is wat vertrouwen kan doen.

Blijf denken. 

De vrije stier

Volledige eigenaarschap van The Investors Podcast

Luister hier de volledige podcast - https://www.theinvestorspodcast.com/richer-wiser-happier/from-poverty-to-power-w-arnold-van-den-berg/