The Hard Sell

Patter Merchanting' and the Strategic (Re)Production and Local Management of Economic Reasoning in the Sales Routines of Markt Pitchers

Bibliographic Data

ID2326136
AuthorsTrevor Pinch (0000-0001-6938-2199), Colin Clark (0000-0002-6028-5197)
Year1986
Volume20
Issue2
Pages169-191
Publication date1986-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSociology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0038-0385 • E-ISSN: 1469-8684
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0038038586020002002
OpenAlexW2022294479
LanguageEN
Citations received31
References cited9

This paper proposes that selling can be viewed as essentially a social, interactional accomplishment, not an economic one. A corpus of audio-visual recordings of 'pitchers' - market traders who attempt to sell their goods with a sales 'spiel' - is analysed. We locate a number of rhetorical formats and interactional practices ('selling techniques') regularly used by pitchers to manage sales. We show how bargains are constituted and enhanced through a contrast between the 'worth' and the selling prices of the goods offered for sale. A number of resources used by pitchers to produce mass sales are also documented. Some analytical consideration is given to the manner in which pitchers strategically exploit intersubjectively held social conventions ('economic' reasoning) in order to intervene in the purchasing decisions of audience members to elicit sales. The consequences of understanding selling and other reltedSociology May 86 4256 locally managed, social accomplishments are also explored

Business · Economics · Exploit · Microeconomics · Order (exchange) · Production (economics) · Purchasing · Rhetorical question · Sales management · Computer Science · Discourse Analysis in Language Studies · Finance · Humor Studies and Applications · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition · Marketing

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