Thing is, at least a few times each month, some random douchebag approaches me (or, worse, rings my doorbell) and asks to give me a free estimate. Because, yeah, random fucktards bothering me in my free time are the ones I want to entrust my car to.
I even once was at a Target and saw a guy in a random pickup block a woman in her parking space to harass her about a dent. (I didn't know what was going on, and it looked like two friends shooting the shit in the parking lot... until I pulled out and he saw my dent, chased me down, acted like something was wrong or he wanted directions, and tried to get me to have him look at the dent.)These assholes don't respond to a simple no thanks most of the time. They're like pushy car salesmen... only they're approaching me when I have no interest in their product. If I wanted an(other) estimate, I'd take the car in somewhere.
If I lie and tell them we've already got an appointment to get it worked on, they try to find out who with and for how much, and insist they can beat it. Or throw out numbers without even looking at it up close. None of these guys ever has visible credentials or business cards or anything.
Anarky Jr was selling Girl Scout cookies in the front yard today. First, some douchebag drives up, jumps out of the car, and asks her if her mommy or daddy is around, and simply won't leave in response to normal conversation. (He finally drives off when I start acting pissy. Wait, acting? You're interfering with my daughter's activities and involving her in your stupidity. The acting was when I was being polite!)
Then, icing on the cake, as I'm packing the stuff up, two bangers in some old piece-of-shit black sedan stop the car in the middle of the road and start asking about it. And I just firmly tell them no thanks, not interested. Three times. At which point, one yells, "We ain't buying your damn cookies, either!" and the car squeals off. Yeah, fucktard. I think you just proved why I'm not interested in dealing with you. Good luck building your clientele with that attitude.
So what the fuck motivates this? There are honestly guys around here (and the surrounding cities) who troll neighborhoods and parking lots to try to get business. Is this ever successful? Does auto body have insane quotas they have to fill?
Also, this is on a 2010 Scion xB. Our previous car, a 2004 (?) RAV4, looked much nicer... aside from similar but worse damage to the rear bumper, as well as a dent in the front fender. Never was asked about that one.
I'm really tempted to start asking them for their business cards or company names, then thanking them and saying, "Now I know which business employs assholes who think it's perfectly okay to bother random people, so I know where not to go!"
