Media Coverage
By: Chris Taylor
In his golf shirt and sneakers, Mark Jankowski doesn’t look like a Gordon Gekko, take-no-prisoners negotiator, and he isn’t. In fact, the book he co-wrote with sports agent Ron Shapiro (Cal Ripken Jr.’s rep) is called The Power of Nice. Besides penning what’s considered one of the bibles of bargaining, Jankowski, a former corporate lawyer, holds seminars for the Shapiro Negotiations Institute, which he co-founded.
For Jankowski, success is all in the preparation. “Most negotiations are won or lost before you even step in the door,” he says. Indeed, before we hit the street, Jankowski works the phones, getting a sense of which shops are flexible on price, and scours the Web for what competitors are charging.
Our first stop is North Charles Fine Wine & Spirits, not far form Jankowski’s Baltimore office. We set our eyes on a display of Blackstone merlot, and Jankowski goes to work. He summons over the salesman, Tony, and in short order milks him for a brief history of the Blackstone winery. “You always try to build a relationship,” Jankowski explains later, “even if it’s a quick little one.”
“Twenty dollars a bottle? That’s pretty high,” Jankowski exclaims when he hears the price. We could always go for a lower-priced Blackstone cousin, Tony suggests. No, we want the good stuff. So Jankowski launches into what he calls his “hypothetically speaking” tactic. “What if we were to by a case?” he asks.
“Well, I could give you 20 percent off,” Tony says, as he punches some numbers into his calculator: That’s $192, down from $240. Jankowski is pleased. “Fifty dollars off, just for asking,” he says as we leave. “Boom”
He’s hungry for more. Off to a store known for its low prices: Best Buy. He wants to niggle them even lower. He makes his way to the DVD player section, where he quickly befriends a salesman named Brian. You’d think they were long-lost brothers. “You live in Parkville? I grew up there!” “You’re a Ravens fan? Me too!”
Jankowski clutches a flyer from the Circuit City across the road, but his homework is of little help here. The Sony DVD player he has in mind is the same price at both stores. No room for leverage there. So he starts freelancing: “If you can’t go any lower on this one, what’s another model I should consider?”
“We have one that’s out the box,” Brian says. “We could give it to your for $99.” The regular price is $219. Not bad, but Jankowski isn’t satisfied. “If it’s a floor model, how do I know it’s going to work perfectly?”
“I could throw in our four-year service package. That’s another $49,” says Brian. A $268 value for $99. I’m starting to believe in Mark Jankowski.
Before I know it, he’s over by the big-screen TVs, checking out the $2,500 models, and his new best friend, Brian, suggests he might be able to get a leather recliner thrown in for free – a promotion the store has run in the past. Jankowski gets another surprise when he talks to the section manager, Kelvin. “Oh, you don’t have to buy those big ones to get the recliner. You could get one of these.”
Now we’re looking at the smaller, $420 Magnavox. The recliner alone is worth $200. But then, there’s a hitch. Kelvin checks with his manager to see if he can make the deal, and he comes back with the wrong answer: “I couldn’t.”
Jankowski is unfazed. “If someone says to me, ‘I couldn’t,’ that says to me, ‘Someone else could.” He goes further up the chain of command to the store manager. “There’s gotta be some way I can get that chair,” Jankowski tells her. The computer won’t accept the unusual deal midday, she responds. But tomorrow they could enter it as a special and hold it for him. Deal.
Now, for Jankowski’s finale, he’s going for a Triple Crown of sorts: a Tiffany clock, a Montblanc pen and some Waterford crystal glasses. High-end booty, all of it, and not the usual stuff consumers would dicker over. We make our way to the Towson Town Center in the suburbs, to Radcliffe Jewelers, a ritzy joint where a salesman immediately tries to sell me a $2,500 Breitling watch. (Er, no thanks.)
Jankowski, who cased the place the day before to gauge its price flexibility, hunkers down with Renée, A perky redhead, to hash out what deals can be done. Waterford doesn’t allow retailers to discount, she tells him. Jankowski sees a brick wall – and heads around it. “So what is possible?” Well, Renée says, she could tack on a $75 gift certificate. Score.
On to the Tiffany clock. It’s the last one in stock. Renée tells him; Tiffany now sells its products only from its own stores. Jankowski sniffs out a reason for a discount: The store is probably anxious to get this clock out of its display case. “Could you give us a break since it’s your last one?” Instead of $1,050, they can let him have it for, oh, $800.
Two down. Now for the Montblanc pen, a gorgeous number, priced at $700. First, Jankowski talks to Renée at length about everything from his own Carter bracelet to his postcard wedding on the Italian coast. Then he “aggregates it all,” using the fact that he’s buying three items to press for a discount on this one. He gets her down to 20 percent, to $560, then digs for more. “How about if I pay cash?” he asks, knowing that credit card companies will take a cut. Sure why not – another $50 off.
Our whirlwind shopping tour ended, we tally up the savings: more than $900 in barely two hours. “And there was no screaming or yelling involved,” says Jankowski, “You don’t have to be a jerk to get a great deal.”
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