During one of the exhibitions, a person came to me and introduced himself as the manager of a company that was ready to invest in our machines.

He had the knowledge of our machines from his previous employers overseas.

When I inquired amongst my colleagues who had previously met him to sell him the machine, they warned me that this person is a total time waste.

But I always believed in meeting people whom I thought were genuinely convinced about our products. I pursued this lead from the exhibition and the customer invited us for a final negotiation.

The office premises were in a building facing the lake in a posh area of a metro city.

There was a proper medium-sized temple with Indian deities in the reception area and there sat a proper priest (he was also a full-time employee of the company) reading from scriptures. The entire atmosphere made me feel like I had entered a temple to pray.

I was then ushered into a cabin with a beautiful view of the lake. I met the Manager with the MD, and we sealed the deal swiftly.

We asked for the shipment address to prepare the contract papers and invoices.

We were given the address of a BVI (British Virgin Islands) Company. I had no idea what this company was, so I took the help of Google and found that it was an offshore company.

I regretted and told him that we could only ship the machine to a proper business entity which is engaged in manufacturing activity. After a few days of haggling, he gave us an address of his company in the gulf region. We prepared the contract, he paid us the money, and we shipped out the machine to him. We were told that the customer will bring it to India with other machines.

As per standard practice, our team started chasing him to prepare for the installation of the machine as it was to be installed in India. We paid a visit to his factory address, only to find that it was just four bare walls, and nothing else.

We were told that we should stop chasing them for the machine installation; when they were ready, they would contact us.

Even after a few years of supply, neither did the customer invite us to install the machine, nor do we know where this machine disappeared after the shipment.

This will remain a mystery forever, probably for the rest of my life.

“The job of a salesman is to sell, not investigate.”