guys selling stuff out of the back of a van

[kore]

has anyone seen these guys driving around in a newer red dodge caravan trying to sell home theatre systems? i have encountered them about 5 times in the last year. they usually have some story about how they are delivering them to a buisiness but have an extra they need to get rid of before they get there, or some other bogus story... really they are selling stuff that doesnt work, is an immitation product, or just plain sucks and isnt what they say it is.
today they came up to me again and as usual i told them i dont want their home entertainment system, and the guy started freakin out, threatening me and calling me gay! what these guys are doing cant be legal! has anyone else had these goofs trying to sell them their stupid crap? i cant believe these guys try and make a living ripping people off. i would have liked to call the cops but i figured they wouldnt be able to do anything. they seem to favour construction sites, they'll drive up and ask people walking around if they want to buy their home theatre system or rollerblades or whatever they have.
theres gotta be a way to get these guys to stop ripping people off, plus im sure im not the first person theyve threatened and such....
oh some peoples children...

[mijinkal]

It's probably all stolen stuff and you should phone the police.

[Kellykins]

No cops can do something, like run the plates, and if the owners have priors, they can get warrants to search the vehicle and make arrests. Just too bad they'll be back on the street as soon as you can say snicklefritz.

[brian468]

like the cops would actually do that up there anyway, I mean down here theres a decent chance they`d look into it but even then its not garaunteed.

[kore]

theyre selling goods without a buisiness liscence, in a vehicle insured for pleasure use(no commercial plates.)
next time i will call the cops, because they threatened me this time.
i thought of doing it today, but i know the police are doing some sort of mass speeding ticket campaign which kicked off today and figured they wouldnt care

[J20]

ya ive delt with these clowns before had the same experiance as you.........they were tryin to get me to pull over downtown to look at the home theater stuff they had, i told them to take a hike they said some crap to me then proceded to follow me.........as soon as they saw a cop they split..........fukin crooks

[1tontj]

seen those dudes up here before too, call them "Vanscams"

[SizzleChest]

i've never seen them myself, but i have 2 friends that got got conned by them. my one friend asked if they came with a warranty, so the guy wrote on the back of a scrap piece of paper - 10 year unlimitted warranty and signed it. ya, my buddy isn't too bright i guess...

this goes on all over north america and probably further. i read about a guy that used to work as one of their assitants and he said that their profit is anything over $150 or something like that. some people pay almost a thousand dollars for this stuff.

[brian468]

Originally posted by SizzleChest
i've never seen them myself, but i have 2 friends that got got conned by them. my one friend asked if they came with a warranty, so the guy wrote on the back of a scrap piece of paper - 10 year unlimitted warranty and signed it. ya, my buddy isn't too bright i guess...


oh man, i`m sorry for your buddy and all but thats HILARIOUS! BWAHAHAHAHAHA :laugh

[kore]

well i hope the person who actually got ripped off reported it.
maybe next time i see them ill run them off the road.
funny thing is when the guy got out of his van and walked towards me shouting threats he ended up turning around calling me gay and driving away in his van. i guess the 3 construction guys one with a shovel, one with a pick one with a 6foot rock pry bar scared him away :laugh :laugh
what a dork!

[kore]

Originally posted by J20
ya ive delt with these clowns before had the same experiance as you.........they were tryin to get me to pull over downtown to look at the home theater stuff they had, i told them to take a hike they said some crap to me then proceded to follow me.........as soon as they saw a cop they split..........fukin crooks
i encountered them in coal harbour in an underground parking lot at one of the bayshore buildings... sounds like you could have been in the same area.

[Brent]

WOW those guys are still around? I was approached by them like 3 years ago...same story about picking up one stero but getting a extra by mistake.

I was approached about 4 times in about a 6 month span. Always near guildford mall.

[J20]

Originally posted by kore

i encountered them in coal harbour in an underground parking lot at one of the bayshore buildings... sounds like you could have been in the same area.

ya i was in the skids when they were buggin me

[kore]

i searched on google and found this:
http://www.crimes-of-persuasion.com/Crimes/InPerson/speaker_scams.htm
seems like these guys are all over the world

[kore]

Originally posted by J20


ya i was in the skids when they were buggin me

well thats pretty close.
bayshore=mucho deniro

[JamesT]

years ago my dad bought some speakers out of a white cube van

he paid like $500 for a $100 pair of speakers:laugh

[Jordan]

i had heard of this for years and years, almost like an urban legend. I remember Larry and Willy busted Dave Randorfs balls one day about getting burned by this scam...then one day i was driving down the road and a guy pulls up beside me and asks if I am interested in this extra home theatre system he has....i started laughing my ass off, i couldn't believe i was finally getting asked.....then the light changed and i drove away...it made my day...

[eighty9_XJ]

I worked for one of those companies 13 years ago for one day, they were called great white north or something like that. It was a expierence I'll never forget, I was promised paid training and told the job was dropping off stereo equipment and sometimes installing it, oh yeah I can install no problem. I was young and eager for a job (and $$) and didn't ask many questions, I was told to came back the next morning to thier burnaby warehouse. So i show up the next morning at the warehouse where there is about 100 pairs of speakers, and a whole lot of empty space. They had 5 vans and 11 guys, i got voluntered to be the third person in one of the cargo vans, sitting on a sideways speaker-box on the floor, in hindsight this where I should have went home but if I had I wouldn't have a story now would I?

So we are on the highway 1 heading east and I ask where are we going? Abbotsford the driver said. Abby? that seems kinda far. "Na your better off back there in abby than the city beside's the sales should be better there he says." Selling? What do you mean selling? I thought we were droping stuff off? "Yeah we are.. to people we sell to, I'll show you how it is done." So we drive through grocery store parking lots and basically they make up whatever B.S. they can think of to get people over to the van, the first time someone comes over he starts this guy how they are overstock studio monitors and worth like $1000 each, so he pulls one out of the box, and I see one of these "liquid cooled" POS for the first time. It looks like something someone made in thier garage and hes trying to sell em for $400 a PR! I couldn't believe it what a rip off this was! They told me to shut-up and wait until they were done selling or get and find my own way home- my car was still in BBY and I was in Abbotsford so I decided to shut-up, by now I couldn't wait for this lousy first day (and last I already decided that). So we drove around abby and then langley for hours and hours, they did't sell a damn thing, I learned that the "salesmen" has to pay $200 for the speakers, anything over that they could keep, i also found out that most of some of them (including the rather obnoxious driver) were americans who travel city to city selling all kinds of elctronics crap from vans. I also learned that my paid traning was in the form of commision- if I sold something, oh this just keeps getting better and better for me doesn't it?

At around 6pm we were in langley, they were stopping in all the strip malls trying to unload overpriced crap to anybody who would listen. We blocking an exit for the strip mall the passenger was giving was giving someone his line and seemed to have her hooked, then a car behind us strating honking, the driver of our van responded by fingering the car behind. The people in the car behind started honking and swearing at the driver, he didn't move until the potential customer walked away. Then had a few choice words of his one for the occupants of the car behind, and sped off. We pulled up to fraser HWY which was very busy and waited for traffic to break so we could turn west. The car rammed us, backed up and rammed us again! So the driver floors the van, cuts into traffic and strats weaving in and out of busy traffic trying to shake this T-bird, they caught up to us and starting beating on the sides of the van with some of the bigest crow-bars i have seen- i swear they were 6' long, then they forced us off the road and started beating on the van, breaking all the windows and mirrors, the driver threw the van reverse backed up, one guy ran up to the outside of van and tried to punch the passenger, but grabbed on to the attacker and yelled to the driver DRIVE!!!, he took off wheels sppining with this guy hanging out the window, and didn't let go until we got up to 60, he blew through several red lights, and managed to shake them after that. By now we were in Surrey, i said let me off here! I'll take the bus from now on! the driver refused, said it would best for me to get my car right away, and not in a good way so I went back with him.

Now I ask a lot of questions before I accept a job - no vans please. :violin

[mijinkal]

:eek: :eek: Wow! now, that's quite a day!!! Glad to hear you survived that one!! I still haven't seen these guys, but they won't get a minute of my day if I do see them.

[mabb]

Yeah, I've seen 'em too. By the time you get the cops on the phone they're in Saskatoon.

So, any of you customer types out there want to invest in this bridge I'm building between the Island and the Mainland? I promise you I'm not from Nigeria, can't help you lose weight, won't add anything to your 'personality' ....

How about this one: send me money and I WON'T scam you in any way! *LOL*

You got to look out for yourselves, children; ain't nobody gonna do it for you.

[Dan]

google search "van speakers"

you'll find its a worldwide phenomenon

[brian468]

they actually used to sell some good crap every once and a while in so cal, my buddy got a bose surround system for 300$

[whitetrashxj]

i saw them in new west, bull****ted for a bit about speakers, asked him to take the cover off to see the speakers, instead he pulled out a cataloug and showed me the pics instead, while he was messing around in the front of the van i took off the cover, the voice coils were puked out and the speaker itself was cracked in half, i just looked at the guy and said, " scammer" then he proceeded to try to tell me that they have this one out of the box with crap speakers in it so that when there showing ppl them if they run off with it then they wont be able to use them, i just rolled my eyes and walked off, after all 500 bucks each is pretty pathetic:confused2

[Limited]

Originally posted by eighty9_XJ
I worked for one of those companies 13 years ago for one day, they were called great white north or something like that. It was a expierence I'll never forget, I was promised paid training and told the job was dropping off stereo equipment and sometimes installing it, oh yeah I can install no problem. I was young and eager for a job (and $$) and didn't ask many questions, I was told to came back the next morning to thier burnaby warehouse. So i show up the next morning at the warehouse where there is about 100 pairs of speakers, and a whole lot of empty space. They had 5 vans and 11 guys, i got voluntered to be the third person in one of the cargo vans, sitting on a sideways speaker-box on the floor, in hindsight this where I should have went home but if I had I wouldn't have a story now would I?

So we are on the highway 1 heading east and I ask where are we going? Abbotsford the driver said. Abby? that seems kinda far. "Na your better off back there in abby than the city beside's the sales should be better there he says." Selling? What do you mean selling? I thought we were droping stuff off? "Yeah we are.. to people we sell to, I'll show you how it is done." So we drive through grocery store parking lots and basically they make up whatever B.S. they can think of to get people over to the van, the first time someone comes over he starts this guy how they are overstock studio monitors and worth like $1000 each, so he pulls one out of the box, and I see one of these "liquid cooled" POS for the first time. It looks like something someone made in thier garage and hes trying to sell em for $400 a PR! I couldn't believe it what a rip off this was! They told me to shut-up and wait until they were done selling or get and find my own way home- my car was still in BBY and I was in Abbotsford so I decided to shut-up, by now I couldn't wait for this lousy first day (and last I already decided that). So we drove around abby and then langley for hours and hours, they did't sell a damn thing, I learned that the "salesmen" has to pay $200 for the speakers, anything over that they could keep, i also found out that most of some of them (including the rather obnoxious driver) were americans who travel city to city selling all kinds of elctronics crap from vans. I also learned that my paid traning was in the form of commision- if I sold something, oh this just keeps getting better and better for me doesn't it?

At around 6pm we were in langley, they were stopping in all the strip malls trying to unload overpriced crap to anybody who would listen. We blocking an exit for the strip mall the passenger was giving was giving someone his line and seemed to have her hooked, then a car behind us strating honking, the driver of our van responded by fingering the car behind. The people in the car behind started honking and swearing at the driver, he didn't move until the potential customer walked away. Then had a few choice words of his one for the occupants of the car behind, and sped off. We pulled up to fraser HWY which was very busy and waited for traffic to break so we could turn west. The car rammed us, backed up and rammed us again! So the driver floors the van, cuts into traffic and strats weaving in and out of busy traffic trying to shake this T-bird, they caught up to us and starting beating on the sides of the van with some of the bigest crow-bars i have seen- i swear they were 6' long, then they forced us off the road and started beating on the van, breaking all the windows and mirrors, the driver threw the van reverse backed up, one guy ran up to the outside of van and tried to punch the passenger, but grabbed on to the attacker and yelled to the driver DRIVE!!!, he took off wheels sppining with this guy hanging out the window, and didn't let go until we got up to 60, he blew through several red lights, and managed to shake them after that. By now we were in Surrey, i said let me off here! I'll take the bus from now on! the driver refused, said it would best for me to get my car right away, and not in a good way so I went back with him.

Now I ask a lot of questions before I accept a job - no vans please. :violin


HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA :laugh man O man. that is a good one. That could be a movie! If I get asked and they give me **** the bush bar is going to move the van! your lucky those guys did not get ahold of you!!! :redneck

[builtzuki]

Wow i have heard about them but have never seen them in real life. :eek:

[belmont mild]

2 words



OVEN DOORS

[mud-dog27]

hahaha ive come across these clowns a few times this past year saying thta they were couriors that got over stocked and were selling it at wholesale and i was like yea cause im gunna buy **** in the collosus parking lot but bg=y far funniest thing ive ever had happen me and a buddy are driving north on 200th towards the free was and just as were comin up to like mopac area this acura rips up beside and is yellin for us to roll down the window as im think buddy i drive a jeep i dont wanna race you(its happened before) so we roll down the window and he starts askin if we like sports and wanna buy jerseys....back of car had like 5 boxes....the right there goin down 200th like 80...90km/h he starts pulllin out jerseys (hey drivin with no hands....hahaha) and were like no we dont wanna buy your **** and then he starts following us so i ended up ditchin the clown and wound up on top of the sportsplex parkade....complete tool cause its prety hard to loose my jeep and if ya cant see it you can deffinatly here it


but whatever that was my story man the things people will do

[lars]

I was also lucky enough to be solicited by a white van salesman. Didn't buy anything, but was glad to have had the experience of finally seeing this phenomenon. Kinda like whale watching.

...lars

[meanman]

Had the same thing happen to me about 5 years ago near metrotown mall. When I told the guy I wasn't interested he started freakin' out and yellin' at me.
The guy was about 5'8" and maybe a buck 45 wet and I'm ex ppcli infantry 6'2", 225 and love to go. So I ask the guy "what did you just say?" and he goes on this rant as I'm walkin' up to him. Just as I get up to him I dummy him and run at the van and his buddy buggers off leaving skinny boy in a heap roadside.
GOOD TIMES GOOD TIMES!!
:angry

[Jordan]

saw them in Home Depot Richmond about 10 minutes ago....funny stuff.....:D

[eighty9_XJ]

Spotted and wanted in langley (http://www.rcmp-bcmedia.ca/index2.jsp)

$30 - $50 value might be a little generous.

Click on the "news releases link" then selling speakers from vans.