29. Money talks
Quietly slipping the desk agent a $20 bill can get you some very nice free room upgrades. Stick it between your credit card and license when you hand it to them, and ask if they have any upgrades available. This works especially well in Vegas or places with other very large resort style hotels. $20 is a great little tip for the agent, and they have full authority to bump you to a nicer room without getting in trouble.
30. That’s why my wine tasted funky
I work at a big winery in California, but pretty much every winery does this.
During harvest, grapes come in by the truckload. They are picked by machines with little human intervention.
Every load has thousands, probably more, of bugs. Spiders, earwigs, everything. Also, there are usually other animals. I’ve personally seen snakes, mice, rats, bats, birds, etc go through the crusher/destemmer.
THIS ALL GOES DIRECTLY INTO THE WINE.
Fear not, though, the stuff you drink is perfectly safe. Not vegan, though.
31. Don’t let your grandparents watch their commercials
American Mint, LLC sells “collectables” such as “the world’s smallest gold coins” and the “wild west bowie knives”. Everything is garbage, the $49.99 knife they sell you was acquired by them for $1 or less, all made in China. Any gold or silver in their coins is from the Republic of Liberia, so they probably don’t pay much for it. The .750 ounce small gold coins that are .999 fine sell for over $89.99 which is more than double their value.
They make their money by screwing people into subscriptions, then when you return the item, they say they never got it or they take 3-4 months to credit the return.
I remember when an elderly woman called in to customer service to complain that she couldn’t get her Thanksgiving dinner ingredients because the American Mint had billed her debit card without her authorization and threw her account into the negative. We heard these stories all the time from the CS reps.
In the warehouse, returns used to come in by the mail cart. They would send out about 2000 items a day, and receive about 1250 returns a day.
Everything there is junk and a terrible “investment” yet they’d like you to believe otherwise.
Also, their “certificates of authenticity” are a joke, as they never kept track of who got what number, and when the stuff came back returned, it just goes right back on the shelf with little inspection. The Certificates of Authenticity were regularly reproduced for returns & the numbers aren’t always sequential so more than likely, many people have the same certificate number.
32. Cars, baby, cars
I worked at a car dealership for 9 months. Here are a few tips on buying cars dirt cheap:
- Never, ever pay anything near MSRP. Don’t negotiate from MSRP either. A salesperson can have you feeling like you got “a deal” by dropping $1,000 from MSRP and STILL make a great commission.
- Negotiate from invoice up.
- The lowest price is not invoice – It’s triple net. Triple net means the invoice price minus the factory kickbacks minus any bonuses paid to the dealership. You CAN actually get triple net – It’s hard, though.
- Best way to get a good price? Call the internet department or the fleet manager. Ask them how much over invoice a specific car is. Usually it’ll be $100 to $500 above invoice. Make a counteroffer. Generally, when you’re dealing with internet or fleet you’ll get a decent deal.
- Anything between $0 and $200 above invoice is a pretty good deal. $200 to $400 is decent. Anything more than that you’re getting ripped off. Only exception is hot cars, new releases, etc. If a car’s been out for more than a year and you pay more than $400 over invoice, you got screwed.
- Don’t buy ANYTHING they sell you in the finance department. The $250 alarm system can be installed for $40 anywhere else. The same goes for anti-rust, etc. The only thing to consider is extended warranty, which they have a 100% markup on – NEGOTIATE.
- Buying a used car at a dealership is retarded. These guys literally buy cars at $500 and sell them for $6995. If you’re buying a used car, go on Craigslist and pay a mechanic $100 to look at it and make sure you’re getting a good deal. It’ll be far, FAR cheaper.
