Let’s Make A Deal
by Tracy Staton
"I've been asked to, but I had to say no; you have to be a lawyer
for that," he says. "I'd love to do it, but I'd probably land in
jail."
ALLAN STARK WASN'T always a jolly Negotiate4U ambassador, plying
the auto dealerships and appliance showrooms and design studios of
sunny southern
Florida. He began his professional life in
Baltimore, where he took the reins of the family office-supply
business, which was founded by his father, who started out by
selling pencils on a street corner during the Depression.
Allan managed 65 employees and three locations, posting sales of $8
million a year. Business was good. He made a good living. He was
content - but not really happy. "My happiest times were when I
negotiated purchasing for the store," he says. "I'd tell our
purchasing agents, 'Get your best price, and then let me call.' A
hundred percent of the time I got a better price. They'd say, 'Of
course you get a better price; you're the Stark in Stark Office
Supply.' So I'd use a fake name and still do it. I wanted to show
them they could do that."
Too bad he didn't realize at the time that he had a business in the
making. He eventually sold Stark Office Supply, moved to Boca
Raton, and tried a couple of other careers - selling life insurance
and brokering mortgages - before it hit him: All the negotiating
he'd done on behalf of friends and family over the years, he could
now do for others for a fee. "Now I'm as happy as a lark," says
Allan, who's 62 and has two grown daughters. "I wake up in the
morning raring to go. I get a call from someone who wants me to
make a deal, and I go crazy. I get on two telephones. I'm a
maniac!"
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