When I was grocery shopping the other day, I happened to come upon a pitchman selling "Kitchen Magicians" in the produce aisle. This was nothing more than a plastic mandoline slicer, but he made it sound like it was the greatest thing since sliced bread (pun intended).

I knew he was a pitchman and not just demoing them because of the way he spoke, with a nice SLOW cadence that was almost hypnotic. He had a gathered a good-sized tip, too, and was artfully slicing up tomatoes so thin that you could read the newspaper through them.

I didn't stay to watch how he turned the tip, but I'll bet he sold a fair number of the gadgets that day. Always nice to see a true master at work!! SETH

Recently our local KMart had a young lady pitching polycarbonite kitchen tools. She had a raised platform on rollers with lighting directed toward the work surface. She built the tip by telling shoppers over the store intercom if they went to trhe flashing light the first 10 people would receive a free gift (food garnisher). She was funny and had great interaction with the crowd.

Some of the kitchen gadget pitchman are natural's at pitching.I couldn't imangine them doing anything else for a living.

Don