A team of eight St. Joe’s students returned from a weekend-long trip to Tampa, Florida after competing in the annual Selling with the Bulls sales competition, held on Feb. 17, where they competed with 190 students from 32 universities across the U.S.
According to Donald Townsend, Ph.D., visiting professor of marketing and director of the SJU Sales Club, the Selling with the Bulls event allows each participant to compete in every round of competition, giving each student the opportunity to win or lose multiple rounds. This is unlike most national sales competitions, which are typically single elimination formats.
“In a lot of the competitions, you may get knocked out of the first round, and you never get to the second, third, fourth round,” said Townsend. “But in real life, you have to keep going to the end.”
Townsend said this setup makes Selling with the Bulls one of the “toughest sales education[s] around.”
This is the fourth time Townsend’s students have participated in the competition, and each year, no matter the end result, Townsend said, students gain valuable practice and professional experience competing in the business world.
For Katie Messina ’23, the excitement about participating in the competition was also driven by wanting to learn more about sales and pursue a career within marketing.
“It is a tough competition and the St. Joe’s sales program is definitely a lot newer, so we are not as seasoned as some of these other schools competing,” Messina said. “But I am really excited to get the experience of competing and talking to lots of new people.”
Another member of Townsend’s team, Julianne McGuire ’23, said she enjoyed participating in the St. Joe’s sales competition that was held on campus in the fall semester of 2022, and was looking forward to the Tampa experience.
“I am excited to see how I can best put my abilities forward in this competition, and also see where I have room to grow,” McGuire said. “I am also really excited to get to know the other students going from St. Joe’s.”
This competition benefits the competing students because they learn the importance of communication, listening and understanding what the clients’ needs are and putting this understanding
into practice.
“I am teaching students how to communicate and how to listen,” Townsend said. “In sales, you need to listen 80% of the time in order to find out what the client’s main issue is.”
Students said they benefited from all the preparation for the trip and learned a lot from competing.
“After participating in the competition, I feel as though I was able to practice my selling skills in a competitive environment, which challenged me to become better,” McGuire said. “Another positive thing I took from the experience was getting to know and becoming closer with members of the SJU Sales Club and Professor Townsend. Without their support, the competition would’ve been much harder.”
