The Art Of The Deal.

One in a series of essays about how to successfully negotiate anything. Or not.

I walked into the only pawn shop in my town and went to the back where they have their musical instruments (four no-name brand Strat copies, a violin, two basses and a 40-watt guitar amplifier).

"Can you do anything about the price of this bass?" I asked one of the staff, opening the door to negotiation.

But she had been raised in a house where her dad yelled at her to shut the door.

"No, the owner isn't here and we can't change prices," she said, unapologetically. "You could ask him" - she pointed to someone behind the counter - "but he'll probably tell you the same thing."

I did, and he did.

"This has been here quite a while," I observed. The little yellow sticker on it showed that it arrived eight months earlier. "And it's kind of beat up," I said. A previous owner had plastered stickers all over it, there were a couple of dings in the paint and it was missing a control knob.

"Yeah," said the man behind the counter. "But it's an Ibanez."

I put the bass back on its stand. I'd have felt guilty paying the price they wanted and depriving the pawn shop of the cachet of having an Ibanez in stock.