Peter Rosengard, as his business card proclaims, is a life insurance salesman, one of the most successful of all time. He has ensured that families up and down the country have benefited from much needed financial protection in difficult economic times. He also calls himself a “professional breakfaster”, although that is only on his Twitter profile, not his business card.
This new book is no “how to” or “self-help” manual but is an engaging and entertaining look at a life well lived. It is set out in easily digested, though not chronological, chunks and is a story of sex and drugs and rock ’n’ roll, quite a few fist fights and the six-day war.
When not selling life assurance (he remains in Guinness Book of World Records for the largest ever policy), Mr Rosengard’s achievements include founding the Comedy Store club in London and a 9/11 charity, managing 1980s band Curiosity Killed The Cat, introducing Glasgow airport ‘have a go hero’ John Smeaton to an unsuspecting US audience and being thrown out of Disneyland for getting in a scrap with Minnie Mouse.
The stories range from the confessional to the emotional and the comedic, but all are told with a self-deprecating wit and some laugh-out-loud moments.
But there are ideas and lessons in there too. Pinning back ears with Super Glue for a more girl-friendly look is one of the not so good ideas. One of the most obvious and better ideas, though, is found in the title – the benefits of “talking to strangers” and how doing just that can be enriching in a personal and business sense.
At the book launch the first person I met had bumped into Mr Rosengard at a restaurant four hours earlier – they had never met before but were now no longer strangers. The guest list on the night included Comfort (a local parking warden) and clients from all walks of life, including several celebrities.
Rudyard Kipling’s poem “If…” talks of someone who “…can talk with crowds and keep his virtue, or walk with kings – nor lose the common touch” . The poet could have been talking about Mr Rosengard, who will talk to anyone at any time about anything, which is a lovely outlook, though I guess not to everyone’s taste. There would be no chance of looking at your shoes in a lift; if you see Mr Rosengard waiting for one and do not want to chat, you had best take the stairs.
The book’s final paragraph sums up his approach: “I love life, I love selling, I love selling life…” It is a powerful and entertaining story well told.
Published by Coptic Publishing
