单选题 Unlike their American or European counterparts, car salesmen in Japan work hard to get a buyer. Instead of walking around showrooms waiting for customers to drop by, many Japanese car salesmen still go out to get them. They walk wearily along the streets selling cars door-to-door. New customers are hunted with a determination and existing ones entertained with fruit and cakes on their birthdays. But life is getting tough—and not just because new-car sales are falling.
With more Japanese women (who often control the house-hold budget) going out to work, the salesmen increasingly find nobody at home when they call. That means another visit in the evening or at the weekend. Then they face an extra problem: more people, especially the young, prefer to choose a new car from a showroom where they can compare different models.
Even as late as the mid-1980s some 90% of new cars were sold door-to-door. In some rural areas most new cars are still sold this way. But in the big cities more than half the new cars now are sold from showrooms.
Although investing in showrooms is expensive because of the high cost of Japanese land, dealers have little choice. A labor shortage and higher expectations among Japan"s workforce are making it difficult to recruit door-to-door salesmen. Most of a Japanese car salesman"s working day is spent doing favours for customers, like arranging insurance or picking up vehicles for servicing, rather than actually selling.
Japan"s door-step car salesmen are not about to vanish. The personal service they provide is so deep-rooted in Japan that they are likely to operate alongside the glittery new showrooms. The two systems even complement each other. What increasingly happens is that the showroom attracts the interest of a potential buyer, giving the footsore salesmen a firm lead to follow up with a home visit.

单选题 Japanese car salesmen usually do not wait at showrooms for customers to drop by; instead, ______.

单选题 Implied but not stated: the competition in ear market is ______.

单选题 Young people like to buy a new car ______.

单选题 The Squadron of Japanese ear salesmen is reducing because of ______.

单选题 Japanese ear salesmen do their customers many favors such as ______.