Don’t put yourself in that situation. In a word: pre-qualify. The HOF pitch is designed to create a HOF purchase. Not every customer is a HOF prospect and as you've noted, once the pitch is made, it's hard to put the genie back in the bottle. This is a common problem with canned sales pitches. Unless the salesperson understands that the sales process in more than a spiel and the customer is more than a mark, your store's long term success will be in jeopardy.

Any good sales presentation starts off by listening. Listen to and address your client's best interest and you can't go wrong. If they don't give you an idea of where they want to be, start in the middle and make adjustments based on feedback. If they sense you just want to make a big sale rather than serve their needs, you may lose them.

It's hard to pre-qualify your customers all the time. I try never ask a customer a range they would like to spend at the beginning of the sale--I want to get to know them and find product they like--they might think I'm out only for their money if I ask how much do they want to spend too early into the sale. Most of the time my associates start with HOF because they can't get out of a customer what they are looking for--but at least with the HOF presentation they have their attention because it's usually something they haven't seen before. Sometimes this presentation allows them to get the customer to open up and then the customer says, "Well I'm looking for a one carat but not in that price range." Great--but now how do you make everything look as good?

Shanu, >Most of the time my associates start with HOF because they can't get out of a customer what they are looking for< I might start by asking the customer if they have heard of HOF. If the answer is yes, they might be in your store looking specifically for HOF, in which case dive right in with the HOF pitch. If the answer is no I would show something midlevel and gauge their reaction. You might say something like..."this stone represents a nice balance of quality and price, but the HOF are unsurpassed for maximum beauty". If they seem impressed move forward with the HOF pitch. If they back off because of price you have already made the midlevel stone look attractive.