$137 for a salesman's call

The average cost of an industrial sales call has risen to $137.02, acording to the Laboratory of Advertising Performance, a division of McGraw-Hill. The $ 40.23 increase over a survey two years ago is the most dramatic since 1942. The survey measures how much it costs the average company for a sales representatives to call personally on a client.

Sales costs have been growing faster than inflation. From 1967 through 1979 the consumer price index has risen 117.5 percent, compared with the 219 percent increase in sales costs.