It seems to me that the person who wasn't listening was the manager who ignored the reasonable reasons for not wanting a cold room and made up some bullshit about compressors.
I would not assume the manager was making things up. He might have truly believed what he was saying. In these situations if you take the time to understand, you can get a lot of leverage by getting to the root of their concerns and then building a pathway to address them mutually.
If they thought it was going to harm the compressor, you would listen and understand their concerns. Then you would explain that you are familiar with the system and can show them that it won't cause harm to the compressor. Then you propose a reasonable alternative, such as offering to set it to the desired temperature as soon as you leave and possibly sending them some authoritative HVAC source to allay their fears.
The person in this story didn't even try to do that.
If you spend time with professional sales people (the good ones), the first thing you learn is that you have to listen to the other side, understand the root of their concerns, and work toward a mutual resolution. If you shut down and refuse to even listen, you get nowhere like this guy.