Chapter 49: My Success Can Be Replicated

There were simply too many people on-site, and with the double-file queue, Bai Lu alone could not possibly keep up. Lu Fan therefore called Jiang Ermei, who was running a nearby stall, to come over and help.

As for himself, he stayed on the outer perimeter, responsible for maintaining order in the line and telling those who had already registered to leave promptly.

Even so, this stall still drew a peculiar spectacle. Everyone passing by would stop to watch for a while, asking about what was going on here.

Lu Fan was very busy, and right beside him was an unobservant little girl who kept following him, persistently asking if he wanted an ice pop.

Lu Fan hadn't bought an ice pop from her stall for three days now, and her parents had brought in a bit too much stock over the past two days, leaving them unable to sell out daily.

The addition of Jiang Ermei boosted the registration speed significantly. She was quite sharp-tongued; whenever she ran into customers asking all sorts of questions, a couple of sentences from her would send them packing.

Seeing the queue gradually shrink, Lu Fan stopped worrying. In another few minutes, they should be able to close up shop.

"Little girl, stop following me. Go on back first. Later on, I'll buy a few expensive ones so you can make more money."

"You promised, now don't go back on your word."

Lu Fan smiled faintly, and as he turned around, he caught sight of a pretty woman with a ponytail not far away, snapping pictures of him continuously.

The camera blocked half of the young woman's face, revealing only her sword-like eyebrows that slanted upward into her temples, and a high-bridge nose resembling something straight out of a comic book.

Lu Fan thought back for a moment and decided he didn't know her, but he still cooperatively flashed a V-sign.

Click! Click!

She took two more pictures, lowered the camera, and glared at him with a fierce expression.

Lu Fan cursed under his breath, "Psycho."

I even posed for your pictures, and you're still glaring at me.

Pretty as you are, you still fall a bit short compared to the three at home, and your lips are a bit too thin—you're destined for a hard life!

This was just a minor episode. Once Lu Fan finished muttering, he stopped looking at her and went back to attending to the customers in line.

"Uncles and aunts, don't rush. The line in front has gotten shorter, and it will be your turn soon."

"The gift you get tomorrow is a stainless steel basin worth two yuan, the day after tomorrow it's a large enamel basin worth four yuan, and the day after that it's..."

"Those who have already registered, please step out of line. One registration per person."

Lu Fan had sharp eyes and quick hands, pulling two people right out of the queue.

"I'm registering for my old partner..."

"Me too!"

Though advanced in age, the two were still arguing their case.

"Alright, just this once as an exception. Make sure not to duplicate names, and go wait at the very back of the line."

Ten minutes or so later.

The registration work finally came to an end. Lu Fan checked the time; it was already close to eight o'clock.

He beckoned to the little girl selling ice pops, and she trotted over in a flash.

"Give me four of your most expensive ice pops."

"Coming right up!"

The little girl happily cradled four torch ice creams and ran back, announcing, "Eight yuan!"

Seeing that Bai Lu was still counting money, Lu Fan said, "I'll pay you in a moment."

Handing a torch ice cream each to Shi Hu and Jiang Ermei, he said, "The company leadership has given their verbal approval for that venture of yours. I've secured a batch of goods from a good buddy of mine, and they'll arrive tomorrow, or at the latest the day after."

"However, if the two of you want to do this, we need to hash out the details properly. First of all, you won't be able to sell in this night market. Since I've set up my stall here and already pre-sold quite a lot, you probably won't find it easy to sell here either."

Shi Hu said excitedly, "It doesn't matter, as long as we have the goods, we can go anywhere."

Jiang Ermei, on the other hand, asked, "Big brother, how much can we make for selling a shirt for the company?"

Lu Fan explained, "The commission bonus is tiered. The more you sell, the higher the commission."

"For instance, if you sell 100 pieces, I make 10 yuan per piece; sell 1,000 pieces, and I make 12 yuan per piece; sell 10,000 pieces, and I make 15 yuan per piece."

"This time I've placed an order with the company for 20,000 pieces, and the commission is 17 yuan per piece."

"As the company's first batch of wholesalers, I need to restructure the rules for you two to ensure you have sufficient profit margins as well."

"Thank you, brother."

At that moment, Bai Lu walked over with her notebook. Lu Fan unwrapped one of the torch ice creams in his hand, handed it over, and asked, "How many people today?"

"382 registrations. Combined with the previous ones, we now have a total of 520 customers."

Lu Fan nodded and calculated silently in his head: "520 customers, three pieces each, that's equivalent to 1,560 pieces of clothing. My profit is 17 per piece, so the total I can make is..."

Bai Lu stated, "26,520 yuan."

Right after that, Lu Fan saw Jiang Ermei and Shi Hu's eyes light up, burning with excitement and even breathing heavily.

Immediately following that, Lu Fan poured a bucket of cold water on them.

"Don't think this money is easy to make. If you continue trying to sell clothes with that conventional mindset of yours, I'm afraid those clothes won't just fail to sell—they'll end up stuck in your hands."

"Right, right, right. Brother, teach me."

"Don't worry, Big Brother Shi Hu. Since I want to pull you into the company, naturally I'll teach you the company's entire operating process. But to be honest, if we want to make big money while relying solely on our own personal sweat and toil, it's still rather difficult!"

"How do you figure that?"

"I won't keep it from you. Every strategy has a time limit. Once we play this trick in this market, it won't work as well the next time, and sales will only drop lower and lower."

"Then we just switch markets."

"That's true, but have you ever thought about whether other people will learn from watching us make money like this? Everyone is in business, and this set of tactics isn't hard to learn at all. After watching from the sidelines for two days, I reckon you could pick most of it up yourselves!"

Shi Hu chuckled and said, "True enough, we just didn't have the goods. If we had the goods, we'd have started running this method of yours long ago."

"Therefore, this method won't last long before plenty of people start copying it. We must fight for the market and race against time."

Jiang Ermei chimed in directly, "Big brother, you're an educated man, and some of what you're saying goes over our heads. Just tell us straight what we should do, and we'll listen to you."

"Alright, then I'll speak plainly. My commission is 17 yuan per piece. If you take the goods from me, I'll only keep a profit of 2 yuan, and you make 15 yuan. Understandable?"

"Understood!"

"You can do retail, and you can also do wholesale. I suggest you do both. You can find one or two markets to handle retail yourselves, making 15 yuan per piece. Beyond that, there are many markets you simply can't cover, so you should farm those out, find other people to run them, and take a 2-yuan commission per piece for yourselves."

"You two have spent years setting up stalls at various bazaars, so you must know a lot of people. Gather these people, teach them this method, and let them make money for us. Let's make it bloom everywhere, what do you think?"

Shi Hu and Jiang Ermei exchanged glances, their excitement no longer masked.

"It can work! Ermei and I really do know quite a few people who sell clothes."

"That's the spirit. There's no time to lose; you'd better gather people tomorrow. I'll give them a thorough lecture, teach them all the difficult points and key essentials of this marketing method, and then in the evening, you can all come over to the stall for a live on-site inspection.

Let everyone see that my success can be replicated.

If they are willing, they can take the goods and hit the markets to sell the day after tomorrow."

"Shi Hu, Ermei, don't worry. As long as the people introduced by you take goods from me, you'll get a 2-yuan commission for every piece of clothing."

"Furthermore, when you contact them, make it clear that the company provides a safety net for this inventory. If they can't sell out, they can return the goods for a full refund unconditionally, so they won't bear any risk."

"Alright, we'll handle this immediately."

"Mhm. Whether they can make money and whether they want to make money is everyone's own choice. Just convey the case of how I've been making money these past few days to them, and there's no need to force whatever choice they make."

"If they don't come, that just means they lack the fortune for it." The hand holding Jiang Ermei's cigarette was trembling slightly.

Seeing that the talk had come to a close, Lu Fan took Bai Lu and left the area.

..

"Master, master, they're leaving."

"Should we follow them and see where their lair is?"

Xue Gang said with a headache, "Yiyi, they'll be back. Look at how they didn't rush off even after finishing just now. They chatted with the neighboring vendor for a bit, ate an ice pop, and smoked a cigarette without the slightest bit of tension. That means they aren't at the running-away stage yet."

"But, master, did you see that female accomplice of theirs? She spent quite a while counting money. She must have collected several thousand tonight alone, and that bag was bulging—it has to be full of cash. Won't they run?"

"No, trust your master, they'll definitely be back tomorrow. And Yiyi, next time you're covertly photographing criminal suspects, try not to shove the camera right in their faces."

"Master, rest assured, there were so many people on-site, he didn't suspect me at all."

"I'm still very sharp!"

Xue Gang smiled helplessly. He wanted to go back to the bureau chief and return this prized disciple.

The police precinct mascot wasn't an easy thing to babysit.

..

Successfully advanced to the second round, but the data has been so poor these past two days. Begging for follows, begging for monthly votes!