Brilliant Years 1991

Chapter 103 I Really Have No Regrets
After the filming of the commercial was completed, only one day later, James Wong took out five edited commercials. Cao Yukun rushed over and suggested some minor adjustments. James Wong then re-edited the commercials and the commercials were released quickly.

On the contrary, the large-scale giant screen advertisements stipulated in the contract, although customized, require waiting for a few more days, because Huang Zhan’s own advertising company cannot do that part. The spray painting of large-scale giant screen advertisements needs to be done by more professional related companies - but it will not delay things.

Next, with the help of Huang Zhan, Cao Yukun soon met the relevant persons in charge of advertising at several TV stations. Of course, it was mainly Wireless, or TVB, the absolute overlord of red-sky TV stations!
Since they are willing to spend the money, why would a commercial TV station turn away advertising business that comes right to its door?
We quickly agreed on a series of advertising matters.

In short, meet and discuss cooperation.

It was definitely not as busy as when Cao Yukun was working on subscription certificates and making that huge fortune in Shanghai.

Lawyer Ah Hao has almost become Cao Yukun's full-time secretary - he can earn at least five or six hundred Hong Kong dollars from Cao Yukun every day. As long as Cao Yukun does not actively ask him not to follow him, how can he bear to let him go?

But soon, after sorting out the advertising-related matters at Hongkong, Cao Yukun flew back to the Magic City again - the export approval was obtained.

In other words, the task that Cao Yukun had been busy with, “selling beverages produced in Fuping County to Hongkong”, had finally cleared the last bottleneck!
According to the domestic export quota rules of this era, the export business of this beverage will be handled by Jin Zhiqiang's Jin's Trading as the middleman. He will import sour plum juice from the domestic beverage producer Fuping County Shimen Beverage Company at a price of 2400 yuan per ton, and then export it to Hongkong Yiren Kangyin at the real-time exchange rate of 320 Hong Kong dollars per ton, which is about 2500 Hong Kong dollars.

It's purely to make a profit from the price difference.

Jin's Trading will not even pay a penny for the freight. The first half of the transportation will be handled by Shimen Beverage Factory, and the second half of the sea transportation will be paid by Yiren Kangyin.

According to the exchange rate, as a middleman, they can earn a difference of about 600 RMB per ton!
However, at this time, to be honest, Jin Zhiqiang no longer cared whether he could make a profit from the price difference with Cao Yukun - because on May 5, the authorities suddenly announced a series of major policy adjustments to the Shanghai stock market.

The limits on stock price increases and decreases have been removed.

The daily transaction limit has been cancelled.

Including the T+3 trading system, it was changed to T+0 in one step.

It can be said that this was definitely a day that went down in history - the stock market surged that day!

It is said that the price of the subscription certificate doubled immediately, reaching an astonishing high of 3600 yuan per share within the same day - and there was no demand for it!
Without mentioning anything else, just based on this one point, Jin Zhiqiang, who received 2000 subscription certificates from Cao Yukun at 4800 yuan per certificate, has already made a net profit of million!
At this moment, for him, an export order of 1000 tons of beverages, with a total value of no more than million RMB, how important is it for him to make a difference of or yuan?
Moreover, such a small price difference can be regarded as a very low profit considering the privilege of the export license in his hand, almost making no profit.

In his words, just helping!

However, for Cao Yukun, it was enough to successfully transport these 1000 tons of beverages to Hongkong and try to open up a new path.

Three women once asked him in different tones: Do you regret it?
What they were asking about, of course, was the subscription certificate that had been sold so early.

I really have no regrets.

…………

"Mr. Sun, happy cooperation!"

"It's a pleasure to work with you, Mr. Kun!"

On May 5, the day after Cao Yukun rushed back to Hongkong, he asked Sun Shangbin to come out. With the witness of lawyers from both sides, the two signed a cooperation agreement.

Hongkong Yiren Kangyin Co., Ltd. granted the Hong Kong-wide distribution rights of "Qinyuan Brand Plum Juice Drink" to Sun Shangbin's China-Hong Kong Trading for a period of one year.

After the beverages enter the port and complete a series of procedures such as customs declaration and tax payment, they will be transferred to China-Hong Kong Trading, and this local distributor will distribute them to major supermarkets and retail stores across Hong Kong.

There is no advance payment, and all the pick-up prices will be settled by China-Hong Kong Trading with Yiren Kangyin at a price of HK$7800 per ton - one ton in the trade sense, for large bottles of 550 ml, that is 2000 bottles, and the market recommended retail price is HK$6 per bottle, and for cans of 350 ml, that is 3000 bottles, and the recommended retail price is HK$4.

Cao Yukun has done a very serious market research. It is obvious that the packaging of the beverages currently sold in Hongkong is based on Coca-Cola as the absolute template and benchmark. Therefore, Coca-Cola is divided into 300 ml and 500 ml packages. Most of the other brands of beverages imported to Hongkong are also in the same way.

Only a few brands use slightly larger volumes of 305 ml and 510 ml.

But Cao Yukun was different. During the telephone conference, he directly set two packaging specifications for the next production, 350 ml and 550 ml - which were significantly higher than the mainstream packaging specifications of most beverages on the market!

However, the selling price is directly aligned with that of Coca-Cola and Pepsi. Unlike other beverages, which proactively lower their prices to a level slightly cheaper than the two major colas in order to compete with the market.

Qinyuan brand plum juice will be sold at HK$4 and HK$6 per bottle, which is exactly the same as the two major competing colas!
In this retail price, the retailers are actually the ones who make the biggest profit.

Of the big pie of paper with a retail price of HK$12000 per ton, retailers generally take about 25% of the share, which is about HK$3000. The remaining HK$1200 per ton belongs to the distributors. In the words of Sun Shangbin, what he earns is purely hard-earned money - in fact, of course not, it is channel money.

As for the price of 7800 Hong Kong dollars per ton that Cao Yukun got, the first step is the import price, 2500 Hong Kong dollars per ton, and then the freight. The route from Shanghai to Hong Kong is a major route, there is no shortage of ships, and it is easy to distribute goods. The price is relatively cheap, but it is still 120 yuan per cubic meter, which is equivalent to a ton price of nearly 150 yuan.

Then there is tax payment and customs clearance - Hongkong is a free port for international trade and no tariffs are charged on imported goods, but this does not mean there are no other expenses.

Just at customs, it includes customs broker fees, cargo storage fees, inspection fees, etc. After passing customs, if you want to sell it as a commodity, you must pay consumption tax. Moreover, beverages are food, so of course they require special licenses, which requires going to government offices to obtain local food safety certification.

Taking all these factors into account, Cao Yukun's delivery price has actually reached about 2850 yuan per ton - he has carefully analyzed various plans, which has basically reduced the cost to the lowest. Even so, it is because he has always been running back and forth for his Yiren Kangyin Company, and until now he has no expenses such as office address, office supplies, and labor wages - although Ah Hao charges 50 Hong Kong dollars per hour, 400 yuan a day, and eats and drinks for free, but in fact, his expenses are only temporary. If he really wants to open a stall right away, it seems that he has saved this money, but in fact he has to spend more.

Shell companies save the most money.

At least in the initial stage of developing business, Cao Yukun would rather try his hand in this way.

Taking all this into consideration, excluding the costs of advertising shoots, celebrity endorsements, and advertising placements, Cao Yukun can basically achieve a paper profit of around HK$5000 per ton of beverages - of course, he can only make a profit if the beverages are sold.

…………

“It’s damn expensive!”

This time, finally, there was no lawyer Ah Hao to accompany him. Cao Yukun took a taxi and ran out by himself, intending to find a place to live. Although he had been to Hongkong two or three times before, Cao Yukun's daily schedule was very full and he had no time to pay attention to anything else. Now, in his opinion, the entire beverage sales link has been opened up, and he finally has the leisure to consider that he may have to live in Hongkong for many days a year in the future.

You can't always stay in a hotel, right?

I’ve lived here enough!

However, a quick look at a real estate agency showed that the hotel was really cheap!

I didn't pay attention to these things before, and I didn't care about that little hotel fee. In fact, if you book a room all year round, a 50% discount is the normal price. A king-size room at the Imperial Hotel for a year would only cost 70,000 to 80,000 Hong Kong dollars.

However, this money is only enough to buy two square meters in a remote area!
The house that Cao Yukun is looking at now is in a good location and the asking price is HK$56000 per square meter!

A so-called thousand-foot luxury house, which is about 90 square meters, would cost a little over five million!

It’s simply off the mark!

This amount of money can buy several houses in Shanghai. If you don’t choose the best ones, you can even buy ten small villas!

However, thinking about it again, in the previous life, probably around 2018, the location here in Hongkong was slightly better, and the price was above 20 Hong Kong dollars per square meter. It seems that the housing price will still rise!

However, with this four-fold increase over a period of more than 20 years, there is not much profit to be made.

Just give up and rent it!
The rent is cheap - for a 8 square foot luxury house in a good location, the annual rent is between HK$12 and HK$, depending on the level of decoration.

Although this price is still shockingly expensive compared to the low rent in Shanghai at this time, compared to the house price, with an annualized return of about 2%, it is obviously more cost-effective to rent a house.

So I asked the agent to take me to see the house.

The magical thing was that he actually looked at a house on the street where his company was registered.

It’s true that the decoration is quite good. The three-bedroom and one-living room apartment is just over 80 square meters. It seems a bit small to him, but it is definitely more comfortable than a hotel. Moreover, it is a little out of the way and costs only HK$55,000 a year.

I rented it without hesitation and paid the full rent for the year right away.

Fourteen floors, with a good view.

After a quick bite at noon, he ran to the supermarket to do some shopping. Then, he was finally able to get rid of the life of living in a hotel and temporarily had a place of his own in Hongkong.

He worked until the evening, and just as he was about to go to the vegetable market and cook a meal for himself, he suddenly received a call from Huang Zhan, "Mr. Cao, come out for a drink!"

Without waiting for anyone to ask, he explained the reason, "I told people that I met a guy who is more handsome than Leon Lai and John Lone, but they didn't believe me. Come quickly and have a drink!"

Cao Yukun laughed out loud.

But after thinking about it, he refused - it had been about a month since he had been busy every day, flying back and forth between Hongkong and Magic City. Even when he landed in Magic City and went to have a fight with Hu Zihong, he felt hurried and really felt a little tired.

The kind of tiredness that makes one feel very tired in the heart.

Today he just wanted to buy some food, come back to clean up, drink some wine, and have a good sleep.

Even when James Wong said, "There's a beautiful lady!", he still declined with a smile.

However, he did not refuse and agreed to "make an appointment another day".

(End of this chapter)