Courtyard House: Is Xu Damao a childless man? Let me help.

Because the investigation revealed that his family used to work at a steel rolling mill, and the current "280s generation" employer strongly recommended that he work at the steel rolling mill, the higher-ups arranged for him to return to the steel rolling mill and start as a team leader in the workshop.

Although they still have to work in the factory, their starting point is already a step above others.

You know, there are so many people working in the workshop, and many of them only get promoted in their professional titles until retirement. Banggeng, on the other hand, started as a team leader right away, which is actually quite good.

But I don't know whether to say that Bang Geng is 'idealistic' or 'ambitious', because even with this job, Bang Geng is still not very satisfied.

It has to be said that the effects of this rural slumber were noticeable on others, but on Bang Geng, there were absolutely no effects.

After working in the steel rolling mill workshop for about half a year, Banggeng couldn't take it anymore and started clamoring for Uncle Yi to give him some capital so he could go into business.

At first, only Ye Jianchuan and Sha Zhu had resigned and gone into business, so Uncle Yi refused Bang Geng's request no matter what.

Because of this, Banggeng had a lot of arguments with Uncle Yi. At first, Uncle Yi was somewhat in the right, saying things like "be down-to-earth" and "they were just speculating."

However, as Ye Jianchuan and Sha Zhu's businesses grew bigger and bigger, and as Xu Damao somehow managed to open a grocery store and make money, Uncle Yi's "grand principles" gradually lost their appeal.

The last straw that broke the camel's back was that Uncle Er's restaurant and Uncle San's convenience store had also started to make money. It was okay if they couldn't compete with others, but they couldn't compete with these two guys!

So Uncle Yi didn't care about anything else and simply took out half of the more than two thousand yuan he had saved up as Bang Geng's capital, so that Bang Geng could find a way to start a business.

But... does Bang Geng really know how to do business? The mindset he received growing up wasn't geared towards business at all.

After all, no businessperson would think it's someone else's fault if they don't buy from them, and no businessperson would try to make someone else's business worse off instead of trying to improve their own business when it's not doing well.

And this is exactly Banggeng's 'habit'! After receiving the capital from Uncle Yi, Banggeng followed suit and rented a shop, wanting to open a grocery store like Xu Damao.

The reason for this idea is that when Banggeng was sent to the countryside, Uncle Yi used his connections to arrange for him to be stationed near Beijing.

That's why Banggeng thought that if Xu Damao could find connections and people willing to sell him things, then he should be able to find people to sell him things too, since he had been sent to the countryside for several years.

When I buy the goods, I'll sell them at Xu Damao's price. I don't expect to earn several thousand yuan a month, but earning a few hundred yuan shouldn't be a problem, right?

Then... Banggeng was dumbfounded. Without checking the market, Banggeng went and rented the shop, then ran back to the place where he had been sent to work in the countryside, hoping to find some connections or something.

Then... the connection was found, but the awkward thing was, while the other person was willing to sell the item, they weren't willing to accept the price the guy was asking for...

However, the prices offered by these fellow villagers were a bit too high for Banggeng. If he bought the goods at these prices, he could still make a profit, but let alone a few hundred yuan a month, after deducting rent, he would be lucky to have any income at all!

This infuriated Banggeng, because in his view, these "fellow villagers" were disrespecting him and deliberately raising the price so that he wouldn't make any money!

But in reality... Bang Geng doesn't even think about it properly; there are quite a few differences between different rural areas!

Previously, to prevent him from suffering, Uncle Yi specially found someone to help him settle down in a place on the outskirts of Beijing. Although this place was not considered part of Beijing, it was still very convenient for him to enter the city.

Since there's a bus stop less than half a mile away, they can easily take all their agricultural products to the city to sell in one trip.

For something as simple as this, how could anyone possibly be willing to sell it to you at a price far below the market value?

Xu Damao was different. Although he would go to places closer to Beijing when showing films in the countryside, he also visited some rather remote areas. 2.5

In these remote areas, it would probably take two or three hours by oxcart just to get to the station. In such remote places, it is actually a troublesome thing for them to take their agricultural products to sell.

So even though Xu Damao offered them a slightly lower price, he also saved them a lot of time, which is why they were willing to sell these things to him.

As for Xu Damao, since each acquisition involves a relatively large quantity, and he rented a car to travel this route, his time cost is not actually too high.

But Bang Geng never even considered or studied these intricacies! So although they sound like simple principles, when it comes to Bang Geng, he's basically completely clueless.

Chapter 285 The Essence of the Convenience Store

Then... feeling wronged, Bang Geng lost his temper and started berating the fellow villagers who wanted to sell his things at 'high prices'.

Now, all the goodwill I had built up while cutting in line has basically vanished.

When Banggeng finally wanted to earn back the rent for his shop this month and tried to buy some things at a high price to resell, the villagers refused to sell to him.

This was only Banggeng's first failure. After this failure, before the lease expired, Banggeng sold the shop to someone else at a low price.

Although he still lost some money, at least he didn't lose it all. The difference in price was only equivalent to one month's salary for the old man.

After this unprofitable deal, and since he had already resigned from the steel mill, Bang Geng stayed at home for about two weeks.

During these two weeks or so, although Banggeng couldn't quite figure out how well Lao Liu's restaurant was doing, Lao Yan's convenience store should be right at the street corner, so whether it was doing well or not was something everyone knew.

So, after only a few days of free time, Bang Geng started thinking again about whether he should follow Old Yan's example and open a small shop to make some money.

However, this time Bang Geng learned his lesson and knew to learn about the 'market' in advance. But Bang Geng's method of learning about the 'market' was a bit too simplistic; he went directly to ask Yan Jiecheng.

How could Yan Jiecheng possibly tell Bang Geng those important things? So he just picked some unimportant things to tell Bang Geng, such as how much the rent was, what kind of things the shop sold, or how much money he could make in a month.

While these pieces of information seemed important, Yan Jiecheng overlooked the most crucial point: the source of the goods.

Why is it that so many people know about running a small shop, yet so few are willing to actually try it?

The answer is simple: it's because they can't find a suitable, cheap, and stable source of supply or procurement channels.

If there is a stable source of supply, then this small shop can basically be said to be making money without lifting a finger.

However, Yan Jiecheng did not tell Banggeng about this. The reason why their store was able to do so well and earn so much money in a month was because Ye Jianchuan helped them solve the problem of sourcing goods.

So, if we really want to be serious, the Yan family's little shop wasn't actually opened by the Yan family through their own abilities, but rather it was 'gifted' to them by Ye Jianchuan.

However, Third Uncle and Ye Jianchuan had always had a good relationship, and the Yan family members were also very polite to Ye Jianchuan. So, Ye Jianchuan was willing to help with something that was just a small favor for him.

Besides, this favor wasn't done for nothing. Including helping Yan Jiedi find a job before, Ye Jianchuan didn't do those favors for free either.

Ye Jianchuan's twins had reached school age, but because the controversy hadn't subsided, they weren't sent to school.

During that period, Ran Qiuye basically stayed at home taking care of the children while teaching them some basic things. Later, when Uncle San found out about this, he took the initiative to help teach the children.

Besides, wasn't Uncle San later 'exonerated'? Uncle San also helped arrange for Ye Jianchuan's two children and Sha Zhu's four children to attend school. With Uncle San taking care of them at school, Ye Jianchuan and the others felt much more at ease.

So providing some help to their family is, in Ye Jianchuan's opinion, a way of expressing his gratitude to Uncle San.

However, Banggeng knew nothing about these things! After finding out what Yan Jiecheng had told him, Banggeng ran back to ask Uncle Yi for money.

Although Uncle Yi had learned from his previous experience, he still wanted Bang Geng to "make him proud," so he generously gave Bang Geng a thousand yuan as capital and told him to find a way to open a small shop.

After receiving the money, Banggeng was no longer as reckless as before. Instead of rushing to rent a shop, he first researched the prices of various items and where to source them.

On this point, Banggeng deserves a little praise. Although his way of handling things has been led too far astray by Jia Zhangshi, and no matter how much Uncle Yi teaches him, he can't be saved, Banggeng's brain is at least not as stupid as Jia Zhangshi's.

However, after finding out where each product was sourced, Bang Geng began his bewildering journey, because he discovered that opening this small shop was not as easy as he had imagined.

Putting everything else aside, although the shop is called a "small" shop, it also has another name: a general store! And a general store... naturally means that you can buy a lot of things here.

For example, at Yan Jiecheng's family's small shop, in addition to the various best-selling snacks that Ye Jianchuan helped them contact, they also brought back some common items to buy themselves.

For example, oil, salt, soy sauce, vinegar, pots and pans, needles and thread, etc. However, the sales volume of these items is actually quite fixed, and the money earned is actually very little. These items are mostly used to attract customers.

For example, if someone runs out of soy sauce at home and goes out to buy some, and you happen to see a fragrant popcorn stand next to the convenience store, wouldn't you want to buy a bucket?

Therefore, these everyday items are not considered profitable goods for Yan Jiecheng, but they are things he has to prepare. And these are things that Ye Jianchuan cannot obtain with his help.

Fortunately, their family still had some connections. Through Yu Li's connections, they were still able to contact the suppliers of these items, which is why the small shop was able to open so smoothly.

But Banggeng doesn't have those connections! And after calculating the prices, he realized that these things didn't seem to make any money, so he simply crossed these unprofitable items off his 'purchasing list'.

So what are the remaining things that can make money? The answer is simple: snacks and the like.

Chapter 286 If you have nothing to offer, who would buy anything from you?

Bang Geng knows exactly where to find these things—Ye Jianchuan, of course!

So Banggeng shamelessly approached Ye Jianchuan, hoping that Ye Jianchuan could help him find a way to source goods.

Ye Jianchuan was actually too lazy to care about these things. If he had to deal with such trivial matters, wouldn't he be driven crazy by them?

However, upon reflection, I realized that while I didn't particularly like Bang-ge (a type of Korean singer), he hadn't bothered me at all during those ten years.

In addition, Qin Huairu has been working hard and following him around without complaint. After all, Banggeng is her son. Why don't I lend him a hand?

So after Bang Geng begged Ye Jianchuan twice, Ye Jianchuan actually agreed directly. It's just giving you some supplies, right? It's actually a relatively simple matter.

Bang Geng was overjoyed after receiving Ye Jianchuan's promise, because he hadn't expected that asking Ye Jianchuan for a favor would be so 'smooth'.

Now that the supply of goods is secured, can I just sit back and count my money? Although I don't earn as much as Sha Zhu and Ye Jianchuan, the monthly income from Old Yan's small shop is already more than I would earn in a year working at the steel mill.

The idea was good, but putting it into practice was not so simple. After Banggeng opened his small shop, he found that his business was not as good as he had imagined.

Of course, there are reasons for this. As mentioned before, when Bang Geng was looking for sources of goods, he found that many products were not very profitable, and he had to find someone to purchase them, which Bang Geng found very troublesome.

So I just went all in and crossed out all these things with a big stroke of my pen, saying I didn't want them anymore! And these were exactly the kinds of things that ordinary families would buy most often.

Then... Bang Geng discovered something: his little shop, which initially had a steady stream of customers, mostly just came in to ask a question.

For example, "Boss, could you get me that bottle of vinegar?"

Vinegar? Banggeng, adhering to the principle of 'keeping things simple,' simply didn't stock that product, so vinegar is definitely out of the question.

Upon hearing this, the person didn't even feel jealous? After a moment of silence, they rolled their eyes at the guy and then turned and left.

A little while later, another person came in wanting to buy a toothbrush, but sorry, we didn't have any!

Well, they don't even sell toothbrushes? The customer turned around and left.

After a while, people who come to buy things from you will find that your little shop is not what it seems. They want to buy something from you, but you don't have anything. So when they want to buy something else in the future, they simply don't bother to come to you to ask.

So after a week or so of a 'good start' with many customers and decent sales, Bang Geng gradually noticed that fewer and fewer people were coming to his store to buy things.

After some time, Bang Geng gradually discovered that not only were fewer people coming to his store to buy things, but the customer base was also becoming increasingly homogenous, basically consisting only of teenagers.

That's normal, since over 90% of the items in Banggeng's shop are all kinds of snacks and treats.

These things are basically just for making money off children. Of course, even adults will buy things like instant noodles and biscuits produced by Ye Jianchuan's food factory.

But you sell it here, and the convenience store not far away also sells it! I'm not just here to buy instant noodles, so instead of buying things in two different places, I might as well just buy everything at that convenience store.

Then... Banggeng's convenience store experienced a precipitous drop in sales. At that rate, let alone earning a few hundred or a thousand yuan a month, it would be good if they could just break even on their cost price.

And so, Bang Geng's convenience store's first month came to an end. Because of the 'good start' in the first week or so, Bang Geng's convenience store was actually profitable in the first month.

However, compared to Lao Yan's small shop, his shop only earned about two hundred yuan a month, which was really a bit of a failure.

Most of the profits were earned in the first half of the month after the store opened. In the following two weeks, Banggeng's little shop only had a few customers each day, mostly children.

Even if kids have a big appetite, lack self-control, and crave snacks, there's always one crucial thing that limits their spending: they don't have that much pocket money!

The children only have a little pocket money each day, and there are only so many children who come to Bang Geng's store to buy things. Even if all of them are added together, they can only contribute a few dozen yuan a day.