The stall owner opened a colorful bag and poured out a picture, followed by a whole piece of dry bread.
The stall owner just threw the dried bread into a bowl of hot water without giving a second thought and covered it with the flattened bag.
“It will be ready to eat in a few minutes!”
A buyer wearing bell-bottom pants immediately laughed and said, "It's just instant noodles."
Although it sold in small quantities and was expensive, as early as the 1970s, Shanghai had a product called egg instant noodles. It was produced by the same manufacturer as White Rabbit Toffees. But egg instant noodles disappeared within a few years, and were far less famous than White Rabbit Toffees.
It is said that Japan has also started making instant noodles in recent years, and some domestic factories have spotted the business opportunity. Last year, someone went to the south and ate instant noodles produced by a factory in the south.
The stall owner looked a little embarrassed: "There are pictures inside! Take a look, a box of fifty packages, with quite a few kinds of pictures. It's the one about the little blue-skinned goblin that all the little kids love to watch. How does the song go? Oh, right, on the other side of the mountain, on the other side of the water..."
Before he finished singing, the people around him dispersed with laughter.
The instant noodles sold in the south are as big as a palm, with thick and firm dough. This small bag of instant noodles is only one-third of the size.
And judging from the taste coming from the bowl, it was just average.
Having just come out of difficult years, even if the city kids were a little better off, who could spend a few cents on such a small pack of instant noodles, just for those little blue-skinned goblins inside?
The stall owner saw that everyone had left, muttered to himself, and found a pair of chopsticks to eat the noodles in the bowl.
No matter what, it can't be wasted, right?
But the taste is really not good, it tastes soft and soggy.
Qian Qing was interested and came over to take a look.
She keenly felt that there should be business opportunities here.
Who says kids won’t buy snacks for picture books?
She discovered this when she was selling popsicles. She didn’t know whether the popsicle factory wanted to highlight their uniqueness or to ensure the highest quality, but after eating the most expensive milk ice cream, you would find a small line of words on the stick that said “milk ice cream”.
Although it is just such a simple stick, it is something worth showing off in the eyes of primary school students.
Qian Qing has seen children making these sticks more than once. Some of them grind them themselves and ask their parents to buy them, while others mix them with ordinary sticks. If you gather five of them, you can put them together to form a five-pointed star.
Children’s happiness is so simple, they can create many different things with just a stick.
Qian Qing asked if she could try some, and the stall owner hesitantly found a pack for her.
He got this kind of instant noodles from a local flour mill through his connections. Seeing that flour mills in the south were making money by making instant noodles, the factories in the provincial capital also became interested.
However, they make several kinds of instant noodles, both large and small. The large ones are naturally aimed at the market, while the small ones are produced as snacks for children.
The success of White Rabbit in recent years has attracted people's attention, and children are always generous in buying things. So local flour mills want to try and see if they can also create a brand.
The idea of the pictures was proposed by a new college student who tried to make a batch.
Qian Qing took a pack of noodles, cut it in half, and then cut the dried noodles in her hand in half again, giving one half to Qian Yu and keeping the other half for herself. The stall owner also found a bowl and helped her put the other half in to soak.
Qian Qing tasted it and wondered why those who came to purchase goods were in a bit of trouble. The noodles tasted weird when soaked in water, but they were quite good when eaten dry.
After thinking it over for a while, Qian Qing made up her mind: "Give me two boxes."
One box costs ten yuan, two boxes cost twenty. Qian Qing also ordered two large boxes of instant noodles. Although these are larger in size, the good thing is that they are lighter.
Qian Qing bought some snacks and stationery with the remaining money. At this time, I don't care about expensive or cheap goods. I just want to have everything. I bought a little bit of everything and went back to see what sells well and then replenished the stock. Anyway, most of them will not go bad, so I can just sell them slowly.
Qian Yuzhong still felt that those pencil cases were too expensive. Each pencil case purchased at ten yuan, which seemed not worth it no matter how he looked at it.
Qian Qing thought those pencil cases were pretty, in pink and blue, and they were obviously the kind that elementary school students would like.
The purchase cost them 600 yuan. The stall owner gave them a small change and hired a helper to deliver the goods to the guesthouse. There were three large boxes of goods in total. If the two women were to carry them back alone, they would attract attention on the way.
Qian Qing was still shopping for the next few days, but she didn't buy anything.
She had little money, a piece of wool was ten yuan, a top of sheared sheepskin was twenty-five yuan, and earmuffs were three yuan each. If she really wanted to buy like this, how much could she buy with more than two thousand yuan in her hand?
So she decided to take another look.
Finally, one day in the market, Qian Qing saw someone pulling a cart of colorful things setting up a stall outside the market.
The silver building was originally a market that was allocated by the supply and marketing cooperative, but the reform and opening up came before the building was built. As the center of the province, the provincial capital was quickly filled with goods from the south, and the supply and marketing cooperative was somewhat impacted.
Later, a three-story building was built on this land, and stalls were set up for sale or rent, selling all kinds of clothes, shoes, socks, bags and hats.
In recent years, more and more people have been engaging in wholesale clothing in silver shops, and the management has become more and more standardized.
So the guy who was setting up a stall outside with a cart was soon stopped by the man in red armbands who was in charge of the market.
Qian Qing hurried over and started talking to the people pulling the cart.
"What are you selling?" I was far away and could only see things like towels.
There were two men and two women on the other side, but they were dressed differently from the people in the market.
Nowadays, people's clothing styles are quite polarized. The fashionable ones wear sunglasses and wide-legged pants. Women wear a small scarf around their necks, and men wear a pair of leather sandals in summer. The casual ones wear formal clothes with rigid styles.
Although the clothes these people wore were not fancy, their colors and quality were quite different from those of the locals.
The woman was wearing a white sweater with a khaki coat on top, and the man was wearing a navy blue jacket with his collar turned up.
The woman next to the bus smiled bitterly and said, "Pillow towels and some handkerchiefs, do you want some?"
Qian Qing suppressed the ecstasy in her heart: "Let me take a look first."
The other party saw that she didn't look like she was here to have fun, so he opened a corner of his clothes for her on the street.
Various colors and patterns, stacked layer upon layer, one stack upon another...
Qian Qing flipped through the pages a few times, feeling happy but also a little puzzled: "You guys are not locals, right?"
Isn't this a good thing? Why do they look so lifeless?
The two men had frowns on their faces and the woman looked helpless. Only after the explanation did Qian Qing understand.
They originally came from a small factory in the south, which originally made pillowcases and handkerchiefs and sold them to supply and marketing cooperatives and major state-owned factories. In recent years, pillowcases made in their factory have become unpopular in the south, and pillowcases made of smooth fabrics have become popular.
Their factory's direct shipments are to the south. Without a fixed market, the factory's machines are old and they cannot compete with other large factories producing old-style pillowcases. They are supported only by handkerchiefs.
As a result, the handkerchiefs could not be sold. Handkerchiefs with bare edges were no longer rare. The handkerchiefs sold in the south were all printed on.
The price was not competitive, and the quality was not up to par. This summer, the factory stopped production and sold the accumulated inventory to the workers to pay their wages.
Most of the workers sold the goods locally, but the four of them wanted to take a chance and bring the goods to the north, hoping to make more money.
Qian Qing asked tentatively: "How do you sell your products?"
She thought these people didn't seem like scammers, spoke logically, and explained their past dealings clearly, so she wanted to take over this batch of goods.
The four of them looked at each other and gestured with their hands.
"A pillowcase costs seventy cents, and a handkerchief costs fifteen cents."
The factory price was 40 cents, and the handkerchief was 5 cents. This was the highest price they thought.
Qian Qing immediately made the decision: "I want them all!"
Every household needs pillowcases, as well as handkerchiefs. Moreover, these two items are consumables. People who are particular about pillowcases will replace them within a year, and even frugal people will not use pillowcases for many years. Old-fashioned pillowcases will pill after long-term use, and will become thinner after frequent washing.
In the supply and marketing cooperative, a pair of pillowcases cost at least three yuan, and a handkerchief cost at least thirty cents. You also needed a ticket to buy it, so you can imagine how easy it would be to sell this truckload of goods.
Qian Qing was afraid that someone would intercept them, so he paid for the four people to go to the guesthouse where he was staying and booked a room for them.
After settling in, Qian Qing started to calculate the costs.
There are 3,000 pillowcases and 2,000 handkerchiefs in this car. The cost alone is 2,400.
She had three thousand when she came out, and now she has spent six hundred on the purchase of goods, plus the cost of food and lodging, so she doesn't have enough money left. And she also has to consider the travel expenses for bringing back this truckload of goods, which is not a small amount either.
Qian Qing made a prompt decision and started to borrow money. Lao Ding had done everything in the provincial capital over the past few years. He now had a store in the provincial capital, selling things like electronic watches and alarm clocks.
When Lao Ding heard Qian Qing say that there was a shortage of goods, he directly borrowed 500 yuan from her.
He was penniless back then and had just started to hang around. Zhou Hao gave him fifty yuan without asking any questions, which was almost three months' salary for Zhou Hao.
With Lao Ding's 500 yuan, Qian Qing borrowed a few more people from Lao Ding to check the goods and make payments.
Once the goods were taken down, Qian Qing couldn't stay any longer as it would attract too much attention.
Qian Qing did not choose to use a truck for transportation. Although Lao Ding had made some money, he was not rich enough to own a car. Qian Qing was worried about using another truck, so she decided to use a train.
Qian Qing did not look for Chen Xinran again. Instead, she waited at the train station for Lin Xiaohui's bus to pass by, and took advantage of the gap between the buses to go look for Lin Xiaohui.
This time, Qian Qing was asking someone to do the job for her, and she was very clear about it. She directly paid Lin Xiaohui for ten big reunion tickets.
All she wanted was to occupy the resting space for the train crew next to the dining car.
There were too many things, and even the berth couldn't hold them all. There were usually several berths where train attendants rested, and Qian Qing planned to cram all the things there.
Lao Ding arranged for someone to deliver the big bag of things to the car, and Zhou Hao found someone to wait for them in Y City.
Even so, Qian Qing was still nervous along the way, and Qian Yu also stared, not daring to make any mistakes.
Qian Qing said that all the 1,000 pillowcases and 1,000 handkerchiefs were hers. Qian Yu had never seen so much money in her life, and Qian Qing gave it away in the blink of an eye. This trip to the provincial capital left a deep impression on Qian Yu.
When they finally docked in Y City, Lin Xiaohui asked someone to help Qian Qing unload her belongings, and the two of them finally breathed a sigh of relief.
They looked at each other.
Come on, let’s have some fun!