After a busy day, Meng Zhao finally had some time to rest after dinner. She returned to her room, closed the door, and seemed to shut out the noise from the outside world.
Now that her business is growing, she can't possibly keep up with everything on her own. So, in her spare time, she keeps accounts and practices her calligraphy.
It has already achieved some results; at least there are no longer situations where only a few words can be written on a piece of paper.
Meng Zhao carried the money box to the table, first taking out the 200 coins that were already in it when he left, and the rest were all the income for the day. Meng Zhao took out the two pieces of silver in the corner and weighed them; they totaled two taels.
She had previously met a customer who loved braised beef while selling skewers at the night market. Knowing that she had opened a business, he came to support her. He bought half of the several kilograms of beef that Meng Zhao had prepared today, and he paid for it with one yuan.
Because he arrived early, Meng Zhao almost didn't have enough change. Next time he goes out, he'll have to prepare more copper coins in advance to avoid encountering big spenders.
Meng Zhao counted the remaining copper coins and piled them into small heaps of 100 each. Once he had collected 10 heaps, he strung them together with hemp rope to make a string of coins.
She counted out the copper coins from the money box one by one, and finally got a total of six strings of coins and 420 copper coins. Adding the two taels of silver she had just received, she had collected a total of eight taels and 420 coins today.
Meng Zhao picked up the ledger and wrote it down, then began to look through the previous grocery bills.
She remembered everything clearly. The beef alone, weighing over ten kilograms, cost nearly five hundred coins, and the pork she bought with her parents cost a total of one and a half ounces.
The vegetables, chickens, ducks, and rabbits delivered from the village cost him a total of seven hundred coins. He also spent over three hundred coins on the chickens, ducks, and fish he bought in the county.
In addition, she needs a lot of spices for braising meat, which are not cheap. Meng Zhao calculated the approximate amount needed, plus the rent for firewood, which would cost several hundred coins.
Fortunately, she keeps some of the old braising liquid for reuse. This not only makes the braised dishes taste better in the future, but also saves some money on spices.
Adding in labor costs, Gu's skills have now been mastered to a high degree, and she is now in charge of cooking some simple dishes at the dock. Meng Zhao pays her one hundred coins every day.
Aunt Feng'e received seventy coins a day, while Shen Yun, being younger, only received thirty coins. In addition, Meng Zhao gave the two children some pocket money for their daily help. Adding this to the daily labor costs, it came to a little over two hundred coins.
With the shop opened, the imperial tax rate has increased significantly. All things considered, the cost alone is four taels of silver, so her profit today should be around four and a half taels.
She was collecting money the whole time and remembered clearly that most customers paid more than forty coins today, and many bought hundreds of coins at once. Many of them, like Aunt Qian, originally only bought a little, but then added some more when they saw that there was a discount today.
If we wait until the opening days are over and the discounts are gone, her price per person will probably drop to twenty or thirty coins.
After calculating the accounts, Meng Zhao had a general idea of what was going on. In any case, he had indeed made money. Even if he only earned three taels of silver a day, that would be ninety taels a month, which far exceeded Meng Zhao's expectations.
The thousands of copper coins piled up in the box, which she had carried back to the yard with great effort, must have been a sweet burden.
Keep a small amount of copper coins for later use. Put the silver into a money bag and place it in a box along with the strung copper coins. When you have enough, go to the money shop to exchange it for silver ingots for easy storage.
***
Now that Meng Zhao has a shop, he also has a place to meet. Today, after signing a contract with a grain shop, he came directly to the shop. After waiting for a while, Meng Zhao found a time when there were fewer people and went over to talk to him.
The village head first reported the recent situation in the workshop to Meng Zhao. The workshop was operating well and there were no unexpected problems.
After listening to the village head's words, Meng Zhao took out the contract he had made with Xiao Youzhi the day before.
The village head was very surprised when he saw the contract. If it came to ability, probably no one in the entire workshop could compare to Meng Zhao. They had been running around all day, talking themselves hoarse, just to sign a contract for a few dozen or a hundred catties a month. Yet Meng Zhao had quietly negotiated such a big deal.
After carefully reading the contents of the contract, the village head frowned slightly and slowly said, "If we add the extra two thousand catties per month, the workshop will not have enough manpower, and we will need to hire more people."
Meng Zhao nodded upon hearing this, confirming it. "Not only do we need to add more people, but we also need to buy a few mules. They'll be useful for collecting potatoes or grinding grain, and the potato scraps from the workshop can also be used as feed, so the cost of raising them isn't too high."
"Alright, I'll go pick out some mules right away. I'll make sure to choose a few that are strong and healthy so we can use them immediately when we get back, without delaying things."
Then Meng Zhao raised another concern: "Village head, with our current production volume so large, can the potatoes from the surrounding areas of the village be supplied in time?"
These words made the village head frown. "This is also something that has been troubling me lately. These days, we're going to farther and farther places to harvest potatoes, and it takes most of the day to get to some of them."
"So I came up with a solution: I asked some villages to send people to deliver the goods. This made things much more convenient, but the price was a bit higher. However, things should be better after we buy mules."
Although buying mules can increase transport capacity and save labor, it is only a temporary solution. Qingshi County is not a potato-producing area. If too much manpower and resources are spent on transporting raw materials, it will be a loss.
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