Business Hours
Song Qi, the universe's ultimate invincible otaku and the person who didn't win the community's annual perfect attendance award, has been troubled recently.
He was moved by the fact that when his good roommate Xu Youling was preparing for the exam, he would stay at home most of the time except going out to the study room or library to study during the day.
Xu Youling is a pragmatic, hardworking and somewhat restless person. His way of relieving stress after studying is to clean up the room, sprinkle fragrance beads in the washing machine and cook delicious meals. If Xu Youling is at home, the lights in the living room are always on. Looking up from downstairs can also soothe the fragile heart of Song Qi, who works overtime.
But now—ever since Xu Youling obtained his qualification and mysteriously disappeared into the depths of the White Pagoda for a while, his attention has clearly turned elsewhere. He works from morning till night in that shop filled with plush animals, practically living there.
The ending is that every night when Song Qi returns home, he has to face the dark living room like an empty-nest old man and shed angry tears of being abandoned.
It just so happened that when Xu Youling had just started his design service project, he kindly borrowed his lop-eared rabbit and orange cat for an experiment. He took care of the rabbits until their fur was fluffy and beautiful, and they jumped around in circles on the counter in the store.
The direct consequence is that the rabbit has become extremely picky, requiring daily massages. Song Qi's occasional brushing can no longer satisfy its yearning and pursuit of a better life. If Song Qi comes home from work and collapses on the sofa, the rabbit will actively pull at his trouser legs, its round eyes eagerly saying: I want to enjoy my rabbit life!
At this time, Song Qi could only swallow his anger and pick up his rabbit, walk across several blocks to the brightly lit shop that was open from morning to night, and at the same time avoid being bored to death at home.
But distance wasn't the biggest obstacle to helping out at the store. On the contrary, Song Qi had always been willing to go there to help out. It was just that after a new member joined their startup team, he tried his best to avoid being around that person.
There was no other reason, except that he felt that the man looked a little too smart and too bad, and would probably deceive Xu Youling into a state of confusion.
Song Qi pushed the glass door open with his shoulder. The sound of wind chimes startled the two people who were calculating sales at a small table in the lounge area. Xu Youling looked up and smiled in surprise: "You're off work!"
"Why is he here too?" Song Qi handed the anxious rabbit to Xu Youling in a bad mood and sat down on the chair.
Lu Heng adjusted his glasses and looked at Song Qi with a half-smile: "Mr. Song, why can't I be here? Manager Xiao Xu just gave full praise to my work. You know, accounting requires talent and ability."
The young man was wearing a casual suit and exquisite gold-rimmed glasses, but he had a shrewd and business-like temperament and did not seem out of place sitting in a small community store.
But Song Qi certainly wouldn't think so. He looked at Xu Youling's baggy overalls and gloves, then looked down at his own wrinkled short-sleeved shirt and jeans, and retorted mercilessly: "You're such a fake dog and fox!"
"A rabbit lacking economic literacy."
"How can being in jail be considered economic literacy?"
"I'm a full-time graduate student in business school."
"you!"
"Alright, alright..." Xu Youling smiled wryly and put the rabbit, which had squinted its eyes in comfort, back to Song Qi's hand, and advised, "Stop arguing..."
If he knew that Song Qi would dislike Lu Heng so much, he should have done some work on both sides earlier to prevent them from attacking each other every time they met.
Song Qi fell silent in anger, but Lu Heng spoke slowly, "Then let's continue looking at the data?"
"Okay!" Xu Youling nodded vigorously.
This small shop has been open in this neighborhood for a full six months. The business model of a shop is very different from that of a street vendor, and if you are not fully prepared, you can easily lose all your money.
Although Xu Youling possessed a golden finger that could soothe the spirit, he hadn't told anyone about it, and naturally, it couldn't be used as a marketing tool. Therefore, when their shop first started, the first thing they had to do was to promote the business concept of "spiritual bodies need care" and get more people to agree with this idea.
Fortunately, Xu Youling's early experience in setting up stalls earned him a certain reputation in the nearby streets. When the shop first opened, there were indeed some old and new customers who came to visit, and the shop was very crowded for a while.
But within a few weeks, this upward trend began to slow down and even stagnate. There were fewer and fewer new customers. Although old customers still came, it was difficult for them alone to support the store's turnover.
Xu Youling struggled to keep going, developing new businesses, carefully arranging the store environment, and upgrading equipment, but there was still no sign of a return.
It wasn't until Lu Heng, who was released from prison, called him.
The day Lu Heng came, he was dressed like an elite as always. Although he looked a little tired, the shrewdness in his eyes was unmistakable.
He pointed fingers at Xu Youling's shop on the spot without any mercy.
“The storefront is too small and the writing is ugly.”
"Why install a door like this? It doesn't make you want to look inside at all. It's like walking into the owner's living room."
"Knock it all down and make floor-to-ceiling windows. You have money, right? If not, go get a loan."
"Tsk, I can definitely make it back. That's what I do."
"The menu is such a mess. Who made it for you? The art is terrible too."
…
Lu Heng was giving instructions and talking nonsense in the front, while Xu Youling was taking notes in the back with a small notebook in his hand. He was so serious that he almost bumped into Lu Heng who turned around.
"That's all." Lu Heng spread his hands. "How much are my words worth?"
"Uh..." Xu Youling paused, "I can't afford much..."
Your opinion has not been tested at all!
"It's okay, I don't need much either." Lu Heng showed a very aggrieved yet tolerant expression. "How about this, you give me a long-term job, I will live in your store for a while, and I can help you with the store and accounts. If you don't trust me, forget it."
"I do find it a little bit distrustful." Xu Youling admitted honestly.
For some reason, although Lu Heng made many suggestions that sounded reasonable, he still felt that the other party was being slick.
Lu Heng raised an eyebrow: "You may not trust my character, but you cannot not trust my business ability."
Then he quickly showed off his graduation certificate from a famous financial university, his resume before going to prison, etc., and shone with such pride that Xu Youling's eyes were blinded.
Lu Heng stayed in the store like this.
To be honest, Xu Youling was a little worried about him at first, thinking that he had a criminal record. Although according to his own words, he was raped or something... the probability of such a thing was too small.
So during the time when Lu Heng left in the store, Xu Youling simply lived in the store himself.
Lu Heng had no problem with his caution and naturally allowed the young store manager to tentatively inquire about his previous life experiences, and to brag about them when appropriate.
"I started my first independent business project in my sophomore year." Lu Heng, lying on the floor, raised a finger. "I made my first pot of gold."
"Hmm...hmm..." Xu Youling was about to fall asleep.
"But I personally feel the most fulfilling was the internship I did during graduate school," Lu Heng said. "It was truly transformative. It completely reshaped the underlying logic. I felt like I went from being a student to a true practitioner."
"Good...very good..." Xu Youling nodded.
Lu Heng turned over and sat up. "Yeah! I think it's great too! Do you want to hear about the job I found after graduation using this internship experience?"
"No need!" Xu Youling couldn't stand it any longer, "Please go to sleep!"
Following Lu Heng's method, the small shop actually went from being on the brink of breaking even to slowly moving towards profitability.
The first thing to be done was the floor-to-ceiling windows. Wanting to save money, Xu Youling chose the materials herself at the building materials market instead of hiring a renovation company.
After installing the floor-to-ceiling windows, the interior becomes much more airy, and even from the main road one can see the neat and beautiful layout of the store, as well as the spiritual beings of all sizes who are enjoying a bath, massage or beauty treatment.
In addition, Xu Youling loves cleanliness, so she kept the floor-to-ceiling windows clean inside and out, and many passing sentries and guides would stop to take a look.
According to Lu Heng's theory, attention is the biggest source of wealth.
Stop today, push the door tomorrow, ask the price the day after tomorrow, and get a membership card the day after tomorrow.
In addition, Xu Youling has actively launched many preferential projects, such as return gifts for old customers, first payment benefits for new customers, and monthly cards for haircuts and blow-drying services... While the previous customer flow has remained stable, new customers are also constantly pouring in.
At the same time, he opened an online reservation channel so that customers can manage their time more freely and do not have to wait for a long time due to peak hours in the store. After all, the spirit body cannot be too far away from the owner.
When everything was flourishing, Lu Heng casually said during one of the accounts, "Why not recruit a few sentinel apprentices?"
Xu Youling thought this made sense. He'd been worried about the store's survival during its initial downturn, so he'd never considered hiring any staff, leaving him alone. But now that customer traffic had picked up, many of the shopkeepers had approached him or Lu Heng about needing the store's services.
But both of them and Song Qi were guides, so they really couldn't take the sentry's orders.
After having this idea, Xu Youling began to pay attention to recruiting store clerks. He not only posted advertisements, but also published relevant information on recruitment websites.
But perhaps because most sentinels don't have career plans for these daily, service industry jobs, suitable candidates have never been found.
"Anyway," Lu Heng tapped the table with his pencil. "I think the store still needs a few sentinel apprentices. Otherwise, we'll lose half our customers. That's a shame."
"Yes..." Xu Youling sighed, "But I can't recruit anyone..."
The most difficult thing is always to change people's ideas, just like most customers only come into the store because they are curious about dressing up their spiritual bodies, but it is a good start to have such a beginning.
"We can't lose this market," Lu Heng made a decision, "We must find a suitable sentinel as soon as possible."
The orange cat jumped onto the table and hooked Xu Youling's arm with its tail. Outside the window, the night was dark and the air was calm and gentle.
Xu Youling was sitting across from Lu Heng, facing the door, so he saw a young man push open the door and greet him, "Hello, sir! We're closed tonight, so we can only do some simple projects."
The young man showed no intention of leaving: "I'm not here to cleanse my spiritual body."
"Ah...what's the matter?"
"Apply for a job," the young man said simply. "Didn't we post a notice?"
"Oh... please come in!" Xu Youling stood up.
For some reason, he always felt that Lu Heng, who was facing the gate with his back, looked a little flustered.
Hopefully, he's just wrong.
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