Thirty-three small hair accessories, big business.
Final exams are just around the corner, and the courses have already been finished. Every day it's the same: the teacher writes problems on the blackboard, and the students copy them down while doing the exercises. It's incredibly tedious. But that's student life, whether you like it or not.
Seeing that her homeroom teacher already gave her enough practice questions every day, Li Wei didn't do extra practice at her small desk after school. Instead, she would practice martial arts and play the piano after finishing her homework. Li Wei, on the other hand, would play basketball and water the flowers and plants she had planted. Her life was quite pleasant.
After escaping from the thugs, Li Wei seriously considered learning kung fu from her grandfather, but later decided against it. Aside from the fear of not growing tall enough, there were already enough people around her learning kung fu; she wouldn't be left out. She figured she'd try not to be alone in the future. And when she grew up and became a real beauty, she could just buy more self-defense devices like stun guns—the effect would be the same.
Another, less respectable reason, is that she's rather lazy.
However, Luo Da was treated exceptionally well, and was treated as someone on the same level as Li Lianhui and Li Lin. Luo Er benefited from this and was even more frequently disciplined and threatened with becoming a eunuch.
Back home, Mom has finalized the land purchase and building arrangements. Apparently, all the houses along a main street in town are going to be demolished, and it'll probably be over a month before the apartment numbers are handed over. The exact location has been assigned; it's not far from the town government, but the price is relatively higher. Mom is now even more excited and motivated every day.
Meanwhile, sales at the family processing plant had increased significantly, and they were short-handed. After discussing it, my parents decided to call my eldest uncle and aunt to help out; it didn't matter who they used. They had originally wanted my maternal grandmother to move in, so my maternal grandfather wouldn't have to travel back and forth so often. Luckily, a family in the backyard was selling a house at a reasonable price, and my grandparents could live there. Unfortunately, my maternal grandmother didn't want to leave her little corner of the world.
The house was still bought, but the eldest uncle and aunt lived there first, while the eldest cousin was taken care of by his maternal grandmother who lived in the same village. The eldest uncle gave the old woman some money every month, since the old woman had sons and grandsons, and if she only let the eldest aunt take care of the child, the other children would be jealous and cause family conflicts.
Before I knew it, the final exams were over. As usual, I had three days off before the school released the grades and final summary, and then summer vacation began.
With a rare three-day holiday, Li Wei's second cousin, born to her second aunt, was having his one-month celebration tomorrow. The family's steamed bun workshop was too busy, so her mother asked her father to take the children. It would just be a meal, and Li Wei didn't really like her second aunt, plus her father's bicycle could only carry two children at most, so she didn't go.
Li Wei rested at home for a day, tidying up her own clothes and belongings, and also sorting through Li Lin's and Li Lianhui's. She skipped her father's things, since her mother had them. She also checked the remaining fabric scraps and other materials, and was shocked by what she found. Aunt Lin and Wu Feng's mother were incredibly efficient; they'd probably used up all the fabric scraps in just a day or two. Looking at the mountain of hair accessories, Li Wei felt a little apprehensive. When would this ever end?
I checked the calendar. Looks like I'll have to go to the free market and the town market during my two days off. The town market is the day after tomorrow.
I should pick up some raw materials while I'm at the free market. After a while, I need to find a way to buy fabric scraps directly from garment factories. And other raw materials too. I need to figure out how to get them directly from the manufacturers, one by one. That way, I can save the trouble of dealing with everything little by little. A typical small-time vendor. That way, once production volume increases, I can consider wholesaling instead of retail. Li Wei was getting excited just thinking about it. It was as if a bright future for big-time vendors was beckoning her.
In the afternoon, Li Lin and Li Lianhui returned from their maternal grandparents' house with their father. Li Lin, in particular, was now quite the star, more so than the other girls at school. She adorned her hair with ever-changing styles of hair accessories and wore little floral dresses made from scraps of fine fabric by Li Wei. Every day she dressed up like a little butterfly, clearly a rising star in the school.
Li Lianhui was relatively unknown. He spent his days running around with Erpangzi and Luo Er, and was always covered in mud.
So, Li Lianhui jumped off his father's bicycle and immediately went to Old Luo's house in the front yard. Li Lin went to find Wu Feng, whispering to herself that they wanted to go to town together to visit Gu Liwei. They each had their own interests.
Li Wei tidied up all her things. She took a shower and changed into a simple cotton loungewear dress, which she had made herself. She simply sewed a rectangular pocket, cut off the two bottom corners of the pocket, making them rounded, and hemmed the edges. Then she slipped it on, and it became her casual loungewear.
I spread out a small mattress and had a comfortable afternoon nap.
When I woke up, it was already dinnertime. Grandpa didn't come over today, so it was just the five of them eating. Mom didn't cook either; she heated up a few steamed buns and bean buns, stewed a pot of green beans, smashed some cucumbers, and picked a few horn-shaped peppers for Dad. That was dinner.
In the evening, with nothing to do, Li Wei sat at the courtyard gate to digest her food. Finding nothing else to do, she asked Li Lin to bring out her erhu. She now knew more songs than Li Lin, and the two of them played and sang together, enjoying themselves quite a bit. Soon, Wu Feng arrived, making it a trio. Shortly after, Li Lianhui, Luo Er'er, and the fat guy also arrived, but not to sing; they came to cause trouble. They tugged at Li Lin's clothes and pulled Wu Feng's braids, making the girls squeal and scream, but none dared to provoke Li Wei. Li Wei ignored them and just continued playing her erhu.
On a quiet summer night, the soft, melancholic sound of the erhu filled the air, making Li Wei feel light and airy, as if she were about to drift away...
When Li Wei lay in bed that night, she was still a little dazed, feeling that everything was so unreal.
Time flowed by like water, and before they knew it, summer vacation was over, and a new school year began. Li Wei moved up to fourth grade as planned. The others followed suit. Such a large-scale, high-speed grade skipping activity was unprecedented, not only in their own school but also in the six or seven primary schools in the town. However, because the children's grade skipping exam scores were all above 90, under the immense mental pressure from the housewives, the collective grade skipping became a foregone conclusion.
This sparked a wave of grade skipping in the school. After half a semester, several students skipped grades, including Gu Liwei, whom Li Wei knew, and the daughter of Ms. Meng, Li Wei's first-grade homeroom teacher.
It's a new class, new classmates, and new teachers again. Li Wei sometimes thinks that at this rate, more than half the teachers in the school will probably be teaching her. But that's just a thought. Skipping grades is impossible now. It doesn't bother her, but the twins and Luo Er are probably too young. Their minds are more immature than those of older children, which isn't good for their development. Oh well. Anyway, she's prepared to repeat high school twice; she has plenty of time.
What's particularly interesting is that the two boys who used to bully them—the one with dark skin and the other with blond hair, nicknamed "Little Black" and "Little Yellow"—are both in their new class. Little Black's name is Zhao Rui, and Little Yellow's name is Qiao Xiangnan. Their names are quite nice, but unfortunately, the kids themselves aren't all that great.
So Luo Da was the one who was most comfortable with himself. He spent all his time hanging out with the other boys and never showed up. However, he never missed a day of doing his homework and practicing kung fu every night. He also didn't miss herding sheep or drinking their milk. Sometimes, Luo Er and Li Lianhui would do it for him, and the two boys were surprisingly hardworking and dutiful, which puzzled Li Wei.
Li Wei's main raw material for making hair accessories—fabric scraps—was obtained during summer vacation through her maternal grandfather's connections with her great-uncle's brother. Her great-uncle's daughter worked in a garment factory, and whenever needed, she could pick up fabric scraps from that collectively owned factory—at a lower cost and with a wider variety of patterns and styles. So, during the summer vacation, Li Wei asked her aunt, who was home on holiday, for help. After two transactions, they obtained several large bags, enough for her to use for two or three months.
The most interesting thing is that once during summer vacation, Li Wei went to the free market with her aunt to sell hair accessories. She met the woman in the floral dress who had bought her hair accessories before. She said that the hair accessories sold well in her family's small shop and had already sold out. She was looking for Li Wei. She immediately picked out a few styles from Li Wei's hair accessories and placed a large order for 500 hair accessories. Her brother's small shop also needed some.
Cheng Fei was stunned. She really didn't expect that her niece's small business would be so successful.
Li Wei wasn't as happy as she had imagined. Her hair accessories had always been made from scraps of fabric. The patterns and textures of fabrics varied greatly, making it impossible to produce uniform styles now unless she bought large quantities of the same fabric, which would significantly increase costs. Although that was the inevitable trend for the future.
In the end, Li Wei agreed with the woman that the styles would be the same, but the fabric would be random. The woman could buy it if she liked it, and if not, that would be fine. It was the only acceptable solution for both parties at the moment. Li Wei wasn't worried at all. Her hair accessories were selling quite well, so it didn't matter whether the woman liked them or not, although it would be a bit of a blow.
So, Li Wei sat there, chin in hand, watching the students playing happily on the playground, her mind preoccupied with business. Despite having a general idea of what to expect, Li Wei still planned to find a way to buy suitable fabrics for making hair accessories, gradually standardizing the styles and colors to adapt to the expanding market demand. Using scraps of fabric was more suitable for small workshops; it wouldn't amount to much.
As for sourcing the goods, she decided to first inquire with her second grandfather's daughter, since the garment factory also needed a large quantity of fabric. Li Wei took out her miniature notebook and wrote down something she needed to do soon, a habit she had developed over the past few months. "A bad pen is better than a good memory," was a saying her previous homeroom teacher constantly repeated to encourage the children to write more words and solve more problems, and Li Wei wholeheartedly agreed.
Also, with Aunt Lin doing the cutting and Aunt Wu doing the making, we can basically meet the needs. Even if we run out of manpower in the future, Aunt Lin can find more people to cut the fabric, and Aunt Wu can find more people to make the finished products. Since it's all piecework, many housewives can use their spare time to earn some extra income, so I don't need to worry too much. Since I'm going to standardize the product styles and purchase raw materials uniformly, I need to put more effort into the design; otherwise, if we can't sell them, we'll lose a lot of money. (Note this down.)
Another point is to expand sales channels. It's really not feasible to rely on just one person; her small frame makes going out inconvenient. Suddenly, she remembered the floral dress that had received five hundred orders for hair accessories. Now she knew the dress's surname was Dong, her name was Dong Huijun, and she ran a small shop. This gave Li Wei an idea: she could try contacting some small shops first, especially those near schools. These small shops are the prototypes of future supermarkets! She noted this down.
There's also the storage room. Right now, the west room is manageable for storing odds and ends, but if Mom builds a new house in the future, the problem will be solved. As for my own side, there's the finance, purchasing, shipping, personnel…
Li Wei's head ached more and more as she thought about it. The more she thought about it, the more things seemed to pile up. So she decided to stop thinking about it and rest her head on her desk. She needed to plan things out properly that night; there were still so many things to do.
Honestly, you don't know until you try; even something as small as hair accessories isn't easy to make well. She also has to manage her student duties, take care of her child, and so on…
Li Wei suddenly had a premonition that her leisurely life was about to enter a period of rapid change.
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