Launching plum wine
After arranging the relevant matters for spring plowing, Fu Zhiqiao returned to the city to begin preparing for the launch of plum wine.
The two shops I bought before the Lunar New Year are under renovation and will be completed soon. The larger shop on the right will be used as a warehouse for the time being, while the smaller shop on the left will be merged into the Taibai Wine Shop after the renovation is completed. It will be used specifically to receive VIPs and female customers, and will also be a prelude to the launch of plum wine.
The target customers for plum wine are women, so the sales style cannot be as bold as that of Taibai wine. Therefore, she specially set up a reception room for female customers to prevent male customers who come to buy Taibai wine from bumping into female customers.
The hardware infrastructure is under construction, and the corresponding supporting facilities must also be in place.
Although the liquor store has expanded considerably and added a section that only serves female customers, there are currently only male staff members, and she needs more female receptionists.
"Granny, go find the matchmaker and buy some maids. They should be clever and have pretty faces."
Granny Cui accepted the order and left.
A matchmaker is a middleman who buys and sells maids and servants. In the Great Wei Dynasty, human brokers were a legitimate profession, equivalent to intermediaries. Wang Po was the most famous matchmaker in the city, and she was well-connected in various trades.
Soon, Granny Wang brought more than a dozen maids to the door for people to choose from.
Upon entering and seeing the person, Granny Wang was very respectful, curtsied, and called to the maids behind her: "Hurry up and greet Granny Cui."
"Greetings, Granny Cui." The little maidservant bowed along with her.
With a beaming smile, Granny Wang said, "Granny Cui, all these maids are good, honest and hardworking. Do you see any you like?"
Granny Cui looked at the timid young maids and nodded, saying, "I trust Granny Wang to handle things."
The young girls all stood up straight, because Granny Wang had instructed them beforehand to make sure they behaved well.
"The Fu family is a good family. Today, the mistress of the house is buying maids. As long as you are chosen to stay in the Fu residence, you will have no worries about food and drink in the future. You will do easy jobs such as serving tea and water. At worst, you will only have to do laundry and sweep the floor. You will be able to live in a big house and receive a monthly salary. Whether you can seize such a good opportunity depends on your performance today."
Compared to those who were sold to brothels to be concubines, they were already very lucky to be sold to their mistresses as maids.
Granny Cui pulled Granny Wang aside and asked her about the situation in detail. Now that the young lady had opened a shop and started a business, she was afraid that she might accidentally attract a spy to the mansion.
Granny Wang said, “I personally selected and bought these girls. They are all from farming families. I know very well how many people are in their families and where they live. They were sold because their families were too poor to survive. They are not from shady backgrounds. I, Granny Wang, dare to guarantee with my life that these girls are absolutely fine.”
The "illegitimate origins" refer to people who come from elsewhere to solicit beggars, while the girls under her command are forced into servitude because their families are too poor to survive.
Granny Cui was still a little worried, so she verified the backgrounds of the maids one by one, and finally selected five pretty maids to keep.
These maids all had death contracts, which made them more valuable than those with open contracts. Once they signed the death contracts, as long as their master didn't sell them, they would belong to the Fu family for life.
In the Great Wei Dynasty, people, like commodities, could be legally bought and sold.
Selling children is a very common phenomenon. In order to make a living and supplement the family income, many parents have no choice but to sell their children because the family is too poor. It is better to sell their children to others as servants than to starve with them. At least they will not die from starvation.
Although Fu Zhi Qiao has integrated into this society, she is still an open-minded modern person at heart. She has never had the idea of enslaving her servants, but treats them as her own employees.
Once a commoner is enslaved, it's equivalent to losing their freedom. They must obey their master for life, and even if their master beats or abuses them at will, the government will not intervene. There are ways to get rid of slavery, but the only option is to pay a higher price to redeem oneself, and many maids cannot save up that much money even in their entire lives.
Twenty-five taels of silver per person, cash on delivery and indenture on the other.
"Thank you for making this trip." Granny Wang was efficient, and since she would inevitably have to deal with her again in the future, Granny Cui gave her an extra tael of silver as a reward.
Granny Wang left happily with the reward money, thinking to herself that she preferred doing business with wealthy families because they were quick to choose their customers and gave generous rewards.
Five girls, around twelve or thirteen years old, followed behind Granny Cui like a flock of little quails. They were all children from poor families, and it was their first time entering such a large courtyard. They were nervous and scared, and each of them hung their heads.
"Raise your head and introduce yourself."
A crisp, melodious sound rang out from above.
One of the maids mustered her courage and looked up. She saw Fu Zhi Qiao sitting on the chaise longue. Her smile was like a gentle breeze, and her fairy-like appearance stunned her. The maid relaxed her stiff body, bit her lip, and whispered, "This servant's name is Xiao Hua."
Fu Zhi Qiao compared the information on the indenture with the information. The tall maid was called Xiao Hua, and she was the oldest among these people.
"My name is Xiuxiu."
"My name is Xiao Shuang."
...
Once someone took the lead, the others followed suit and announced their names.
Fu Zhiqiao: "I bought you back not so that you would serve me. I have a shop outside, and from now on you will be the shop's maids, receiving wages from the shop, not from the mansion."
Upon hearing the words "wages," the maids' minds began to race. The reason they had been sold was because their families were short of money.
These days, you need money to survive. The big-eyed maid on the far right, named Xiuxiu, mustered her courage and asked, "Miss, how much are we paid?"
Ginkgo answered these trivial questions: "The wages are fifty coins a month. If you do a good job, keep the tips you get from the customers. Do you understand?"
"I understand!" The little girl's eyes lit up after hearing that.
Using both kindness and severity is the fastest way to win people's hearts.
Fu Zhiqiao raised her eyes slightly, her voice carrying authority, "Now that you all know Granny Cui, you should follow her and learn etiquette. Let me make this clear: you only have half a month. If you fail Granny Cui's test by then, you'll only be able to do menial cleaning work."
The young maids all changed into their maid uniforms and put on their best to learn how to receive guests from Granny Cui.
*
Taibai wine has already accumulated many repeat customers, so Fu Zhiqiao doesn't need to worry too much about sales. However, plum wine is a completely new business. Compared to the strong liquor of Taibai wine, the sweet and sour plum wine is more suitable for women.
Therefore, we cannot adopt the same sales model as Taibaijiu.
Every beginning is difficult, and she invested a lot of time, manpower, and resources when she launched Taibai Wine.
Leaving aside the initial R&D costs, the subsequent promotional activities, such as spending money on drinking challenges, hiring online trolls to stir up trouble at Penglai Juli, and offering free tastings, have enabled Taibaijiu to achieve its current success.
Most importantly, there isn't much plum wine left in stock. The few jars she brewed before only weighed about 200 jin (100 kg). Therefore, the plum wine can only be made in a small and exquisite way, and the container cannot be a wine jar; it must be a special porcelain bottle.
After careful consideration, Fu Zhiqiao finally chose to use a plum vase to hold the wine.
The narrow opening of the plum vase allows for precise control of the amount of wine poured and prevents the alcohol from evaporating, making it the perfect choice for storing plum wine.
The plum vase is only the size of an adult's palm, with a small mouth and short neck. It is covered with white glaze, which is smooth and free of any impurities. The vase is simple and free of any additional decorations, which does not detract from the beauty of a "graceful lady".
Fu Zhiqiao was very satisfied with the finished product. Only such a wine bottle was worthy of her plum wine, and it was worth the high price she spent to hire a highly skilled craftsman.
Not only was the porcelain vase custom-made, but she also designed a matching plum blossom carved gift box. The white glazed plum vase was placed in the groove inside the box and then tied tightly with a ribbon to secure its position, preventing the bottle from shaking and breaking inside the box.
The white-glazed plum vase containing eight ounces of plum wine, packaged in an exquisitely carved gift box, is a work of art with extremely high aesthetic value.
Considering the cost of raw materials and packaging, a price of six taels of silver is quite reasonable.
Plum wine uses Taibai wine as its base, which costs ten taels of silver per jar. Not to mention that so much rock sugar is added, which are all high-cost ingredients!
In the Great Wei Dynasty, people called rock sugar "stone honey".
Scarcity drives up prices. Because sugar-making technology was not mature and could not be mass-produced, sugar in the Great Wei Dynasty was extremely expensive and not everyone could afford it. Only nobles could enjoy the sweet sugar, and in the eyes of ordinary people, sugar was a luxury item.
The plum wine, weighing around 300-400 jin (approximately 150-200 kg), is only bottled into plum jars, which amount to only a few hundred bottles.
Defu personally supervised the production and signed for both the plum vase and the carving. To ensure that each plum vase was perfect and flawless, he carefully inspected each one before daring to deliver it to Fu Zhiqiao.
After waiting for about ten days, a large number of white-glazed plum vases and carved gift boxes were delivered to the Fu residence.
The plum wine was originally brewed in their own yard, and since it wasn't convenient to move it now, they simply bottled it at the Fu residence.
Fu Zhiqiao was putting on her apron and directing the maids to fill plum wine into plum bottles.
The bottles had already been cleaned and disinfected. A special funnel was inserted into the bottle opening before the plum wine was poured in. Halfway through filling, the doorman suddenly came to report that Song Dali, a shop assistant, had come to say that someone was causing trouble at the shop and asked her to come and handle it.
Is someone causing trouble?
Fu Zhiqiao took off her outer garment and instructed the maids to be careful when filling the containers, then went to the main room to meet Song Dali.
"Who's causing trouble in the tavern?"
Song Dali glanced at Fu Zhiqiao furtively. This was the first time he had reported directly to his boss. He bit his tongue to remind himself to concentrate: "The troublemaker is named Han Jincai. He's a notorious scoundrel in Shizijie. He was sneaking around trying to drug our wine, but he got caught red-handed. He's been tied up in the backyard. Manager Fu has gone out of town to buy goods, so I've come to ask you how to deal with him?"
Upon hearing that the person had been caught, Fu Zhiqiao was no longer in a hurry and told Song Dali to go back and keep an eye on the person first.
She was getting hungry after drinking for half the day, so she ordered the kitchen to make some pastries. She slowly finished her tea and snacks, went back to her room to change into clean clothes, and then headed to the wine shop.
Sitting in the carriage, she was still wondering if Han Jincai didn't know that Taibai Wine Shop was connected with Penglai Residence.
Since the wine shop started cooperating with Penglaiju, it has never encountered any suppression from its competitors. It is an open secret in the city that Penglaiju is backed by Lord Sima. Being on good terms with Penglaiju means being on good terms with Lord Sima. How could anyone be so blind as to cause trouble for Taibai Wine Shop?
Or is it that someone is behind Han Jincai?
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
