Chapter 49
Ye Manzhi could remain calm in front of her boss and colleagues, but she couldn't hold it back after leaving the office.
It was not a big deal for the residents to make a few coal stoves for their own use, and she did not care at all.
However, those people not only made their own coal stoves, they even sold them for profit!
This made her very uncomfortable!
"You designed the coal stove, and I built the factory, but we didn't make a penny. Instead, someone else got a bargain, using your coal stove to make money! Just thinking about it makes me mad."
Ye Manzhi was almost pissed off to death by those people!
The more she thought about it, the angrier she became, and she ended up crying.
Wu Zhengrong stopped in surprise, not understanding why she suddenly started crying.
"Ye Lai Ya, what's there to cry about?"
"I was angry!" Ye Manzhi wiped away her tears with the back of her hand, mumbling to herself, "I was angry and crying!"
Wu Zhengrong: “…”
Is it true that someone would actually be angered to tears?
"I'm so sad, why are you still laughing?" Ye Manzhi was already very angry, and when she accidentally caught a glimpse of him laughing, she immediately gained three pounds out of anger.
"Aren't you crying because you're angry? Why are you sad?"
Wu Zhengrong couldn't find a handkerchief in the study, so he had to go out and get a towel to wipe her tears.
"My name isn't on that coal stove. It's normal for something to be copied after it's been produced. Some factories, after producing a new product, even go to other factories and give them guidance on how to produce it. If everyone thought like you, we'd be pissed off enough to be reincarnated several times."
Ye Manzhi paced around in her study. "Teaching other state-owned enterprises is supporting national development, and it's quite glorious to say so. But they're secretly producing coal stoves and reselling them at low prices, enriching themselves! This is harming the public interest for their own benefit!"
She herself has never made any money using a coal stove, so why should she let others fatten their pockets first?
Wu Zhengrong stopped her from spinning around, pulled her over and sat her on his lap, "Calm down! Don't be a slave to your emotions!"
"Who is a slave to emotions? I'm just angry."
Wu Zhengrong wiped the tears from her cheeks and asked with a smile, "You're not so angry because you didn't make any money, are you?"
"That's right!" Ye Manzhi found a comfortable position in his arms and admitted it generously, "I just can't stand seeing others making money with your idea! I can't make a profit with the coal stove myself, so others can't do so either! You gave me your idea to support my work. I used the idea to build a factory. In a big way, it's supporting national construction. In a small way, it's to let the street office retain more profits for funding. Of course, I also want the leaders to see my work ability."
"Comrade Ye Manzhi, you are now a cadre."
"What happened to the cadres?"
Wu Zhengrong took her fingers and rubbed them. "You're just a young grassroots cadre who's just started working. Supporting national construction or withholding funds for the unit are not your current concerns. The most practical benefit of running this factory is to let the leaders see and recognize your work ability. Do you agree with this?"
"Yeah, about the same."
"You're a cadre. You can't make money by secretly making your own coal stoves. And you can't stop others from doing it. Instead of getting yourself angry and crying, why not use this incident to gain some benefits for yourself?"
Ye Manzhi raised her head from his arms, stared at the two shadows under his long eyelashes for a while, and couldn't help but kissed him on the chin.
"What benefit can you get me?"
Wu Zhengrong lowered his eyes to meet hers, his gaze lingering on her lips for a moment before getting down to business. "Someone secretly making and reselling coal stoves has indeed made your work more difficult, and your superiors are aware of this. Under such difficult conditions, you've still been able to develop the factory. Doesn't that only highlight your personal abilities?"
Of course, if the factory goes bankrupt because of this, it will be a different outcome.
In order to appease cadre Xiao Ye who was crying out of anger, he could only pick out nice things to say.
"This coal stove has very low technical content, and its only worth is the design. Once the finished product is released to the market, it's only a matter of time before it's imitated. You can't expect to gain much from such a small factory. Focus on the main issues first. When you take on the role of factory director, make sure the leaders recognize your personal abilities. Forget about anything else."
Ye Manzhi looked up at him, her eyes dark and moist from being washed by tears. "Comrade Military Representative, you are really good at comforting people. If you don't want to be the Military Representative in 656 anymore, can you go to the military region and be a political commissar?"
"Thanks to Cadre Xiaoye for his good wishes," Wu Zhengrong smiled, finally lowering his head and kissing her lips. "Can we kiss now?"
"You've already kissed me, and you're still asking..."
Ye Manzhi was held tightly in his arms, her oxygen was depleted, her lips and tongue were numb, and her limbs were exhausted from the kisses.
"When will you take me home?" Wu Zhengrong held her face, breathing a little hard.
"Why are you so anxious?"
"You don't want to keep hanging out with me like this, do you?"
"What do you mean by hanging out? It's clearly a relationship!"
Ye Manzhi blushed immediately. This man's choice of words often left her at a loss for words.
She was so breathless from the kiss that she felt seasick. She mumbled, "How about New Year's Day or Spring Festival?"
"Well, I'm going to pay a formal visit to Old Taishan on New Year's Day."
*
After Ye Manzhi returned home that night, she did not tell her parents directly that Wu Zhengrong was coming to visit.
She went straight back to her room, closed the door, and then dared to take off the scarf.
She took out a small mirror and looked at her swollen lips, then covered her face with her hands and threw herself onto the bed.
Why did she get so angry and cry today?
Well, Wu Zhengrong is still very useful. Falling in love can indeed make people forget their worries temporarily.
She was tossing and turning on the bed and accidentally pressed down Lihua's tail.
Hearing the kitten's meow, she quickly picked it up and petted it.
"I don't know if Wu Zhengrong likes cats. Do you want to accompany me to Yard No. 16?" Ye Manzhi said in a coaxing tone, "His house is very big, and there is a big yard. Will you come with me? However, Wu Zhengrong likes to be clean, so he may not agree to you staying in bed! Oh..."
"Meow meow meow~"
She held the cat and whispered to it for a long time, then wrote today's diary. In the diary, she scolded those bad guys who resold coal stoves. She scolded them for two whole pages, and finally relieved the depression in her heart.
Afterwards, I went back to work full of energy.
She has come to terms with it. The coal stove is not a high-tech product, and there is no way to prevent someone from taking advantage of it.
Compared with the initial 5 yuan of capital for building the factory, the factory recently sold some coal stoves and made a profit of nearly 100 yuan.
It will take some time before the workers can be paid, so she plans to upgrade the coal stove.
The first thing is to replace the paint bucket with a clean tin bucket.
Some customers have previously complained that the paint buckets are not beautiful enough and hope that the factory can produce a batch of higher-end coal stoves.
Secondly, according to the suggestion of her third brother, a "secondary air" device was added to this batch of higher-end coal stoves.
By using this device to supply a large amount of air to the honeycomb coal, the ignition speed of the coal stove can be increased, and the carbon monoxide can be burned again, reducing the probability of carbon monoxide poisoning.
The cost of the new furnace was nearly one yuan more expensive than the simple furnace. Ye Manzhi didn't know how the market would accept it, so he only asked the factory to trial-produce five new furnaces equipped with secondary air devices and put them in the supply and marketing cooperative for trial sale.
As a result, just two hours after the stove was delivered to the supply and marketing cooperative, Director Hou called the street office and asked the factory to send ten more stoves.
"Is our new stove such a good seller?"
"It's much better than the paint bucket we had before," Director Hou chuckled. "To be honest, that paint bucket really wasn't up to par. Think about it, who were the first people to be promoted to use honeycomb briquettes? Most of them were cadres!"
The cadres receive monthly salaries and have enough money in their pockets.
If you buy a stove that will last for several years, you will of course choose a better quality product.
"The blower you installed on the stove is quite good. It really sets it apart from ordinary stoves," Director Hou suggested. "Send more of these new stoves to the supply and marketing cooperative. Paint buckets aren't selling well, so you should find other sales channels."
Ye Manzhi was both curious and surprised by the result, and quickly asked the factory to arrange the production of new furnaces.
Paint buckets, iron stoves, and secondary air stoves are produced in a ratio of 4:2:4.
She continued to observe for several days.
The supply and marketing cooperative did have a larger sales volume of secondary air stoves, but the cheap paint bucket stoves were still easier to sell thanks to the sales by the fourth sister-in-law and the driver who went door to door.
Of course, recently more and more people are reselling paint bucket stoves on the market, and even the paint buckets at scrap collection stations are clamoring to raise prices.
Ye Manzhi advised herself not to get entangled with those speculators and to focus on the main contradiction first.
However, the manuscript sent to the newspaper had no response, so she had to ask her leader for help.
"Which newspaper did you send the manuscript to?"
"Both the daily and evening papers have been published."
"For future publications, please contact Zhao Erhe," Mulan whispered. "He has an aunt who is an editor for the evening paper. It would be easier to get the manuscript approved if you give it to him."
Ye Manzhi suddenly realized.
No wonder when the work was divided again, Director Mu assigned the publicity work she was responsible for to Zhao Erhe.
The root is here!
It is a good thing to have a colleague in the unit who has a say in publicity, and Ye Manzhi is quite happy about it.
She could actually ask Wu Zhengrong's classmate for help; he worked at a daily newspaper and should have some influence. But favors wear thin the more you use them, and she couldn't keep Wu Zhengrong in debt for such trivial matters.
Ye Manzhi handed the manuscript to Zhao Erhe and asked him to help find a shortcut and send it out as soon as possible.
For this purpose, she treated Zhao Erhe to three dumplings stuffed with pork and cabbage at noon.
"Give me half the box of dumplings," Zhao Erhe negotiated with her, "I'll deliver the manuscript directly to my aunt's house tonight."
Ye Manzhi stuffed another dumpling into her mouth and pushed the lunch box to him distressedly, "You have to treat my affairs as important matters!"
"Haha," Zhao Erhe teased, "What big deal can your little coal furnace factory have? Go look at the other factories on the street. They're all having a production-increasing and savings-saving competition. They're all working themselves to the bone."
Ye Manzhi said with lingering fear: "Fortunately, we produced an unplanned product, otherwise we would have to participate in the competition as well."
I gave the dumplings to Zhao Erhe at noon. She was a little hungry, so she went to the factory cafeteria for dinner after get off work.
After she had dinner and took a long walk in the yard, Wu Zhengrong came back from get off work.
"Why are you getting off work later and later lately?" Ye Manzhi asked, "Is 656 also joining the production increase and savings competition?"
"I'm participating, but it doesn't have much to do with me. I'm following up on the project with the Chief Engineer's Office. The production increase and savings competition is mainly managed by a few deputy factory directors." Wu Zhengrong smiled. "Increasing production is easy, saving is easy, but trying to do both is difficult. No one wants to do this kind of work. The city asked the company leaders to hold a meeting on production increase and savings, but the notice passed through four hands and no one wanted to attend."
Ye Manzhi listened with great interest, as she loved listening to gossip about the factory leaders.
"Who should go in the end?"
She hoped that Deputy Director Zhou would be tortured.
However, Wu Zhengrong said, "Not necessarily. The meeting hasn't started yet. I guess Director Shen will have to go in person. The meeting notice issued by the Municipal Party Committee may still require the attendance of the top leader."
"Hey, I'm the boss too! Why didn't anyone notify me of the meeting?"
At this point, Ye Manzhi's heart moved slightly, and she asked, "What do you think about me attending that meeting you mentioned?"
"Have you received the notice?"
"No."
"Then it has nothing to do with your factory." It was the first time that Wu Zhengrong had seen someone take the initiative to request a meeting.
"Oh, you don't understand!"
Ye Manzhi felt that people in big factories did not understand the hardships of small factories and did not want to talk to him more.
After she returned to the office, she found Director Mu and said, "Director, I heard that the Municipal Party Committee is going to hold a 'citywide meeting of factory and enterprise leaders'. What do you think about me attending?"
Mulan wants to ask, what is the relationship between you and the head of the company?
After a few seconds of pause, he remembered that Ye Manzhi was now also the person in charge of the factory.
She is treating bean buns as non-dry food.
Mulan thought she was young and didn't know the rules, so she could only explain, "Meetings held by the Municipal Party Committee generally only require the heads of large and medium-sized enterprises to attend, most of which are state-owned units at the district level and above. Factories under our street office don't need to attend."
"I know the coal furnace factory doesn't have to attend, but," Ye Manzhi revealed, "this meeting is to mobilize all factories and enterprises in the city to further carry out a comprehensive conservation campaign. We need to be frugal! Isn't our honeycomb coal furnace just right for the occasion?"
"It's quite appropriate for the occasion, but the key is that you weren't notified of the meeting, so how were you going to go?" Mulan was stunned by her bizarre ideas.
"I know the time and place of the meeting. I can go directly there when the time comes." Ye Manzhi asked uncertainly, "Director, do you think it's okay for me to attend the meeting?"
Mulan can’t say for sure!
She said okay, she didn't receive the meeting notice.
No, she is also the head of the company, although it is only a temporary one.
Seeing that she was also undecided, Ye Manzhi said tentatively: "How about I give it a try? If they let me in, I'll go in and have a meeting. If they don't let me in, I'll come back. I'm just afraid that they will think I'm causing trouble and arrest me. Director, you have to rescue me when the time comes!"
Mulan was amused by her and couldn't stop laughing.
The young people were very enthusiastic about their work, and she really didn't want to pour cold water on them.
"Hahaha, okay, then go ahead and give it a try. If you get caught, I'll be responsible for rescuing you, hahahaha..."
Ye Manzhi felt uneasy because of her smile.
However, she felt relieved after getting a clear explanation from her leader about joining the "gang".
She doesn't care what the city leaders think of her. The emperor is far away and the mayor cannot possibly manage the street office.
She is more concerned about the opinions of her immediate superior.
This time, with the approval of her leader, she made herself a work permit as the director of the "State-owned Guangming Coal Furnace Factory."
Then, taking this freshly issued work permit, I went to the Municipal Party Committee Auditorium for a meeting.
There are at least hundreds of large and medium-sized factories in the city. In addition to municipal factories, there are also centrally-managed enterprises such as Factory 656.
As the meeting time approached, the auditorium entrance was almost entirely filled with the heads of major factories and enterprises.
Ye Manzhi is not only a lesbian, but also a particularly young lesbian.
She is too young to be a secretary to a leader, let alone the head of a company.
So, today she specially wore Chang Yue'e's cotton-padded jacket and a black scarf to make herself look more mature.
However, no matter how maturely she dressed, it was not easy for her to sneak into the city meetings.
As soon as she reached the sign-in area at the entrance of the auditorium, she was stopped by someone.
"Comrade, which unit are you from?"
Ye Manzhi's heart was pounding in her chest. She pretended to be calm and took out her work ID and letter of introduction. "I'm the director of Guangming Coal Furnace Factory!"
The young clerk took her work ID and looked through the registration book twice, but couldn't find the Guangming Coal Furnace Factory.
"Comrade, have you come to the wrong venue?"
"I'm not in the wrong place!" Ye Manzhi said confidently, "I'm here to attend the city's meeting of factory and enterprise leaders."
The young clerk was confused by her and went inside to find the leader, "Director Chen, this comrade said she was here for a meeting, but her unit is not listed in our registration book."
Director Chen rushed over and asked, "Comrade, are you sure you received the meeting notice?"
Ye Manzhi didn't dare lie about this and said truthfully, "I didn't receive any notice. I'm the director of the coal furnace factory. I heard the city was going to hold a 'citywide meeting of factory and enterprise leaders', so I came directly to attend the meeting."
This was the first time Director Chen had encountered a comrade who had come to the meeting without receiving any notice. He stared at her for a long time before saying politely, "Comrade, units that have not received any notice do not need to come to the meeting."
"I see," Ye Manzhi discussed, "Since I'm already here, I might as well go in and listen to the meeting spirit conveyed by the leader."
Director Chen didn't mince words this time. "Comrade, this meeting is limited to certain participants. Those outside of this range are not required to attend."
"Isn't the meeting open to all business leaders in the city? Our Guangming Coal Furnace Factory is an enterprise in Zhengyang District, so it should also be considered citywide, right?" Ye Manzhi said earnestly, "Leader, the coal furnace factory is a relatively wasteful enterprise. We've been looking for ways to increase production and save money, but the results have been unsatisfactory. As soon as I heard the city was holding a conservation mobilization meeting, I rushed here immediately! I hope to learn from the successful experiences of some of our sister units at the meeting, and then bring back the latest instructions from the city leaders to the factory. Our employees are all looking forward to it!"
Director Chen thought to himself that leaders of large companies would try to avoid this kind of meeting, and here someone actually walked in on it!
Although this meeting is of high standard, it is not actually a particularly important meeting.
The call for increased production and savings has been going on for several months and has become a cliché. The main purpose of this meeting is to re-emphasize the importance of savings.
Director Chen took her work ID and letter of introduction and called to verify her identity information.
Ye Manzhi had reported to Director Mu in advance and was not afraid of his investigation at all.
She had been waiting at the door, and when the meeting was about to start in two minutes, Director Chen came back with her ID.
"Follow him into the meeting," Director Chen pointed to the young clerk beside him. "The nameplates for the meeting seats are fixed. Please arrange a seat for this comrade in the back."
Ye Manzhi was overjoyed. "Thank you, Director Chen. With this opportunity to attend the meeting, I will definitely strive to make our coal furnace factory an advanced unit for increased production and savings this year!"
Director Chen was very fond of this kind of comrade with high work enthusiasm. He waved his hand and said, "Hurry up and go to the meeting. Don't be late!"
In this way, Ye Manzhi stepped into the door of the Municipal Party Committee Auditorium for the first time.
The young clerk arranged a seat for her in the last row, as if to prevent her from causing trouble, and sat next to her.
Ye Manzhi didn't care and took out a pen and notebook to record the content of Vice Mayor Liu's speech.
Regardless of whether it is useful or not, Ye Manzhi is also a small cadre who has met the mayor!
Ha ha.
The leaders mainly emphasized the issue of saving cotton in several state-owned cotton mills and saving edible oil in oil factories.
This part alone took half an hour.
Ye Manzhi thought to himself, it seems I need to stock up some cotton cloth and cooking oil in advance.
If the raw materials were not so scarce, the mayor would not have emphasized it so many times.
The next step is to encourage major state-owned factories to save electricity and coal.
The situation at Factory 656 is relatively good because it is responsible for producing military supplies and the factory can basically provide electricity 24 hours a day.
Other factories are not so lucky and often experience power outages for most of the day.
The entire mobilization meeting lasted more than an hour, and Ye Manzhi wrote down four pages of content.
At the end of the meeting, Deputy Mayor Liu habitually asked, "Which comrades from any units still have questions? Let's discuss them together."
Everything that needs to be said in the meeting has been said, and generally no one asks questions, so everyone packs up their papers and pens and prepares to leave.
Ye Manzhi, who was sitting in the last row, quickly raised her arms high, and even stood up a little bit for fear that others could not see her.
Deputy Mayor Liu had already packed up his notebook, and only after his secretary reminded him did he notice that someone in the last row had raised their hand.
"Well, a comrade in the back row raised his hand. Which unit is this comrade from? What questions do you have?"
"Mayor Liu, I'm Ye Manzhi, the director of Guangming Coal Stove Factory!" Ye Manzhi stood up and said, "I'm deeply inspired by what you just said. Saving coal and electricity really does have to start with every little thing. However, I think it's important to save coal not only for industrial electricity but also for domestic use. Our Guangming Coal Stove Factory recently produced a new type of honeycomb coal stove, specifically for the honeycomb coal that the city is promoting."
"Using this honeycomb coal stove, it ignites quickly, is clean and safe, and can effectively reduce the risk of carbon monoxide poisoning. An average family of seven can save at least 1 yuan per month on coal and fire bills!"
"Mayor Liu, we are willing to cooperate with the city's conservation campaign and promote the use of honeycomb coal and honeycomb coal stoves to save the city's coal consumption..."
When Deputy Mayor Liu heard that she was there to sell products, he was immediately at a loss whether to laugh or cry.
The supply and marketing personnel actually managed to attend the municipal party committee meeting!
He raised his hand to press it, then smiled and said, "Comrade Xiaoye's suggestion is very good. Besides saving coal and electricity in industry, we should also save coal and electricity in daily life. I understand what you're saying. How about this: you first send this new type of coal stove to the comrades at the Commerce Bureau and the Coal Construction Company for a look. We can discuss how to dispose of it later."
Ye Manzhi had no intention of asking the mayor to help her promote coal stoves.
She was content with what her leader said.
She didn't get entangled in the meeting, exchanged a few words with the mayor and then sat down.
However, she felt that this matter should be struck while the iron was hot.
After leaving the municipal party committee meeting, she returned to the factory to pick up two new coal stoves and went to the Municipal Commerce Bureau that afternoon.
She had experienced how difficult it was to get into the District Education Bureau, so she didn't have much hope for the Municipal Commerce Bureau.
After she inquired about the specific location, she first went to the office of the deputy director whom she had met in a previous meeting.
When he was stopped by the director's secretary, Ye Manzhi said with a friendly smile, "Comrade, I'm the director of Guangming Coal Furnace Factory. Deputy Mayor Liu asked me to come!"
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