Chapter 83: Chapter 83: After all, Young
Adding to the thirty over yuan he had left, and keeping some change for everyday expenses, he could buy fifty yuan worth of cotton.
Having made his calculations, he discussed with Shao Jianguo, “Comrade, I’m buying in bulk, is there any chance you could give me a discount?”
Shao Jianguo didn’t directly say whether he could offer a discount, instead probing, “So how much are you planning to buy?”
Jiang Changhai waggled a finger: “A hundred catties. I’ll buy a hundred catties if you give me a discount.”
Shao Jianguo calculated the cost: “Five fifty cents per catty, it can’t get cheaper. We’ve hauled it from afar, including workers’ food and housing, the costs are high, we also need money.”
They were selling at a very fair price; if it weren’t for the volume, they wouldn’t dare to sell it so cheaply.
Listening to him crunching the numbers, an idea suddenly came to Jiang Changhai, sparking a new way to make money.
“Comrade, how about this, I do have some connections here. I’ll help you find some sales channels, and you give me a cut. Let’s partner up, what do you say?”
Shao Jianguo’s eyes lit up at these words, “Comrade, are you serious?”
Every day he was delayed here, he was incurring more expenses for food and lodging. Naturally, someone willing to help was exactly what he was hoping for.
“I never tell lies.” Jiang Changhai stated solemnly, swearing with utmost conviction.
Seeing that he was serious about helping sell the cotton, Shao Jianguo didn’t quibble. He grandly gestured, generously proclaiming, “Comrade, if you can help me sell this batch of cotton, I’ll give you five cents per catty; for the cotton you buy from me, it’s fifty cents per catty.”
Jiang Changhai was inwardly thrilled to hear this. Five cents per catty might not seem like much, but it adds up with the volume.
The salesperson had said that they had brought a large batch of goods from the north.
“Good, so we’re agreed?”
Both looked at each other, feeling they had each scored a great deal.
With a very familiar tone, Jiang Changhai said, “Big Brother, now that we are partners, always calling each other ‘comrade’ feels a bit impersonal, I don’t even know your name.”
Upon hearing this, Shao Jianguo thought it made sense and introduced himself, “My name is Shao Jianguo, a few years older than you, just call me Big Brother.”
“Alright, Big Brother Shao, my surname is Jiang, you can just call me Changhai.”
“Big Brother Shao, don’t you think you should show me the cotton? It will be easier for me to talk to people about it when I go out to look for buyers,” Jiang Changhai suggested.
Slapping his head, Shao Jianguo laughed and said, “Look at me, all excited and forgetting the matter at hand. The cotton is stored in a civilian’s house near the train station, let me take you to see it.”
Jiang Changhai followed Shao Jianguo and checked out the cotton, which was indeed fresh. He was reassured and gave Shao Jianguo fifty yuan, making a deal for a hundred catties of cotton.
Having no place to store it at home, he gave Shao Jianguo a heads-up, leaving the cotton there for now and planning to come back for it in a couple of days.
After finalizing the deal, Jiang Changhai hurried back to the village with his ox cart.
At that moment, fourth graders at the commune primary school were having a Chinese language class. The teacher, Meng Weidong, wrote the rare words from the lesson on the blackboard, teaching the students the pronunciation and explaining the meanings one by one.
However, he noticed that the universally acknowledged Little Genius, sitting in the front row, had her head down all the time, not joining in with the others reading the new words aloud.
He thought she must be too young, with an attention span not long enough to stay focused for extended periods, and easily distracted.
So he tapped the blackboard lightly with the ruler twice, and only after seeing Jiang Mianmian look up did he continue with the lesson.