Though they were met with rejection at the first provision store, Qi Fang and Qi Tian did not think much of it.
Yet, to their dismay, they had the same outcome at the second provision store, then the third…
The two of them began to panic.
Qi Zhen suggested, "Why don't we lower the price?"
The cost price was only four cents. Even if they were to lower the retail price to six cents, they would still earn a fair amount of money.
Qi Mianmian shook her head. "We can't lower the prices. Yesterday, I told everyone at the market that the cost price was eight cents. If we lower the price now, we'll be contradicting ourselves; it'll be like slapping ourselves in the face. No one will trust us anymore.
"Don't worry, all this is within my expectations. I didn't intend to sell our goods to them today. I'm just here to send them a message. At noon, we'll sell our cakes to the factory workers nearby. Those shopkeepers will see how popular our cakes are, and they'll come to us themselves asking to buy our cakes wholesale."
Qi Fang and Qi Zhen were speechless.
Their youngest sister was indeed a clever girl.
No wonder Grandpa praised only her, and never anyone else, when he was alive.
When they came to the next provision store, Qi Mianmian let Qi Zhen and Qi Fang go in to negotiate… to train their skills in speaking and persuading, and to help them develop a thicker skin.
The two of them had been following Qi Mianmian around for so long, and had learned how to negotiate a long time ago.
Although they were a little shy, they still completed the mission in the end—the mission of forcibly telling the other party their home address when they were inevitably chased out.
Because they mentioned her grandfather's name, Qi Yueming, at every single provision store, Qi Mianmian thought embarrassedly, "Our grandfather's name is too useful. He's helped us a great deal this time. I must burn more paper money for him when New Year's Day comes around."
…
It was finally noon…
Qi Mianmian no longer took her older brother and sister along to provision stores to be scolded by shopkeepers. Instead, they walked back the way they came.
Every time they walked to a factory, they would go to the front door and give out free samples for any workers nearby. Then, they would sell their cakes and bread, priced one cent higher than yesterday.
The price was indeed quite expensive, and there were not many customers.
But like yesterday, most customers would buy a lot at once.
In other words, most of their customers were rich.
As long as what they paid for was delicious, they didn't mind paying more.
In every place, the Qi siblings only stayed for about half an hour. Every time they left, the capable Qi Mianmian would loudly call out the name of the next factory they would be visiting to her siblings.
As a result, anyone who didn't manage to buy any cakes or bread at one location would cycle after them to purchase their goods.
In the end, the goods were sold out before they managed to visit every factory along the way home.
Qi Zhen sighed. "I should have brought more."
This time, there was no need for Qi Mianmian to suggest anything. It was Qi Fang who smiled and said, "We can come over again in the evening. There will be more people around that time, and we'll really have to bring more with us then."
…
The three siblings returned home with a cart full of things.
Aside from flour, eggs, sugar, red beans, raisins, and other ingredients for making bread and cake, they also bought Qi Mianmian's favorite rice and many other groceries.
These included two live chickens, two live carp weighing about a quarter kilogram each, one and a half kilogram of large pork bones with bone marrow, and one kilogram of pork.
Of course, these things would draw too much hatred from the others. Hence, they were stored in bags, preventing anyone else from seeing them.
Qi Fang and Qi Zhen thought that the cakes and bread left at home would have no chance of being sold out…
Yet, as soon as they reached home, Qi Tian said gleefully, "Everything at home has been sold out. There are still some customers who didn't manage to buy anything today, so they asked me to specially reserve some for them tomorrow. I've taken down all their orders. There are more than three hundred of them, so we must bake more today."
Qi Fang and Qi Zhen were speechless.
It was only noon, but all their stock, which consisted of more than five thousand cakes and loaves of bread, had already been sold out.
And the price was even higher than yesterday's…
In other words, they had earned 250 yuan in just half a day.
They wanted to faint.
But there was no time to do so.
The best thing to do now was to start making bread and cake right now.
Otherwise, they wouldn't have any stock to sell in the afternoon.
As the siblings made lunch, they began baking as well.
After working hard the entire afternoon, they produced more than five thousand cakes and loaves of bread.
This was also partially because the oven Qi Mianmian had designed was large, and had two stoves.
It was just that her family members weren't aware, and thought that this was what a regular oven looked like.