After finishing cleaning, Zhang Zian opened the shop, letting the fresh air blow in. The sweat also subsided gradually.
Flipping through the contact lists, he dialed Sun Xiaomeng’s phone number.
"Come over, I will treat you to breakfast," he said.
"Huh?" One could imagine the astonishment on the other end of the phone.
"Right, come here by driving." He hung up the phone as soon as he finished talking, without waiting for the other’s response.
The Spirit Curing Pet Clinic and the Amazing Fate Pet Shop were located separately on the south end and north end of Zhonghua Road. The straight-line distance between them was just a few hundred meters. Not long later, Sun Xiaomeng parked her car right outside the door.
She got out of her car doubtfully. "Did the sun rise from the west today? A stingy guy like you would invite me over for breakfast?"
Zhang Zian looked as if that had hurt his feelings very much. "Was there anything wrong with that? Being neighbors, building a good relationship is necessary. Treating you to breakfast is not a big deal."
"Give me a break! Just tell me what you want, otherwise I won’t dare to eat this breakfast!" Sun Xiaomeng did not believe those nice words coming from his mouth.
Zhang Zian asked, "Thus… Will you be going to your parents’ home today?"
"My parents’ home?" Sun Xiaomeng did not realize what was going on.
"The breeding ground," he reminded her.
"What are you going to do?"
"Borrow your car. Of course, I will pay for the gas!"
"My father is stingier than you. In his breeding ground, all pet sales are final, no exchanges or returns!" she responded.
He asked curiously, "Why would people want to return or exchange?"
"Did you have any customers? I assumed you were about to close your store and were on your way to seek other work opportunities," she said seriously. "If you let me have Galaxy, then I might help you ask a favor from my dad to allow your pets to be returned to him in case they aren’t sold."
"So… this is your opinion! But I’m sorry that you will be disappointed. Except the little hamster I got as a bonus, all the other pets have been sold. I am planning to order more today," he said.
"Nonsense! When I came here the day before, I saw both the Siamese and the Samoyed were still here. You sold both of them in one day?" Sun Xiaomeng was in disbelief.
According to the consumption levels of most regions in the country, one comprehensive pet shop that was willing to do some advertisements would only be able to sell about two hundred pets per month. Additionally, the majority of these sales came from pets sold at discounted prices, such as the hamster, ranging from ten yuan to a few hundred yuan.
Sun Xiaomeng initially thought that Zhang Zian must have priced his pets too high. Usually, new shops would start off with cheaper prices to build a client base.
As a matter of fact, most newly opened pet shops lost money in the beginning. Some people couldn’t hold it until they started making money. Some closed their stores or switched their careers secretly. Some just went the dishonest path. Being the daughter of a breeding ground, she had seen many such cases.
"Come in and take a look if you don’t believe me." Zhang Zian did not bother to explain too much, instead directly telling her to come inside and find out for herself.
Sun Xiaomeng was still in doubt but walked into the store and took a look. To her surprise, the displaying cages were all empty. Zhang Zian gave her the bookkeeping records.
She started looking through it, "Siamese, 3000… Samoyed, 4000… Dates… were both yesterday…"
Zhang Zian felt proud and happy. "I felt my luck was on its way." He curled his finger and counted, "one day seven thousand, ten days seventy thousand, one month two hundred thousand…"
Sun Xiaomeng was speechless. She threw the records back to him. "Enough! Look at you! Don’t even know your name anymore! You could just be lucky! Don’t brag about it! How about this, let’s make a bet, seven days down the road starting from tomorrow, if you can sell one pet a day every day, then I will treat you to lunch for a week. Otherwise…"
Zhang Zian first thought she would ask him to invite her to lunch for a week, or maybe just give her Galaxy. Instead, she said, "If you are incapable of doing it, then you have to be the cleaning guy for my pet clinic for a day. I noticed that your place is well cleaned, you must be gifted in cleaning… How about this deal? Will you dare to take the bet?"
Similar to Zhang Zian’s situation, Sun Xiaomeng was also very busy working on her clinic, treating the animals, and cleaning the clinic, all by herself. She hated spending money on hiring a cleaner, and it was exhausting work for her too.
He thought for a moment and made a decision.
If he won, then he earned seven free lunches. If he lost, he just had to sweat a bit. Honestly, there was nothing he could lose.
"Yes, let’s bet!" he said.
After locking the shop door, they went to the Yonghe Soymilk restaurant first for breakfast, then went straight to the breeding base.
Like last time with Sun Xiaomeng, they did not go to the reception but went straight to find her father.
Based on Zhang Zian’s observation, Pet’s Home’s business seemed unwell. It was hard to point to anything specific. However, based on what he saw and heard down the road, business was more sluggish compared to the last time he was here. Many breeding boxes were empty and workers’ faces were taut. He had already noticed these as an outsider, so Sun Xiaomeng would surely be able to see the changes as well. Since walking into Pet’s Home, she had kept her head down.
Sun Xiaomeng was willing to drive him here, not only because they were good neighbors, but also because she wanted to try her best to help her father. Even selling just one more pet would be better than nothing.
Inferior markets expelled by the superior markets didn’t only exist in the pet retail market, they even existed in the breeding market… Perhaps it could be said that the cause was from the root. Focusing on foul profit-seeking would eventually lose the consumer’s trust. Once their trust was lost, it would be gone forever.
But Zhang Zian was incapable of changing this situation, at least for now. One in poverty should maintain his own integrity, while one in the wealth should give back to others. What he needed to do was to continue maintaining his pet store business by not ordering pets from those fishy breeding bases. This was the one thing that he could control now.
Sun Yinian was feeding the pets one by one. He was the owner of the breeding ground but also worked as a regular worker.
"Daddy! We got a customer. It’s him again." Sun Xiaomeng pouted toward Zhang Zian. "I drove him here."
Sun Yinian got up after hearing his daughter’s voice. He paused for a second, and he seemed to have some problems straightening his back, a soft "ga da" noise coming out. But before Sun Xiaomeng could hold him, he already got his body back up. His face was covered with knife-cutting wrinkles, and there was a lot of gray hair growing on his short-haired head.
"You sold all those pets from last time?" Sun Yinian asked with a raspy voice.
"Yes, all sold out, except the hamster. This time I was planning to get a few more pets," Zhang Zian replied.
Sun Yinian pointed with his hand and said directly, "Go and pick them yourself."
He first picked out a Samoyed and Siamese like last time. The British Shorthair was unexpectedly popular, so he got two of those.These three kinds of pets had already demonstrated their capability to attract more customers. He also selected an American Shorthair cat and a Miniature Schnauzer. He went around the place and picked out a Persian cat too. All of the selected pets were young animals aged from three to five months old.
To be honest, he wasn’t quite willing to select the Persian cat, due to its hair being too long and it requiring constant grooming. Additionally, it was very expensive, but it was a veritable noble cat. If it wasn’t able to be sold quickly, it would occupy much of his time. He chose it just to put together seven pets for the bet and to better understand the pet market.