Zhou Kun thought for a moment, then nodded.
“I’ve always wanted to open a furniture store. But I don’t have enough capital yet, so for now I’ll just keep making and repairing furniture for other people. That’s not bad either.”
He could still earn a few dozen yuan a month.
But after seeing his younger daughter make over a thousand yuan in just a few days trading eggs…
The impact on him was enormous.
Compared to that, his monthly income of a few dozen yuan seemed insignificant.
“If you want to open a furniture store, I think you absolutely should.” Zhou Yuwei walked beside him as she spoke. “As for the startup capital, you can accumulate it in other ways first. But if you keep doing nothing but making and repairing furniture for other people, when will you ever save enough to open a shop, let alone a factory?”
She turned around and saw her father standing there blankly, apparently calculating something in his head.
“Then… how am I supposed to build up the capital?”
He thought for a moment.
“Sell buttons like Yulan?”
The money Yulan earned belonged to her. They would never take it.
Just like before, when the girls made money, Zhou Kun and Lin Hongmei only helped keep it safe.
“You could do what we did before.”
“Trade eggs?”
“Exactly. Not just eggs—there are mountain products too. You can buy them from rural areas and sell them to people working in factories, or to restaurants.”
Private restaurants had become much more common in Beijing.
It wasn’t that Zhou Yuwei had never considered opening one herself.
The problem was that running a restaurant required dealing with far too many inspections.
There were the routine checks from the Industrial and Commercial Bureau, and the neighborhood inspection patrols that would show up every so often.
It was simply too troublesome.
Besides…
She was all talk.
She could effortlessly rattle off famous dishes from Sichuan, braised cuisine, Hunan, Fujian, Chaoshan, Shunde, and countless other regional cuisines.
But when it came to actually cooking…
Well…
It wasn’t merely disappointing.
It was downright disastrous.
So from the very beginning, she had never planned to make money that way.
“You’ve lived in Beijing for twenty years already. You know every street around the city.”
She smiled.
“In a city as huge as Beijing, opportunities are everywhere.”
After taking a few steps, Zhou Kun suddenly clapped his hands together.
“Done! I’ll head to the countryside and start buying goods right now!”
He immediately turned to leave.
“Wait—”
Zhou Yuwei grabbed him and pulled him back.
“Dad, you need to go home and get some money first.”
Had he gotten so excited that he’d forgotten everything else?
“Right!”
Zhou Kun slapped his forehead.
“Look at me—I forgot.”
How could he buy anything without money?
Zhou Yuwei was speechless.
She suddenly felt that this family really couldn’t function without her.
After arriving in Suzhou, Zhou Yulan first found a clothing store.
The moment she stepped inside, her eyes were immediately drawn to the dazzling variety of buttons on display.
“Looking for buttons?” the shop assistant asked.
“May I take a look?”
“Of course.”
The saleswoman happened to be in an especially good mood that day and readily brought them out.
More importantly, she’d recognized Zhou Yulan’s Beijing accent.
She knew the young woman had come all the way from the capital.
“May I ask where these buttons come from?”
“Oh, Hongxia Button Factory.”
“Thank you.”
After asking around all the way, Zhou Yulan finally found the factory.
When she arrived, she saw quite a few people picking through piles of discarded buttons.
“Auntie, what are you all doing?”
“Picking buttons.”
The middle-aged woman smiled.
“These were all thrown away by the factory. They say they’re defective, but they look perfectly fine to us. We pick them up and take them home so we don’t have to spend money buying buttons.”
Looking at them herself, Zhou Yulan also thought they seemed perfectly good.
Their shapes were just a little unusual.
She couldn’t understand why the factory had rejected them.
She wanted to take some back and sell them as well.
Since they were free, she joined everyone else in gathering buttons.
She picked them for three straight days.
During that time, groups of people came and went in waves.
Originally, she had planned to return to Beijing.
But then she remembered what Yuwei had said.
Bring back as many different kinds of buttons as possible.
Not only should there be a wide variety, but attractive designs were especially important.
The greater the variety, the more choices customers would have.
Different prices could also appeal to different groups of buyers.
So on the fourth day, she changed into a clean set of clothes and prepared to enter the factory.
But the gatekeeper stopped her.
“No work-unit introduction letter, no entry.”
There was nothing she could do but head back.
When she returned to Beijing—
Lin Hongmei and Zhou Yuwei were waiting to meet her.
Zhou Yulan looked around but didn’t see her father.
“I didn’t spend much money. Where’s Dad?”
“Your father has been out in the countryside every day buying goods. After coming back, he delivers them all over the city.”
Lin Hongmei smiled helplessly.
“He’s been too busy to come pick you up.”
After they got home, Zhou Yulan told Zhou Yuwei everything that had happened.
Zhou Yuwei examined the buttons.
“How are you planning to sell these?”
The buttons really didn’t seem to have any major flaws.
She couldn’t tell what made them defective.
Still, whether customers would actually buy them was another question.
“If I sell them for two cents each… do you think people will buy them?”
Zhou Yulan wasn’t very confident.
“Sell them for fifteen cents per ten buttons.”
“If someone buys ten, give them one extra for free.”
“Tomorrow, go to the countryside with Dad.”
“Help him buy goods, and while you’re there, see if you can sell the buttons.”
She figured rural customers probably wouldn’t care much about minor imperfections.
“If someone buys ten, remember to throw in an extra one.”
“Okay.”
“But I wasn’t able to buy any factory stock.”
“They wouldn’t let me inside.”
“They said I needed a work-unit introduction letter.”
The planned economy was still the dominant system.
“It’s fine.”
Zhou Yuwei wasn’t discouraged.
“This trip wasn’t wasted.”
“You collected all these buttons, and now you know exactly where the factory is.”
“Next time, I’ll go with you to buy inventory.”
“Okay.”
For some reason, hearing her younger sister say she’d go together with her instantly made Zhou Yulan feel much more confident.
The next day, Zhou Yulan accompanied her father to the countryside.
By the time they returned, she had sold almost all the buttons.
Even after deducting her travel expenses, she still made several dozen yuan.
As the days passed…
Every member of the Zhou family stayed busy from morning until night.
One day, Xu Zitao and Liu Changyun pushed a ladies’ bicycle into the courtyard to find Zhou Yuwei.
She was reciting English from a textbook.
“Whoa!”
Liu Changyun stared at her in surprise.
“That accent actually sounds pretty authentic.”
“My dear auntie, you’re improving at lightning speed!”
“Listen to that pronunciation.”
“If I couldn’t see you, I’d swear an actual foreigner was speaking.”
He even tried reading a few English sentences himself.
“Why doesn’t it sound the same when I say it?”
“You want to know why?”
Zhou Yuwei closed her textbook.
Liu Changyun nodded vigorously.
“Then let me teach you.”
“You need to cut off part of your tongue.”
“Your pronunciation will become perfect.”
“What?”
“You have to cut off part of my tongue?”
“Exactly.”
“Didn’t Grandpa Hu’s parrot start talking after its tongue was clipped? It even became especially clever.”
Zhou Yuwei couldn’t help teasing him.
“Zhou Yuwei!”
“That’s just cruel!”
“You actually compared me to a parrot?”
He had the growing feeling that this girl had become more and more mischievous lately.
“If I really cut off part of my tongue…”
“Whether I’d still be able to speak at all would be another matter.”
“Oh, so you figured that out?”
Xu Zitao patted the bicycle seat.
“Your ride is ready.”
He looked at Zhou Yuwei.
“Want to take it for a spin?”
She walked over.
“It really turned out well.”
This bicycle had been designed from the sketches Zhou Yuwei had drawn.
She hadn’t expected Xu Zitao to actually build it.
From the outside, it looked much like the bicycles already on the market.
But the entire frame was noticeably smaller, making it much better suited for women.
It was also significantly lighter.
“Your skills are seriously impressive.”
“The bicycle you drew uses some parts we don’t have.”
Xu Zitao smiled.
“Otherwise, I could’ve built you an even better one.”
“For now, just make do with this. Go try it.”
Zhou Yuwei climbed onto the bicycle and rode a full lap around the courtyard.
“Not bad.”
She smiled happily.
“It’s very light, and the whole bike feels much easier to handle.”
“I’m glad you like it.”