“They were all made by my sister Sangluo. She said people in the city all like wearing hair ties like these.”
“Yeah, she wants to start a business.”
“They’re not expensive. Sister Sangluo said she’s only earning a bit for the handiwork. Like my hair tie—it’s only fifty cents, and this hair clip is twenty cents. Of course, there are also cheaper ones—some are just ten cents, and they still look very nice.”
“Oh, she’s going to sell them in town. If my classmates knew about them, they’d definitely buy them. They love dressing up.”
Along the way, most of the young wives, girls, and aunties could hear Qin Zhiyu enthusiastically “promoting” them.
Although they admitted that Qin Zhiyu’s hair ties were indeed pretty,
none of them planned to buy any. They were too expensive and not worth it.
Nor did they believe Xu Sangluo could actually sell them.
Five cents for such a tiny thing—it was practically robbery.
Besides, if people had money, why wouldn’t they just go to the supply and marketing cooperative to buy something better?
They all felt that Xu Sangluo simply couldn’t bear the hardship of living with the Qin family anymore and was now desperately trying to think of some speculative way to make money.
Even though trading seemed to have been relaxed recently, who really knew what the situation was?
Didn’t they say the same thing a couple of years ago? In the end, a bunch of people still got arrested.
They all thought the Qin family was really unlucky.
They had originally believed that marrying a city daughter-in-law would help support the family.
But now it seemed that one day the whole family might even be dragged into trouble because of her.
Xu Sangluo, of course, had no idea how the people in the brigade were criticizing her behind her back.
After finishing breakfast and tidying up a little, she hung two bamboo baskets on the bicycle and rode to town.
The bicycle had been borrowed by Qin Zhiyi. Xu Sangluo hadn’t wanted to accept it at first.
Although she would always return the bike with a small bag of pastries, it still didn’t feel right to keep occupying someone else’s bicycle.
But Qin Zhiyi said the bike belonged to his friend. Their family had two bicycles and didn’t use them much anyway.
Only then did Xu Sangluo agree.
Today it was Qin Zhifeng’s turn to take leave and stay home. Mother Qin had wanted him to come along and help.
But Xu Sangluo didn’t allow it.
She had already come to the town once before. It wasn’t very big, so she was now fairly familiar with the place.
She had already scouted out the location yesterday.
Originally, she had planned to start by selling food.
Although the products had changed now, it didn’t really affect her original plan much.
She chose a spot at a fork in the road.
Diagonally across was the state-run restaurant. To the left corner of the street was the supply and marketing cooperative, while to the right along the street was a photo studio, and across from it was a barbershop.
Old Photo Studio
It was now around seven to almost eight in the morning, already past the rush hour for work and school.
But there were still plenty of pedestrians on the road.
Xu Sangluo wasn’t in a hurry. She parked the bicycle and took out a piece of cloth, spreading it over the wooden board at the back of the bike.
She lifted over the bamboo box and began taking out the hair accessories she had made, arranging them neatly one by one.
Today was the first day of her trial sale, so she didn’t hold very high expectations.
Still, at least she wouldn’t lose money.
She had also deliberately dressed up today.
Her appearance was similar to the hairstyle she had done for Qin Zhiyu yesterday.
However, the hairband she wore was far prettier than yesterday’s, and combined with her natural beauty,
her attractiveness increased more than tenfold.
At the very least, as she stood there, passing pedestrians couldn’t help but glance her way.
After arranging the hair accessories, Xu Sangluo took out a small sign and hung it directly on the bicycle’s handlebar.
On the sign were written two lines:
“Exclusive hair ties, hair flowers, hair clips, and headbands. Buy three, get one free. Spend five yuan, get ten cents off.”
Her distinctive appearance, unusual actions, and novel marketing slogans
immediately made people start peeking curiously.
While the passersby were still hesitating and watching, a woman from the photo studio next door couldn’t resist her curiosity and walked over.
“Comrade, are these for sale? Do you have the kind you’re wearing on your head?”
What girl doesn’t love looking pretty? And with Xu Sangluo acting as such an eye-catching model.
Although the items she displayed were all made of cloth, they were extremely delicate and well crafted.
Xu Sangluo immediately put on a perfect marketing smile.
“Hello, comrade. I just had these hair accessories brought back from Wenzhou. They’re all new products from the factories there. Around here, they should be the only ones available right now. Would you like to try a few? They’re all very pretty. I heard many foreigners dress like this—people call it fashionable.”
As the woman listened, her eyes kept drifting toward Xu Sangluo’s hair, then to the accessories on the board. She was clearly tempted.
“Wenzhou, huh? I’ve heard they’ve come out with quite a lot of new things there. How much are these? Are they expensive?”
As she spoke, she couldn’t help picking up a headband to examine it.
The headband was made from bamboo that had been heated and shaped, then wrapped with nicely matched cloth. Two small cloth flowers were sewn diagonally on one side.
The woman admired it, reluctant to put it down but too shy to try it on.
Xu Sangluo immediately said, “Of course, quality items cost a bit more. After all, they’re handmade and brand-new designs. But there are also many affordable options. For example, this kind of hair flower is only twenty cents.”
She picked up a hair flower beside her to show.
This hair flower was actually quite simple: cloth sewn into a small tube about the size of a finger, hollow in the middle, with nylon string threaded through before being tied and stitched.
The cost was just a small strip of cloth and about five centimeters of nylon cord—roughly one cent.
The woman took the hair flower. “Twenty cents? Can it be a bit cheaper? And this sign you wrote here—‘Buy three, get one free’—does that mean if I buy three items, I get another one for free?”
“That’s right.” At that moment two other women came over to take a curious look. Xu Sangluo smiled and said, “Buy any three items and you’ll get a hairpin like this as a gift. It cost quite a bit to bring these goods all the way here, so I’m really just earning a small errand fee. I truly can’t lower the price.”
The hairpin was the common kind made of two black metal wires, usually sold in large sheets with dozens attached.
But this one had a thumb-sized cloth flower decorated at one end, which made it look rather pretty. The selling price was ten cents each.
People always had a bit of a tendency to enjoy small bargains.
Ten cents might not seem like much to people here—sometimes it wasn’t even enough to buy a bun.
But at least it was free.
Immediately, someone else became interested.
Another woman asked the same question as the one from the photo studio earlier, pointing at the ribbon wrapped in Xu Sangluo’s hair.
“Which one is that?”
Xu Sangluo immediately picked up a ribbon. “This one. Because the workmanship and materials are more complicated, it’s a little more expensive—eighty cents.”
The ribbon was about the length of an arm. The middle section was gathered and curled like a scrunched fabric tube, with nylon string inside so it could stretch. On top were two leaf-shaped bow decorations.
The ends were narrow strips about the width of a finger, each with a small cloth flower sewn at the tip. Overall, it looked quite nice.
Most importantly, Xu Sangluo herself was modeling it.
Although it was indeed a bit expensive, the women looked down at the ribbon, then back at her, clearly tempted.
“I’ll take this one, and these two. How much is it?”
The woman holding the ribbon was fairly straightforward. After hesitating briefly, she decided to buy it.
She chose one ribbon, one simple hair flower, and one large bow hair tie.
Xu Sangluo’s smile grew even brighter. She quickly picked out the three items, added a hairpin, and handed them to her.
“Thank you for your purchase. The total comes to one yuan and fifty cents. Thank you for your patronage.”