In the kitchen, the stove was packed full of coal, and white steam rose from the pot, where golden macaroni bubbled away.
Mary, wearing an indigo-blue apron, busily stirred the pot with a wooden spoon.
Today’s lunch was slightly more elaborate than usual: pesto macaroni.
On the cutting board lay a small pile of chopped bacon, which Mary had bought early that morning from a nearby butcher shop, basket in hand.
With only two children to look after today, she had plenty of time and had prepared a proper meal for lunch instead of just tea and snacks.
Dolly leaned against the doorframe and said, “Half of the six pounds of biscuits have already sold out. We can start making more.”
Mary let out a surprised “Huh?” and turned around.
“It’s not even noon yet, and we’ve sold that many?”
Selling half of such expensive biscuits meant a net profit of forty pence after deducting costs.
That was enough to pay her for two days of childcare for the neighbors.
Mary immediately began to consider focusing solely on baking biscuits.
“This might actually work. Tomorrow, I’ll turn down the childcare jobs.
Baking biscuits must be easier than looking after children, right?”
After all, the childcare business had been declining lately.
Dolly thought for a moment. “That’s not a bad idea.
Why don’t we start selling ready-to-eat foods like pastries, just like Lobit Grocery Store?
But there are risks involved. The ready-to-eat food business might not always do well, and we need to consider that.”
Dolly had already thought it through: if the shop were to operate fully, she alone would be far from enough.
She would definitely need many helpers to fill fixed positions, such as food processors, accountants, and cashiers.
Ideally, she would focus solely on managing procurement, deciding on products, and planning sales strategies.
Given the current situation, the best choice was to hire family members as employees.
Mary washed the dishes, dried them, drained the macaroni, and took three ceramic plates from the shelf, saying:
“Of course, in business, things can’t always go well.
We won’t know unless we try. If ready-to-eat foods don’t sell well, I can at least gain some experience and look for work at nearby restaurants later.”
Though Mary was straightforward in temperament, she possessed the practicality of ordinary folk. She wasn’t overly ambitious and understood the realities of business, avoiding blind optimism.
Thus, Dolly felt reassured and agreed.
She wouldn’t hire anyone with an immature mindset for full-time work.
If Mary worked full-time making food for retail, many processed foods would no longer need to be purchased.
Biscuits, candies, and jams could all be made in-house, and more varieties could be added.
For example, sausages, sandwiches, roasted meats, and even producing instant fried noodles and puffed snacks—as long as she could develop the recipes.
As for preparing to sell hot foods, it would only require purchasing a batch of takeaway packaging materials from the market.
Thick cardboard boxes, thin greaseproof paper, soft paper bags, and plenty of Mason jars—this was how all grocery stores and takeaway ready-to-eat food shops in London packaged their goods.
Dolly sat behind the counter, her head lowered as she jotted down tasks in a small notebook.
She also needed to go to the seal engraving shop to have a stamp made with the shop’s name and buy an adjustable rolling date stamp to record production dates.
In the kitchen, Mary began sifting flour again, baking Diamond Cookies and bread.
The weather remained gloomy all day, with a chilly mix of rain and snow drifting down, yet Clark Lane was filled with a rich, fragrant aroma.
By around two o’clock, it was the break time for the restaurant chefs and small shopkeepers.
Dolly drank another cup of Assam black tea to perk herself up, preparing to receive this batch of customers.
Soon, four or five customers arrived one after another. Holding umbrellas, they made their way through the narrow, long Clark Lane and stopped at Nash Grocery Store.
Not long after, they emerged carrying paper bags in their arms, holding umbrellas as they headed back to their own shops.
Lobit Grocery Store was located at the entrance of the lane, and Mr. Lobit was the first to notice this strange situation.
His business today was just ordinary—neither good nor bad. On rainy days, every household was like that.
However, he observed that those who had gone into Clark Lane with umbrellas came out holding paper bags, clearly having bought something.
Had they gone to Nash Grocery Store or Piero Grocery Store?
Why had his shop been overlooked?
The more Mr. Lobit thought about it, the more puzzled he became. He was also selling daily necessities at discounted prices—wasn’t it the same?
After some thought, he called George to go and find out what was happening, especially regarding the Nash family.
Hearing this, George had no choice but to put down the towel in his hand, put on his hat, and run out into the rain.
Mr. Lobit knew that now that the annoying old woman was sick, her granddaughter was managing their grocery store.
Just a red-haired girl who had attended a girls’ school for a couple of days and had no business experience—what could she possibly manage well? She was just barely holding on.
He believed this was the perfect time to press his advantage and bring their store down.
Before Nash Grocery Store moved to Clark Street, he had already driven away several batches of grocery stores from Clark Street.
Whenever there was no grocery store in Clark Street, most of the hundreds of residents in the lane had to come to his shop to shop.
He thought that once he drove the Nash family away this time, he would simply rent out that shopfront and expand the number of his stores.
After pacing around the room for a while, he decided to go out himself.
Nash Grocery Store.
During the afternoon work break, chefs and shopkeepers from Dorothy Street bought up the Diamond Cookies in twos and threes.
As evening approached and many people finished work, the neighbors all returned home.
Even in the rain, quite a few customers came to Dolly’s door.
Out of every ten people passing by the entrance, three or four would come in to take a look.
Most were customers who had taken advantage of the discount promotions.
They knew that the Lobit and Nash families were secretly competing, each trying to outsell the other with promotional goods.
Now, they visited both grocery stores every day to see if any good items were on sale.
Low-income consumers didn’t care about which store had a better reputation or which shop was smaller.
They only cared about where things were cheap and useful, making them the most pragmatic group.
And the three-farthing products Dolly had prepared today were extremely popular among such people, spreading from one person to ten and then to a hundred among the neighbors.
After this news spread, even some children and chimney-sweeping child laborers ran over from nearby streets and alleys.
Their goal was to buy bags of hard candy balls for three farthings—almost the only snack they could afford.
Some young girls, who usually only helped with household chores at home and earned extra income by doing laundry and ironing for others, also came today with spare change to buy some loose cocoa powder and lemon slices.
As night fell, family members gradually returned home, ready for dinner.
Dolly also began her daily end-of-day bookkeeping.
Hundreds of pennies seemed to flutter on wings into the counter drawer.
She roughly calculated that from afternoon to evening, nearly fifty customers had come for the promotional goods and three-farthing items.
The total foot traffic for the day was over seventy people, with the main crowd concentrated in the afternoon.
Sales of promotional household items, three-farthing goods, and homemade foods each accounted for about one-third of the total.
The profit margin on the first category was slim, but the latter two categories both reached around fifty percent.
Averaging these three together, the net profit was roughly one-third of the total sales, higher than the previous quarter.
Today’s average transaction value was twelve pence.
Total sales amounted to nine hundred pence, close to four pounds.
Based on the current net profit margin of thirty-five percent for all store items, her net profit for the day exceeded one pound sterling.
Compared to the actual profit of ten shillings from the previous two days, this was a full doubling.
If she could maintain this level of sales every day going forward, then she could prepare a budget of over ten pounds for her next restocking.
If she could sustain the current daily profit, it would amount to thirty or forty pounds sterling per month.
If she could earn that much money, Dolly planned to call Fred and Mr. Nash back to help with errands and odd jobs around the house.
Both of them were very familiar with the routes around White Chapel, and moving about outside would be safer for them than for the women.
For a small grocery store in such a poor neighborhood, having family members as employees was already the most suitable operational model.
Dolly contentedly recorded the numbers, making plans in her heart.
Night completely swallowed the deep blue sky. After finishing her records, she moved the ladder outside, took down the gas lamp hanging under the porch—this signaled the end of business for the day.
Cold rain still fell in the alley. The pub across the way wasn’t doing well tonight; through the half-window, only one or two people could be seen drinking.
None of the regulars who usually frequented the pub were in sight.
That’s how business was for this little shop: half the customers disappeared on windy days, and they all vanished on rainy days, with London’s weather being so unpredictable.
If there was nothing special to draw people out with an umbrella, it naturally seemed deserted.
Fred finished cleaning the milk delivery cans, brought down some wooden planks from the storage room, and began boarding up the windows.
Then, he pushed the wooden door shut and locked it, and the family prepared for dinner.
In the kitchen, smoke and steam swirled. Tonight’s dinner was relatively simple, as Mary had spent most of her time baking biscuits.
On the small square table were a few plates and jars, with only simple fried eggs and sausages, along with some bread slices and dry cheese.
In the middle sat a plate of biscuit scraps, which counted as the entire meal.
However, no one in the family complained about the food. After a full day’s work and a hasty lunch, everyone was already starving. For now, they focused on eating, only occasionally discussing their respective days.
Mary decided to work full-time on prepared foods and baked goods, and no one thought this was unsuitable in any way.
Dolly believed she truly had a knack for cooking. As long as she was given precise recipes and measurements, she could succeed after just one attempt, and even with unconventional dishes, she could replicate them with ninety percent accuracy.
Meanwhile, Mr. Nash and Fred were astonished by the profits Biscuits could bring.
If not for knowing their own hands were as clumsy as radishes, they would have packed up and gone home to make Biscuits.
Now that the division of labor was settled, the remaining task was to plan which products to produce.
On this matter, everyone wisely remained silent, quietly listening as Dolly spoke with clear logic.
…
Author’s Note: