But the middle class, such as rich farmers, small landowners, small traders, etc., these people can still afford it if they grit their teeth and are ruthless.
Li Qiao doesn't want to turn vermicelli into a luxury product only for the rich. He wants more people to experience the joy of eating vermicelli.
The price of Pingcheng vermicelli has not increased, so the happiest vendors are naturally the vendors from out of town. Fang Shitong is from Hedong Prefecture. After learning about the vermicelli last year, he came to Pingcheng this summer.
After arriving in Pingcheng, he did not stay in an inn. Instead, he rented a small yard and used it to start a small business of reselling Li Qiao's snacks.
Li Qiao's snacks are only sold at Wangyue Tower. He queued up early. After buying the snacks, he used saltpeter to make some ice cubes, and then put the snacks in the ice cubes to freeze. With these frozen snacks, he hurried there. Fucheng, sell these snacks in Fucheng.
Li Qiao's snacks are very popular in Fucheng. Some people who have not gone to Pingcheng but want to eat his snacks are willing to pay for his frozen snacks.
In this way, the amount of money he earned each time was not much, but he could still earn three or four taels of silver in one trip.
This money is enough to cover his expenses in Pingcheng.
This summer, he had a lot of experience in queuing at Wangyue Tower, so when shopkeeper Wang started handing out number plates for vermicelli, his speed was no less than that of the local vendors in Pingcheng, and he grabbed the number eight.
This number is very high.
Shopkeeper Wang’s rule is that each number plate is only allowed to purchase vermicelli once.
After purchasing this time, if you want to buy again next time, you have to queue up again.
Due to the popularity of vermicelli, there was almost no possibility of queuing up again during the New Year. In other words, everyone only had one chance to buy vermicelli before the Chinese New Year.
This means that every time it is a person's turn, that person will spend the most financial resources to buy vermicelli.
The vermicelli here at Wangyue Tower comes from Sanliu Village and Zhujia Village, and there are about 23,000 kilograms of vermicelli a day. This many kilograms of vermicelli is enough to pile up a mountain of vermicelli.
But in the eyes of big businessmen, this is nothing.
While the big businessman was waiting, he had arranged all the manpower, carriages, and routes, just waiting to get the goods.
Therefore, the big businessmen at the front can buy up to ten days worth of vermicelli in one go.
The people in front buy more, so those at the back have to wait patiently.
But time is money, so the eighth-ranked number plate in his hand is really valuable.
Many big businessmen came to him and wanted to buy the number plate in his hand at a high price. The highest bid was 2,300 taels of silver.
But he didn't sell it.
This summer, while reselling snacks, he also arranged the manpower, carriages, and routes.
He spent all his money to buy 50,000 kilograms of vermicelli.
He did not transport the 50,000 kilograms of vermicelli back to Hedong Mansion, but put it in the yard he had rented long ago.
He won't sell this batch of vermicelli for the time being.
After the Chinese New Year, when the sweet potato factory shut down, he would sell this batch of vermicelli.
He has few people and has never been out of Yuanhe Province. Let alone compete with big businessmen from other provinces, he can't even compete with the businessmen from Hexi Prefecture.
In this case, he might as well stay put.
Public security in Pingcheng is very good under Jiang Zhi County. With such a large batch of vermicelli, he asked his family to come and guard it, and he would definitely be able to keep it safe until the sweet potato workshop stops working.
Moreover, before the sweet potato workshop stops working, shopkeeper Wang will probably issue number plates again, so he doesn't have to go out and run around. He can just stay in Pingcheng.
The money he earned from reselling dim sum was enough to cover his expenses in Pingcheng. All he had to do next was to continue reselling dim sum.
Li Qiao is really his God of Wealth.
…
Han Ning was from the capital city and had already gained a reputation as a scholar.
His Han family is a merchant, but he is the fourth generation of his generation, so he can take the imperial examination.
However, the Han family has been in bad luck in recent years, and every time they make a big move, they will inevitably lose money.
The year before last, his father made a desperate move and invested all the family's money in silk, hoping to earn money by transporting silk to small surrounding countries.
As a result, a typhoon came over and several ships of silk sank into the sea. As a result, his family was completely destroyed. He could no longer continue his studies and could only earn money in various ways.
This year I read the article by the Holy Spirit and heard that there were vermicelli in Hexi Prefecture, so he asked his father to ask his grandfather and grandma to borrow money from relatives and friends.
After borrowing a lot of money and pawning his ancestral property, he took eight hundred taels of silver notes with him and came all the way from the capital to Hexi Prefecture with his two brothers.
He had staked his fortune and life on vermicelli. If he lost money again this time, he might as well commit suicide.
Fortunately, the road is boundless. After the three brothers arrived in Pingcheng, they quickly figured out the details of Pingcheng. When Magistrate Jiang and Shopkeeper Wang handed out number plates, the three brothers all got the higher ones. number.
One is number seven, one is number 12, and one is number 15.
He sold the number plates No. 7 and No. 12 for a total of five thousand taels of silver.
With these five thousand taels of silver, the capital of the three brothers has greatly increased. He wrote to the capital to ask his family to borrow more silver and manpower, and then came to Hexi Prefecture to escort the batch of vermicelli to the capital together.
If the Han family really relies on this batch of vermicelli to break bad luck this year, then he must buy a longevity card for Li Qiao at home and pray for Li Qiao every day!
…
Everyone in Sanliu Village makes vermicelli, and anyone who has the ability to do this job works in the sweet potato workshop to earn wages.
But the villagers of Sanliu Village not only planted sweet potatoes, they also planted a lot of miscellaneous grains. Now that the strong laborers work in the sweet potato workshops, the elderly and children at home cannot collect these miscellaneous grains, so the villagers hired People from other villages may ask relatives to come and help.
The villagers work in the sweet potato workshop and can earn 300 cash a day.
They hired others to collect grains at a cost of thirty cents per person, and only three hundred cents for ten people.
Therefore, although they are reluctant to part with this money, in order to make more money in the sweet potato workshop, people in Sanliu Village and Zhujia Village basically hire people or find relatives to come and help.
Tao Zhu observed this situation for several days. That night, after having fun with Li Qiao, he lay in Li Qiao's arms and slowly talked about this phenomenon with Li Qiao.
"In the past, it was really difficult for villagers to find a job to make money during their off-farm days. But now, villagers have become the owners who have the money to hire people."
When he was at Tao's house before, in winter, he had to go to the town to find work.
But the town was so big, and there were so many nearby villages, he couldn't steal the others, so he had to go back to the village.
If he can't earn money, he will definitely be scolded. He can only work harder to satisfy his family.
…
The miserable scenes in the past, looking back now, are the same as they were in my previous life.
He was in a daze for a moment, and when he came back to his senses, he couldn't help but stretched out his hands and feet and wrapped them tightly around Li Qiao.
He squeezed into Li Qiao's arms, trying to squeeze himself into Li Qiao's body.
Without this person, not only would he still be miserable now, but the life of the villagers would not be easy either.
The lack of rain this year has not only reduced the production of sweet potatoes, but also reduced the production of other miscellaneous grains. However, the villagers have to pay taxes, fill their stomachs, and save money for major events in life...
Besides, this is not the worst year. The worst year is no harvest. He has experienced that kind of tragedy before and still doesn't want to think about it.
So, he likes this person so much.
I like Li Qiao, I like it very much.
He was one size smaller than Li Qiao's, and Li Qiao's arms could just accommodate him. His heart was close to Li Qiao's. He buried his face in Li Qiao's neck and rubbed it hard several times, feeling the sensation. Feeling the familiar body temperature, he whispered: "You are really amazing, Li Qiao."
Li Qiao's heart hurt a little from Tao Zhu's grip, and he was still entangled by Tao Zhu, unable to move, but he just lowered his head and laughed softly: "Kiss me then."
When these four words came out, Tao Zhu immediately raised his head and kissed him on the lips.
The two exchanged a soft kiss.
When the kiss ended, Li Qiao rested most of his body on Tao Zhu. He lay on his side, gently rubbing Tao Zhu's back with one hand, pinching Tao Zhu's earlobe and pinching Tao Zhu's cheeks with his other hand. Anyway, he had nothing to do. Can't live.
Tao Zhu's comfortable eyes narrowed. He liked this kind of touch. His body was filled with this person's breath. It was so good.
He said softly: "I will release the news about recruiting workers tomorrow."
"Okay." Li Qiao responded.
"Build a workshop first. It doesn't need to be too big. More than ten rooms are enough..."
Tao Zhu slowly explained his plan.
If you want to start a duck business, you must first have a place. His big yard is used for making snacks, and for the duck business, you need to build a separate house.
Take advantage of the fact that it's not snowing yet and the ground is not freezing, so hurry up and build the house, otherwise, this duck business will be postponed until after the new year.
Li Qiao supported this business very much. When the workers started building the house, he would go with Tao Zhu every day to see the progress as before.
The duck goods workshop was built in the northwest of Baiyou and Li Dazhong's yard, close to the river. Because there were many workers, the progress was very fast and it was completed in less than ten days.
After the building is completed, it is time to recruit workers from the duck goods workshop.
Just like the requirements of the sweet potato workshop, the first thing is hygiene. In a food business, especially if the customers are rich and noble, hygiene is the most important thing.
The taste may not be outstanding, but there must be no problem with hygiene.
The second is to be honest, diligent and meticulous.
Recipes such as braised duck neck, duck wings, and duck intestines need to be kept secret, so when working in the workshop, don't look at what you shouldn't see, and don't ask about what you shouldn't ask.
You have to be diligent, Tao Zhu doesn't like lazy people.
You also have to be meticulous, Tao Zhu doesn't like to rework.
Tao Zhu had already made clear the recruitment requirements when he was building the workshop. The requirements were a bit high, but there were also an extremely large number of people who came to him to sign up.
This is the first time that his family has hired outsiders to do the food business.
In the dim sum business, Li Qiao only uses his own family members, and no outsiders can squeeze in.
For the sweet potato workshop, Li Qiao only uses people from Sanliu Village and Zhujia Village, and people from other villages cannot squeeze in.
But the duck goods workshop’s recruitment scope is finally not limited to the small areas of the Li family and Zhujia Village of Sanliu Village——
In fact, there is no restriction on the status of the long-term workers of Li Qiao's family, but the work that the long-term workers are responsible for is farming, which is too hard. Even if the wages are higher than other landowners, it is still manual work in the end.
But the duck business is different. The duck business is similar to the dim sum business. You don't have to leave your home, you only need to slaughter and clean ducks every day.
Compared with farming, this job is too easy.
People in the surrounding villages were overjoyed.
After waiting for so long, they finally have the opportunity. Not only can they get close to Li Qiao, but this is a long-term job that can be done all year round. Seriously, this is more stable than a sweet potato workshop!
Therefore, the number of people who came to Tao Zhu to sign up ranged from one hundred to eighty every day.
