Chapter Ninety-Nine: A Prosperous Opening

Ear-splitting firecrackers rang out, and Meters Bonwe's Haizhou specialty store was finally about to open for business.

The relatives who had attended last night's family dinner all came to show their support, which naturally included Li Mu's eldest maternal uncle and youngest maternal aunt. What Li Mu hadn't expected was that the two of them had even sent flower baskets.

The custom of sending flower baskets for store openings in Haizhou had a long history. The baskets were about a meter tall, slender bamboo-woven structures filled with fresh flowers, with two strips of red silk hanging from them, bearing golden characters that read: "So-and-so, congratulations on the grand opening of so-and-so's store."

By the time the official opening rolled around, Li Mu had received nearly a hundred such baskets.

He recognized the names on the first dozen or so. His eldest uncle, youngest uncle, eldest aunt, and youngest aunt each sent one—four baskets in total. Zhao Kang sent two, one in his father's name and one in his own.

The four members of Simple Plan—Zhang Kexuan, Ye Tianming, Gu Wei, and Xia Ji—each sent one, though they couldn't make it in person and called Li Mu one by one to explain the situation.

There was also Chen Wan, who entrusted a friend in Haizhou to deliver hers in person and also called Li Mu specially to offer her congratulations.

Then came Song Liang, which didn't surprise Li Mu in the least.

But the next one did surprise him—Zhang Wanjun.

And after that came Zhang Wanjun's imposing underling, Lu Yong.

As for the several dozen baskets that followed Lu Yong's, Li Mu didn't recognize a single name on them.

The mountain of flower baskets stretched from the store entrance all the way to the curb and still couldn't all fit. It was absolutely staggering. Li Mu joked to himself that he could probably make a decent sum just selling flower baskets today, because from Zhang Kexuan's onward, the baskets that arrived were all high-end—big, beautiful, and costing at least several hundred yuan each. All told, they had to be worth over ten thousand yuan.

Actually, Li Mu's opening ceremony was quite simple. He'd prepared a strip of colored silk and a pair of scissors for his parents—just a quick ceremonial snip and that would be that. But Song Liang had called to say he wanted to come and do a snip himself, just for the fun of it. Li Mu knew Song Liang was doing this to bolster his prestige, and he couldn't very well refuse, so he'd had someone buy another pair of scissors before the opening.

At 9:58 sharp, Song Liang stood together with Li Mu's parents for the ribbon-cutting. Li Mu's father stood in the center, his mother on the right, and Song Liang on the left.

Quite a crowd of citizens had gathered to watch, packed in layer upon layer with no room to move. Partly it was because Meters Bonwe had finally arrived in Haizhou, and partly because the opening ceremony was simply over the top—nearly a hundred flower baskets. Who was that supposed to intimidate?

But the bigger shock was yet to come. Someone with sharp eyes recognized that one of the three people cutting the ribbon was none other than Song Liang, the boss of Wanying Real Estate. A guy nearby exclaimed in admiration, "Well, well—the big boss of Wanying came to cut the ribbon for a clothing store? What kind of connections does this store have to be this impressive?"

Someone in the crowd answered, "Dude, you really are out of the loop! Wanying has had this store's ad plastered on all four of their building billboards for days now. You didn't know that?"

"Oh, now that you mention it, I do remember—it was so eye-catching I couldn't not know!"

The moment the ribbon-cutting was done, Li Mu's parents and Song Liang all stepped aside, and Li Mu shouted at the top of his lungs: "Meters Bonwe Haizhou specialty store is now officially open!"

A flood of young people surged inside, turning the store into something resembling a vegetable market in no time.

Li Mu's youngest aunt by marriage immediately got to work with the ten sales associates. Though most of the young customers had come just to gawk, quite a few were genuinely trying on clothes and buying. In the past, if you wanted this brand, you had to go to Jinling. Now it was right at their doorstep, so of course they'd come to check it out—especially since purchases over 299 yuan came with a free shoulder bag. And not just any bag—it was a small teardrop-shaped crossbody that hung diagonally across the back, available in green, yellow, red, and black, with an embroidered logo. It looked absolutely exquisite.

Inside, everyone was scrambling. Outside, Li Mu thanked Song Liang and introduced him to his parents.

Li Mu's father and mother had no idea how their son had come to know such a big shot in Haizhou, but Song Liang's attitude was remarkably humble. He called them "Uncle" and "Auntie" warmly, took down their phone numbers, and gave them his own in return.

Ye Tianming had once told Song Liang that after Li Mu went to Yanjing for school, he should keep an eye on Li Mu's parents and the store while in Haizhou. Song Liang had replied at the time, "You think I'm stupid? You really think I needed you to tell me that?"

Song Liang stayed on-site for an hour before taking his leave to attend to his own affairs. After he left, Li Mu's parents and the various relatives were all curious about how Li Mu had come to be friends with Song Liang. Li Mu simply said he'd been introduced through a friend in Jinling and didn't go into detail.

Li Mu's parents knew he'd sold songs to Simple Plan, the group that was all the rage now, and had heard him mention that the four young men all came from extraordinary backgrounds. So they figured they understood how Li Mu had made Song Liang's acquaintance. But Li Mu's uncles and aunts remained utterly baffled, unable to put their shock into words.

Li Mu himself understood that in terms of social standing, he didn't amount to a speck of dust in Haizhou, whereas Song Liang was the number-one figure among private entrepreneurs. The gap wasn't just enormous—it was like heaven and earth. It was only natural that people would be astonished.

...

By noon, the fierce stream of customers had eased somewhat. Li Mu's father arranged for the relatives to go eat at a restaurant, but Li Mu and his mother didn't rush over. Instead, they went to the cash register to check the morning's sales records. Over the roughly two-hour morning period, they'd sold more than 260 items of clothing, with total sales of 19,000 yuan. Forty bags had been given away. The three cash registers had barely stopped—scanning, ringing up, bagging—without a moment's pause.

His mother was absolutely stunned by the sales figures, but Li Mu felt it was perfectly normal. Meters Bonwe had always been an evergreen brand in second-tier cities and below, and with all the groundwork he'd laid before the opening, the brand was bound to catch fire in Haizhou for a good while.

The store stayed packed all afternoon. From one o'clock to six in the evening—five solid hours—the fitting rooms had a constant line, so much so that the sales associates had to encourage male customers buying T-shirts to try them on right out in the open, saving the fitting rooms for the women.

This year's Meters Bonwe line had a special collection. Whether T-shirts, dresses, or jacket linings, everything in the collection featured a bold, oversized floral pattern. Sales for that collection were absolutely explosive—even Li Mu was stunned by the purchasing power of Haizhou's residents.

Over the five afternoon hours, the take was around 55,000 yuan, and roughly a hundred bags had been given away.

Li Mu's parents were grinning from ear to ear, practically unable to close their mouths. Li Mu made a trip to the bank to deposit the money, and when he came back, he whispered in his mother's ear: "Mom, go tell Aunt later that everyone working overtime until ten tonight gets a cash bonus—500 yuan for the store manager and 200 yuan for each sales associate."

The sales associates had already been working with tremendous drive, and their commissions would be substantial. But Li Mu still felt that in this kind of situation, the boss should show his appreciation. Of course, this wasn't something to do often, lest employees come to view bonuses as an entitlement. But today was special—a good start was more important than anything.

His mother had no objections. She nodded and went straight to his youngest aunt by marriage to relay the decision.

As for why he had his mother deliver the message instead of doing it himself, Li Mu's reasoning was simple: he felt his father lacked any real talent for management or business, so it was better to focus on grooming his mother for that role.

When his youngest aunt by marriage relayed the decision to every employee, their excitement and gratitude were written all over their faces.

The truth is, every workplace has its share of hardworking, dedicated people. What a boss needs to do is mobilize their enthusiasm—but without resorting to nothing but empty promises. Bosses who only dangle carrots tend not to succeed, because they treat their employees like fools, and everyone sees right through them. So you have to be sincere with your staff and know how to share the rewards.

After six o'clock, there was about half an hour when the sales associates could take turns catching their breath. Li Mu's youngest aunt by marriage had signed a meal-supply agreement with a small restaurant not far away. The restaurant would prepare two meals a day for thirteen people—with a proper mix of meat and vegetables, plus soup—delivered to the store at noon and six in the evening. The staff could eat in shifts in the little three-or-four-square-meter space cleared out in the storeroom. As for why they ordered thirteen meals for eleven people, it was just to have extra to be safe, so nobody with a bigger appetite would go hungry.

Li Mu spent the whole day at the store, and apart from marveling at how much money was being made, he marveled at how thorough his youngest aunt by marriage was.

The staff morale she'd fostered was excellent, too. At first, she'd required that whenever a customer paid, all the sales associates had to clap and shout "Keep it up!" no matter what they were doing. Everyone felt awkward about it at first, but as she led the way, by the afternoon everyone had genuinely thrown themselves into it. That shout of "Keep it up!" became heartfelt, and real team spirit took hold.

For dinner, Li Mu and his parents made a special point of going to the restaurant his aunt had partnered with to sample their food. The flavors were good, the ingredients looked fresh, and everything was clean and hygienic—quite impressive.

The most important thing in running a business is putting the right people in the right positions. Even in the most ordinary traditional retail industry, one key talent can transform the trajectory of the whole venture. His youngest aunt by marriage was exactly that kind of key talent.

Back at the store, seven o'clock was prime time on the streets, and business had returned to its peak state.

Li Mu watched by the cash registers for a while, doing some mental math. The peak revenue capacity was roughly 9,000 yuan per hour. But as he observed the cause of this peak, he realized it wasn't truly a peak—it was a bottleneck that would be hard to break through.

The root cause of this bottleneck was that the cashiers couldn't keep up.

Each cashier handled one register: scanning items, taking payment, making change, and removing the anti-theft tags from customers' clothes. Those were all manageable. But the biggest time sink was folding the clothes and putting them in bags, sealing them shut—that alone took up half the time, leaving the customers queuing behind to wait.

Li Mu suggested to his youngest aunt by marriage that she hire three more people to handle cashiering exclusively, freeing up all ten current staff for sales positions. If needed, they could pull people over to help with packaging, easing the pressure on the cashiers and shortening each customer's checkout time.

His aunt caught on immediately. She pulled out her little notebook, found three phone numbers in it, and called each one.

These were people she'd interviewed who hadn't seemed quite suited for sales but had come across as motivated and earnest. She'd kept their contact information just in case. Cashiering didn't require sales skills, and since she needed three dedicated cashiers, she'd pick three from that pool.

Li Mu was thoroughly impressed. His youngest aunt by marriage really knew what she was doing. With her as store manager, he could rest easy.