Fake Eunuch: Discovering the Emperor is a Woman!-Chapter 235 - 233: An Unknown Merchant

Although they don’t set their prices too low now, it’s still much cheaper than the going rate in the market.

More importantly, the quality of their products is not just a little better than those on the market.

Because of this, these merchants can make a substantial profit even after purchasing at full price and then selling the merchandise.

For example, randomly picking out a Glazed Cup, although merchants might spend one hundred or even two hundred taels to purchase it, they can sell it for three hundred or five hundred taels in another State.

Should they encounter a keen customer or manage a perfect pitch, selling at an even higher price is possible.

They say that a double profit margin could make a person take risks, and a triple profit margin could make them lose all sense of propriety. Hence, these profits are certainly substantial.

A rough calculation shows that if these people resell the items they bought this morning, they could earn at least an income of one hundred thousand taels.

Bear in mind, one hundred thousand taels is no small sum! It’s enough to make them take big risks.

Besides, no one is monitoring where they take these glazed goods, whether for selling or personal use.

They also believe that soon, others will catch on, and countless merchants will do the same.

When everyone realizes this, the prices will become transparent and drop significantly, so they need to act on this window of opportunity.

They want to make a kill before everyone else catches on, which is exactly what Lin Yi foresaw.

But unexpectedly, they reacted to the situation in just one night.

Considering such circumstances, Lin Yi already had a plan and arrangements in place.

Thus, he held a meeting with all the sales staff, informing them that a Commercial Department would be established specifically within the shop.

This department’s role is to handle big clients, and it would not be involved with commissions.

Of course, the criteria for a big client differ from that of a regular customer—anyone who buys in bulk quantities is considered a big client.

Although the sales staff regretted this change somewhat, they did not dare to show or voice any dissent.

After all, their lives were given by Lin Yi.

Not to mention, they had made a fortune just yesterday, enough for them to live lavishly for the rest of their lives.

Seeing the staff’s reaction, Lin Yi understood their thoughts and directly informed them that they would still earn commissions on smaller orders in the future.

This was undoubtedly a shot in the arm for the sales force, who immediately became reinvigorated.

Events unfolded just as Lin Yi expected.

Three days after the merchants departed, other merchants took notice and came in droves, seeking direct talks about establishing long-term partnerships.

Unlike the previous merchants who purchased large quantities, these new faces immediately sought the person in charge upon arrival to discuss potential collaborations.

The person in charge, of course, did not meet with them.

Instead, the negotiations were left to the Commercial Department.

It was unclear how the discussions went, but when these merchants left, each of them was pulling away cartloads of wooden crates.

This bustling activity contrasted starkly with the earlier sales agents.

At this moment, they were almost idle, with nothing to do but clean and serve the few customers that trickled in.

The daily sales rarely broke ten thousand taels.

At the lowest point, they sold even fewer items in a day.

Lin Yi had anticipated all of this, of course.

This Glazed Tile Shop was bound not to flourish in the short term after the last court meeting, at least not in retail.

As for the wholesale side of things, that was a very different story.

Even more so, Lin Yi had set a purchase limit for these merchants.

In other words, there was a specific supply for each day, and if most of it was bought up by others, they could only settle for the lesser half, not even a single item more.

Thus, these merchants pounced like wolves on the scent of blood, hoarding goods furiously.

It’s fair to say that as much as Lin Yi’s shop put goods on the market, they would be snatched up instantly.

Of course, they all shared one trait—they were undoubtedly from a merchant background.

Moreover, Lin Yi’s investigation revealed that not only did they hold merchant statuses, but also their own status was not particularly high, with none having any powerful backing.

Lin Yi naturally did not believe these findings and could roughly guess their true identities.

These fellows were undoubtedly just fronts for some major forces.

The officials, fearing being implicated, certainly would not utilize those merchants under them.

Instead, they let these merchants find some obscure small traders to buy and then resell the glazed items in large quantities.

Needless to say, the actual manipulators behind this were obvious.

After all, who could guess that such an obscure small merchant wouldn’t be able to put forward one hundred thousand taels for a purchase in one go?

And to do this every day for ten days in a row, the total would reach several millions of taels.

Those with a net worth of a million taels, even in Capital City, could be counted on one hand.

After all, a single tael of silver is equivalent to 1000 units of future currency.

A million taels of silver would be nearly a billion in future money.

Who with a net worth of 10 billion could be an unknown merchant?

Of course, since the other party wants to play this game, Lin Yi was naturally not going to expose them.

Moreover, the one to profit the most from this situation would be Lin Yi.

To put it bluntly, the cost of producing a million taels worth of Glazed Cups doesn’t even exceed a hundred taels.

...End of Chapter...