Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

”6.9 yuan with free shipping? Brother Sen’s request... I wouldn’t dare bring it up. I’d probably get my ass kicked.”

Upon hearing Chen Yansen’s demand, Li Hui waved his hands in dismissal and plopped down on a bluestone slab by the orchard, instantly losing all his motivation.

For a 1.5-kilogram bundle of navel oranges, once you added in the costs of picking, packing, the box, and shipping, 6.9 yuan didn’t even cover the expenses.

On platforms like Taobao and Jingdong, fruit sellers would only offer a ”1.5 kilograms for 9.9 yuan with free shipping” deal when they were trying to boost sales volume, and even then, they would strictly limit the stock.

But Pinbei wanted to sell without limits!

Zhang Yifeng and Yuan Wei exchanged a look, equally troubled. They had only managed to negotiate the 9.9 yuan price point because of Cloud Speed’s discounted shipping rates.

”Yifeng, what’s your plan?” Yuan Wei frowned, his mind a tangled mess.

”I’ll go talk to Boss Wei,” Zhang Yifeng said, gritting his teeth as he quickly made up his mind.

The boss had made his request, and they had to find a way to make it happen.

Wei Yucheng was the largest local fruit distributor, with his own fruit washing facility, crate factory, and cannery. He also had vast orchards under contract.

After Zhang Yifeng communicated with the local agricultural association, they introduced him to Wei Yucheng.

This type of direct-from-the-source e-commerce collaboration was not the first of its kind.

Juhuasuan had collaborated with orchards and vegetable farmers in Qilu as early as the first half of the year, but they had to give up in the end due to unstable supply quality and a constant stream of negative reviews.

Zhang Yifeng’s team learned from Ah Li’s lesson and went straight to the biggest ”local bully” to cooperate. The advantages were obvious: an abundant supply of goods and the ability to rein in any fruit farmers who might try to pass off inferior products as high quality.

’People’s hearts are hard to fathom.’ Zhang Yifeng knew full well that the three of them could manage to keep an eye on things during packing and shipping, but when it came to actually procuring the fruit, they didn’t have the skills for it.

”I’ll go with you,” Yuan Wei said to Zhang Yifeng after a moment’s thought.

”Brother Feng, Brother Wei, wait for me!” Li Hui, who had been sitting on the ground, saw the two of them getting on a motorcycle to head to town and hurried to catch up.

The three of them bumped along the mountain road, rounded a peak, and drove into the grounds of the Fine Fruit Food Company.

Hearing the commotion downstairs, Wei Yucheng came down enthusiastically to greet them.

When they first met, Wei Yucheng had looked down on Zhang Yifeng and his team a bit. After all, the three of them were only in their twenties and didn’t seem very reliable.

But his attitude changed instantly after learning they were managers from Pinbei responsible for recruiting merchants.

The internet and e-commerce were developing rapidly. Chen Yansen had sold FoxTao and cashed out for tens of billions, and because of that, Pinbei had also made a name for itself in the industry.

Wei Yucheng had opened a flagship fruit store on Taobao, but due to limitations from seasonality, costs, and his own operational skills, business had always been lukewarm.

Through the agricultural association’s introduction, he had taken the initiative to connect with Pinbei.

Even though Pinbei hadn’t launched yet, word on the internet was that Penguin would give it a top-level entry point on QQ and WeChat, leading to hundreds of millions of impressions daily.

Wei Yucheng didn’t even dare to imagine how many tons of navel oranges he could sell in a single day as one of Pinbei’s first-batch merchants.

If the collaboration went smoothly, he could sell sugar tangerines later on.

Therefore, Wei Yucheng took special care of Zhang Yifeng and his two companions.

When he heard they were staying in a shabby hotel in town, he immediately invited the three of them to his home, treating them to good food and drink.

”Manager Zhang, the quality of this year’s navel oranges is quite good, isn’t it?” Wei Yucheng said with a smile, leading the three of them upstairs for tea.

Zhang Yifeng sat down, looked at Wei Yucheng, and sighed. ”Boss Wei, the product is indeed good, but when I reported the navel orange specifications and prices, the company demanded that we lower the price of each grade by another 3 yuan.”

”How much? 3 yuan!”

The smile vanished from Wei Yucheng’s face.

He was only able to offer the 1.5-kilogram package for 9.9 yuan with free shipping because of his influence in the local fruit industry.

Dropping it to 6.9 yuan, not only would he not make any money, he’d actually lose 0.8 or 0.9 yuan in labor costs on every order.

After all, oranges don’t just fall off the trees on their own. Picking, sorting, washing, and packing—every step costs money.

”Manager Zhang, we already had an agreement. How can I do business if I’m not making a profit?”

Wei Yucheng spread his hands and refused outright.

”Boss Wei, that’s not the right way to look at it. Look at our product display page. All the different grades of navel oranges are on a single link, which is different from Taobao. Users will pick and choose grades; they won’t all buy the lowest-priced one.”

”Use a low price to drive traffic, and use the higher-priced options to increase profit. Trust me, you definitely won’t lose money.”

Zhang Yifeng opened his laptop and showed Wei Yucheng the UI design mockups for Pinbei, trying to persuade him with the concept of tiered profit margins.

”I’m sorry, Manager Zhang. I’m a traditional businessman. I absolutely will not do business that doesn’t make a profit. However, if you’re willing to change the requirement to fruit with a diameter of less than 6 centimeters, then I could agree to your price.”

Wei Yucheng said, shaking his head.

It wasn’t that fruit under 6 centimeters tasted bad, but they were so small that even fruit peddlers couldn’t be bothered to buy them.

This kind of fruit was usually used for juice, canned goods, or left to rot in the orchard as fertilizer.

The cost was only 0.2 to 0.3 yuan, cheaper than the cardboard box.

”Six centimeters? Won’t the fruit be too small? Will it affect the taste?” Li Hui didn’t come from a well-off family and wasn’t picky about food. He thought that as long as there was no difference in taste, lowering the price was a good thing.

”Come on, I’ll take you to the workshop to have a look. The taste of the fruit is definitely not a problem. They’re just small and don’t look as good.”

Seeing Li Hui’s interest, Wei Yucheng led the three of them to the fruit-sorting workshop.

As soon as they entered, they saw a dense sea of navel oranges being sorted into baskets by size via conveyor belts and sorting machines. To the side, workers were neatly stacking the sorted oranges.

”Here, these are the ones,” Wei Yucheng said, pointing to the fruit in the corner.

Zhang Yifeng, Yuan Wei, and Li Hui went forward to inspect them and couldn’t help but frown. They picked up the fruit to size them up in their hands; they were only slightly larger than tangerines, with a diameter smaller than a duck egg.

”I’ll have a taste.” Li Hui was straightforward. He broke one open with force, tore off a slice, and popped it into his mouth.

He chewed a couple of times. He didn’t taste the sourness and astringency he expected. Instead, it was sweet, crisp, and juicy. Compared to the large 8-centimeter oranges, the flavor wasn’t bad at all.

”Let me try,” Zhang Yifeng said to Li Hui.

”Here! Brother Wei, you try some too,” Li Hui said, handing over the orange.

”Hey, you know what? Aside from their appearance, the taste is just as good,” Yuan Wei said with a laugh after taking a bite.

”Boss Wei, what’s the cost for fruit under 6 centimeters?” Zhang Yifeng asked, turning his head after taking a bite.

”Let’s just call it 0.2 yuan,” Wei Yucheng said nonchalantly.

”How about 2 kilograms for 5.9 yuan with free shipping? Using these smaller oranges to drive traffic will definitely be more effective than the 9.9 yuan price point.”

Zhang Yifeng’s eyes lit up as he asked for Wei Yucheng’s opinion.

”I’d still be losing money!” Wei Yucheng calculated in his head. The costs alone would be around 6 yuan.

”Boss Wei, if you trust me, I can sell out all the navel oranges from these surrounding orchards for you in a single day.”

Zhang Yifeng was blatantly bragging to get Wei Yucheng to agree.

”Manager Zhang, do you have any idea what the yield of these orchards is? The number would shock you. It’s at least 30,000 tons. At 2 kilograms per order, that’s 7.5 million orders.”

Wei Yucheng chuckled, not believing a word Zhang Yifeng said.

A bestselling fruit deal on Juhuasuan sold a few tens of thousands of orders a day at most!

He, Wei Yucheng, wasn’t some Xiaobai who had never been exposed to e-commerce. How could he possibly believe it?

Zhang Yifeng’s expression didn’t change as he said matter-of-factly, ”It’s only 30,000 tons. If I can’t sell it all, I’ll stay here and grow oranges for you for a year.”

”Damn! Manager Zhang, you play for keeps, huh?” Wei Yucheng was taken aback by his sheer audacity.

Although it was just a joke, it also showed him Zhang Yifeng’s confidence.

”Boss Wei, give me a straight answer. Are we doing this or not?” Zhang Yifeng pressed him for a decision.

”Alright. But let me be clear up front: I’ll only do 100,000 orders at the 5.9 yuan price. If the gross margin doesn’t improve after that, I’m not continuing.”

Wei Yucheng thought for a moment before giving his answer.

He wouldn’t lose much on the fruit itself; the main issue was the high labor costs.

Zhang Yifeng breathed a sigh of relief. He then pushed the price for the 6-7 centimeter oranges down by 1 yuan, and all other grades down by 2 yuan.

Although he hadn’t fully met Chen Yansen’s request, he had certainly done his best.

「That evening.」

Chen Yansen received Zhang Yifeng’s message. After pondering for a few seconds, he agreed.

’Anyway, since there are oranges of different diameters, it’s fine to just leave the choice to the users. If the navel oranges sell well on Pinbei, I can later expand from fruit to all fruits and vegetables, and eventually to the entire food category.’

Adding in categories like apparel, general merchandise, small home appliances, and beauty products, Chen Yansen was confident he could fill out all the mainstream, top-selling categories before Pinbei’s launch.

His starting point was different from Huang Zheng’s. One, he didn’t lack capital; two, he didn’t lack traffic; and three, he didn’t lack merchant resources.

The project had only been launched for 20 days, and the first batch of registered merchants already exceeded 400, with nearly ninety percent being factories and brand owners.

If they couldn’t offer a satisfactory price, they weren’t even qualified to join.

’I know very well that as long as merchants can make money on Pinbei, they’ll come rushing in at the first sniff of profit. I won’t even need to advertise. This is just like when I founded FoxTao; I have to create a benchmark to let the industry know that you can make money on Pinbei! Meiters is a backup option; the fruit merchant from Xiyue is the first choice. This is because the fruit and vegetable category has low unit prices and high order volumes, which will allow Cloud Speed Express to expand rapidly along with it. Right now, my 4,300 couriers contribute over 2,000 wisps of Human Dao Fire to me each month! If that number rises to 100,000, it would be 600,000 wisps of Human Dao Fire a year! At this rate, in less than two years, I could raise my Constitution and Spirit to over 100!’

After replying to Zhang Yifeng, Chen Yansen left the Science and Technology Park.

People from DST Capital were coming to visit tomorrow. On paper, it was a tour, but in reality, it was an investment inspection.

As long as he could ensure he retained controlling shares, Chen Yansen wasn’t opposed to financing partnerships, especially with an investor like DST that controlled vast resources in the supply chain.

Moreover, DST had partnerships with both Qualcomm and Microsoft, which meant there would be more room for negotiation on communication patent licensing fees.

In Chen Yansen’s opinion, the value of the Orange Phone Factory far exceeded that of Orange Technology. Giving up a portion of its equity in exchange for rich supply chain and patent resources was an absolute bargain.