Chapter 88 Wholesale Market

  Thanks for Tony and Ngstone's great support today!

  The next day, the old village chief counted all the chestnuts. Chu Shengmin had a total of 6,700 pounds, Yang Guafu had 5,400 pounds, and another family had 2,300 pounds, for a total of 14,000 pounds.

  Chu Jiaqiang contacted the buyer and they said it was too little, so they wouldn't send a car to pick it up. Instead, they told Chu Jiaqiang to take it to the city district where their people would purchase it at the wholesale market for 4-8 yuan, depending on the quality of the chestnuts.

  "Pack up! Today we'll pack up Shengyi Uncle's car, and take it to the city. The other side also has a special purchasing point in our city. They said the lowest price is four yuan." Chu Jiaqiang said to the three families with chestnuts.

  The onlookers were all envious, the lowest price was 40,000 yuan, and this total is over 500,000 yuan, nearly 600,000 yuan. Among them, Chu Shengmin and Yang Guafu were the luckiest, with an income of one or two hundred thousand yuan that they couldn't escape.

  Second Uncle immediately went to find Chu Shengyi, he had discussed it with Yang Widow and Li Jing. He put out 200, Yang Widow 200, Li Jing 100, a total of 500 to rent Chu Shengyi's cart for one day.

  Chu Shengyi agreed without hesitation, the city is only about 50 kilometers away, and it will take about two hours to get there. The round trip doesn't even need half a day, usually running for a whole day can't earn more than 200 yuan, excluding fuel costs, it's only about 100 yuan, that's if there are jobs available.

  The Chu family helped pack the chestnuts into large snake skin bags, and Second Aunt sealed the mouths of the bags with big pins. Everyone lent a hand to load them onto the truck, and the three principals, plus Chu Jiaqiang and driver Chu Shengyi, set off towards the city together. Second Uncle and Li Jing stayed in the back of the truck, taking care of the chestnuts, while Chu Jiaqiang and Yang Widow sat in the front cab.

  This is Chu Shengyi's first long-distance drive, driving on a standard provincial road, feeling very good.

  "Jiaqiang, help me prune my fruit tree in two days too. I'm also planning to manage it for a year and try the water." Chushengyi couldn't resist this high-profit temptation either and planned to work with Jiaqiang for a year.

  "Oh! Alright! By the way, Shengyi Uncle, what kind of fruit tree do you have?" Chu Jiaqiang asked. Not all fruit trees can make a lot of money, some fruits have high yields but their prospects are not very bright.

  "Persimmons! Persimmons are relatively cheaper, usually around 1 yuan per catty." Chu Jiaqiang explained to Chu Shengyi.

  Chu Shengyi furrowed his brow, but didn't say anything. If you want to talk about which fruit tree is the easiest to manage, persimmon trees are the best, and chestnut trees have to take a back seat.

  Easy to manage, long fruiting period, generally after 3-4 years of grafting, it starts to bear fruit, and reaches its peak fruiting period in 15 years. The economic lifespan can reach up to 100 years, with the saying "one year of planting, 100 years of benefits". It is an important tree species for developing mountainous areas to alleviate poverty and become rich, and also a superior tree species that maintains ecological balance in nature. Persimmon trees are not particular about soil selection, whether it's mountainous, hilly, plain, or riverbank; fertile land, barren land; clay, sandy soil can all produce equivalent yields.

  Take his current few acres of persimmons as an example. Without any management, the trees are still full of persimmons every year, and almost every tree can be picked for hundreds of kilograms, with a total of tens of thousands of kilograms. Every year, except for some particularly idle people who go back to pick some and soak them in water to remove the astringent taste, most of them hang on the trees until they are ripe and fall to the ground, which is heartbreaking to see.

  "I don't even know if my persimmons can be sold, but if they can, I'll deliver them to your doorstep for 50 cents a pound," said Chu Shengyi. He was unclear about the level of quality of the managed persimmons outside and didn't know if his own would be wanted by anyone.

  He's speaking from the heart, even if it's just 50 cents a catty, there's still over 10,000 yuan in income. He thought to himself, should he get Chu Jiaqiang to help pick out some higher-end fruits?

  "Is that a lot? Go back and sell some to me, I want some dried ones, persimmon cakes taste great! Persimmons are not popular in our city, but they have become a mainstream industry in the neighboring province. The prices are also higher, basically all of them have undergone deep processing, made into persimmon cakes, persimmon vinegar, and lion sauce, so the profit is much higher. It's the same persimmon, dried and the price goes up four or five times, made into persimmon vinegar or lion sauce it goes up more than ten times." Chu Jiaqiang said what he knew.

  "What's the point of selling? If you want some, just go ahead and pick them from the tree. The problem is how to sell them, it's a headache! And going out of province is such a hassle!" Chu Shengyi felt a bit bitter, wondering why he had planted persimmon trees in the first place.

  "No way! I want more, weigh a few hundred catties for me, and I'll give you one yuan per catty. And Shengyi Uncle, you don't have to worry either, you can pick them off, peel the skin, and dry them into persimmon cakes. Persimmon cakes don't need to be sold outside the province, just bring them to the wholesale market in the city, five or six yuan is not guaranteed, but three or four yuan per catty for wholesale is definitely possible." Chu Jiaqiang showed him a clear way out.

  Chu Shengyi's eyes lit up, three or four pieces per catty? His own dried persimmon cakes were estimated to be nearly 10,000 catties, which was a huge income. Even Yang Guafu next to him was staring with wide eyes, looking like this guy made more money than himself.

  "Say no need to sell, then don't need to sell, still the same sentence, you want how much yourself go pick. But uncle has a request, wants you to help guide the persimmon cake's method, should be different from our rural area's method?" Chǔ Shèngyì said he would never accept Chǔ Jiāqiáng's money, himself still having things to ask of him.

  Chu Jiaqiang nodded and said, "Alright, I'll go over to help when the time comes. Actually, it's not much different, we just eat them ourselves in the countryside, no need to be too particular. When selling, the main thing is to make them look a bit prettier, and press them into shape when they're almost dry."

  The two chatted and chatted, unknowingly arriving in the city, Zhu Jiaqiang pointed to the road, and the car entered the wholesale market.

  After getting off the car, Chu Jiaqiang called the person in charge again, and the other party came quickly. After greeting each other and smoking a circle, they went straight to the topic: "Let's take a look at the goods first!"

  "Good!" Chu Jiaqiang climbed up onto the cart, pulled out a bag for each of the three people including Second Uncle, and handed them down to those below.

  He pulled the mouth of the bag, and the person in charge shook the snakeskin bag violently from side to side before picking up some to examine closely.

  "The quality isn't too good! The chestnut variety is still okay." said the person in charge.

  Second Uncle was about to speak, but Chu Jiaqiang preempted him, saying: "These chestnuts of ours are all purely natural, so their appearance can't be compared with those that have been fertilized and sprayed with pesticides. As someone who has dealt with chestnuts for years, you should be able to see this at a glance."

  "Oh? So that's it!" The man suddenly sank into thought and secretly thought no wonder, without fertilizers or pesticides, the small size was to be expected.

  "Alright! Since you said so, I won't lower the price. For a bag of this quality, I usually buy it for 4 yuan and 50 cents. Considering these chestnuts are green food, I'll give 5 yuan." The man seemed to have made a major decision. Then he also gave Yang widow 5 yuan and 50 cents, and Li Jing's was also 5 yuan.

  Second Uncle and others heard this, their faces slightly joyful. They originally thought it would be sold at the lowest price, but unexpectedly they could get a higher price, which was several thousand more.

  At this price, it's almost there, Chu Jiaqiang didn't entangle anymore and helped move in immediately.

  When they counted their money, Second Uncle had over 30,000, Yang widow also had nearly 30,000, and even the most frugal Li Jing had over 10,000. The three of them were all very happy.

  Chu Shengyi could only envy, but thinking that as long as he did a good job with the persimmon cake, 30,000 yuan was not a difficult task. He hurriedly pulled Chu Jiaqiang to take a look at the wholesale price of the persimmon cake, and saw that the most expensive wholesale price was as high as eight blocks, which really shocked him for half a day. However, Chu Jiaqiang told him that this type of persimmon cake was only available in the north and was relatively rare, plus the freight cost, so the price was not surprising.

  This time, Chu Shengyi was already confident. He found that the lowest price was more than three yuan, which looked very ugly, but as long as he did a good job, it would be much better than those low-end goods, and selling for four yuan would not be a problem. Calculating it down, it was more than 40,000 yuan, also a staggering fortune.