Chapter 18 – Cracks in the Foundation
By early spring, Li Ming's Italian restaurants had hit what most businessmen would call a "perfect state."
Sales were steady, customer reviews were glowing, and his managers rarely had major problems to report.
It was almost boring.
Almost.
The Missing Shipment
One Tuesday morning, his procurement manager stormed in.
"Boss, the cheese shipment from Haicheng is delayed. The supplier says their plant failed a hygiene inspection and was shut down for a week."
Li Ming frowned.
That supplier had been with them since the first restaurant. Reliable, fast, and reasonably priced.
But a week without their mozzarella? Disaster.
"How much do we have in stock?"
"Enough for three days at most. After that, we'll need to either close stores or change the menu."
Closing stores — even for a few days — would be a PR nightmare.
An Expensive "Solution"
After a quick round of calls, Li Ming found a temporary cheese supplier in another province.
They could deliver — but at almost double the cost.
His accountant looked at the numbers and paled.
"This will cut into this month's profits by at least twenty percent."
Li Ming smiled faintly. "Good. Do it."
The accountant blinked.
"…Good?"
"Better to keep the customers happy," he said aloud.
Privately, he thought, And maybe lose some money while we're at it.
The Dangerous Thought
Still, the incident left a bad taste in his mouth.
If one small hiccup in the supply chain could threaten his entire network, maybe…
…maybe he should own more of that supply chain himself.
Not just cheese, but bread, sauces, meat.
If he controlled it all, no one could interrupt his operations — and it might even let him experiment with other products.
He scribbled in his notebook that night:
Idea: Build own processing plant → "secure" Italian chain → maybe use for other chain later?
He underlined other chain twice.
A Glimpse Beyond the Province
At the quarterly managers' meeting, the numbers from outside cities caught his eye.
One store near the provincial border had started drawing customers from neighboring provinces.
Weekend sales were almost double the weekday average.
After the meeting, his marketing director joked, "Boss, maybe we should open in the next province. Let the pasta conquer China."
Li Ming chuckled — but didn't say no.
He'd always thought the burger chain would be the one to go national first.
But maybe… maybe they'd both expand.
Not now, though. First, he'd finish saturating the province and quietly building the invisible machinery that would feed both empires.