It was almost four o'clock in the afternoon when Fang Bai left Gu Wen's office.
Today is February 23rd, the ninth day of the lunar month, leaving only five days until the planned Lantern Festival event!
Time was too tight; it might not be possible to arrange everything by then.
He quickly returned to Xinghai Shopping Mall and called a meeting with Fang Bai's parents, Jing Tian, Li Meng, Xiang Tianhai, and others.
There was a small office of twenty to thirty square meters inside the mall, where everyone usually squeezed in to work.
Once everyone had arrived, Fang Bai got straight to the point, sweeping his gaze across them before saying, "I have good news for everyone: the company has received approval from the county and has purchased the forty thousand square meters of land next to the mall, planning to build Wen City's largest comprehensive shopping plaza with a total planned investment of 200 million yuan.
Of course, our company doesn't have that much capital right now, so we can only proceed step by step; it would be good if we could complete it within a few years."
Jing Tian and the other university students who hadn't yet officially joined were shocked by the news; the company was expanding so quickly!
A shopping plaza with a total planned investment of 200 million yuan!
Oh my god, what would that look like?
It also meant that they, as the first batch of university students, would have more opportunities for promotion as the company grew, and their salaries and benefits might see significant increases.
Everyone was very excited.
Li Meng couldn't help but part her lips slightly, murmuring, "Wow, that's so much money," then her chubby face puffed up, her eyes widening a bit, trying to find something different about Fang Bai compared to others, feeling he was just a bit handsome and too good at talking, nothing special.
Before they could fully process the information, Fang Bai continued, "I plan to hold a large scratch-off lottery event during the Lantern Festival, and it has already received county approval. Time is extremely tight, and I need everyone's assistance. Please temporarily hand over your current work. If you planned to go home, that will have to be postponed…
This event has been decided. Everyone, please take notes of your work content, and ask questions if anything is unclear."
Then, Fang Bai elaborated, first explaining the detailed content of the scratch-off lottery event.
The continuous stream of news surprised everyone, including Fang Bai's parents.
Prizes worth a total of ten million yuan!
The procurement cost alone would be several million yuan, right? Did the family have that much cash to buy them?
Certainly not, at most three million yuan.
However, during the meeting, Fang Bai's parents knew it was not appropriate to ask there, as it would expose their family's wealth.
Yet, they had decided to hold this lottery event without even asking for their opinions.
Alas, their son was becoming more and more of a schemer.
This afternoon, when Fang Shi left the county government compound, his mind could not settle. He felt his son was too much of a schemer; that was a forty-thousand-square-meter shopping mall!
Converted, that was sixty mu of land!
Even ancient royal noble mansions were probably not much more than that, right?
How much money would that require for investment?
Fang Shi just made a rough estimate: just building a single-story shell would cost ten million yuan.
If they built five stories and decorated it, it would definitely exceed one hundred million.
The problem was, the family didn't have that much money. They had just borrowed two million yuan before the Spring Festival, and now they needed to borrow another five million yuan.
That was seven million yuan in bank loans all at once, with annual interest alone reaching one million yuan.
If it weren't for the booming sales of appliances during the Spring Festival, Fang Shi truly wouldn't know where to scrounge up money to repay the debt.
If they really lost money, the graves of eighteen generations of ancestors would be smoking.
After thinking for a while, Fang Shi also became more open-minded, just as his son had said, those who borrow large sums are the real bosses.
Now they were going to hold a lottery event, which would immediately cost several million yuan, and he still felt a bit pained. It was so hard to save two or three million yuan, and a lot of it was customer top-ups.
His thoughts returned, and he listened carefully to his son's work arrangements.
Fang Bai saw that everyone was a bit dazed, perhaps the information was too surprising, so he tapped the table to remind them:
"I'll first arrange everyone's pre-event work. Time is pressing, so everyone needs to act quickly.
The big boss needs to find out by tomorrow afternoon which printing or offset printing factories outside the city can design and print scratch-off lottery tickets. They must be capable of anti-counterfeiting, and the quantity is eight million tickets."
With high-value prizes, some people would always try to exploit loopholes.
The lottery tickets must have anti-counterfeiting measures, and the most crucial anti-counterfeiting had to come from the tickets themselves.
In later generations, the main anti-counterfeiting measures for instant lottery tickets included: security area verification codes, floating letters, micro-text, and dot matrix symbols. By adopting these anti-counterfeiting measures, the probability of forged tickets and forged winning information could be minimized.
Fang Bai wasn't sure what could be done in this era; he would only know after asking the printing factory.
If the event lasted ten days, Fang Bai would need to prepare ten types of lottery tickets with different anti-counterfeiting base designs, selling one type of base design after another.
It was required that prizes be scratched and redeemed on the same day, otherwise they would expire and become invalid.
From morning sales to afternoon closing, in just over ten hours, counterfeiters would not have enough time to forge them.
Fang Bai would not use local printing or offset printing factories for the scratch-off tickets. The other party would not get the design base map and would not know which printing or offset printing factory Fang Bai used.
And for scratch-off tickets made in other places, they wouldn't know where Fang Bai was holding the event.
There were also other imitation methods, which Fang Bai had to consider thoroughly.
In addition to the anti-counterfeiting of the tickets themselves, Fang Bai planned to customize and engrave a batch of seals.
The lottery tickets to be sold must be stamped, and the seals used each day would be different, but this would be a huge workload, and he wasn't sure if it could be managed.
If the ticket anti-counterfeiting was done well, this step wouldn't be necessary, but Fang Bai felt that if it could be managed, it would be safer to take precautions, especially since there was no QR code for anti-counterfeiting identification at that time.
Fang Bai would discuss these matters in detail with his father later.
Printing eight million lottery tickets was not a large quantity for an offset printing factory, but it was a considerable amount of work.
This was just his preliminary plan; he felt there were still some omissions he hadn't considered, which would only be adjusted during execution.
Fang Bai continued, "Li Meng, you are responsible for finding dealers or manufacturers of santana cars, motorcycles, and bicycles, getting their phone numbers, and clarifying wholesale prices. We need a large quantity: 5 cars, 100 domestic 125cc motorcycles, and 2,000 domestic bicycles, all of which must be delivered before the Lantern Festival;
Jing Tian, you are responsible for finding manufacturers of daily necessities such as toothbrushes, soap, washing powder, salt, and towels. The procurement price should be controlled at around five mao, and the quantity is one million units. Also, clarify the prices;
Xiang Tianhai, you need to set up a two-meter-high, twenty to thirty square meter awards stage, sound system, and other facilities, as well as sixty sales point counters and other on-site equipment;
Chen Yang, you are to handle external publicity. Contact Wen City newspapers and tricycles. Once we are almost ready on our end, we will start city-wide publicity.
…
After the meeting, I will give you a list and requirements. Since we are purchasing products in bulk, first ask the manufacturers if they offer promotional fees for helping them promote their products.
Materials are particularly tight now, and we are in urgent need. Some manufacturers may not have stock; if one doesn't, switch to another. Don't argue with manufacturers, and some manufacturers may have stock but not be willing to sell to us. If it's a state-owned enterprise, act according to the other party's identity; simply increasing the price won't work, be smart. You all inquire first, and finally let the big boss negotiate. If it's really not possible, I will talk.
Time is very, very tight!
From now until the end of the event, you will receive triple salary. If overtime is needed, work overtime. All event expenses will be reimbursed. If you need an advance, get it from the boss's wife. Write your own work plan and report your progress to me every half day. If there's really no money, then spend money to save time.
If the event goes very smoothly, after the event, I will give each of you a big red envelope of no less than three thousand yuan.
Don't tell others about this red envelope and triple salary, so as not to cause psychological imbalance and discourage employee enthusiasm. If anyone is loose-lipped, the reward will be canceled.
But if sales are unfavorable, then I don't need to say more."
As long as everything went smoothly, even if not all were sold, Fang Bai's profit would be no less than seven million yuan, so giving employees a little reward was appropriate.
Fang Bai's preliminary plan was to design eight million lottery tickets, with a total of 2,012,755 winning spots, for a winning rate of approximately 25%.
Prizes included: 5 Special Prizes of santana cars, market value 200,000 yuan, procurement cost around 170,000 yuan;
100 First Prizes of domestic 125cc motorcycles, market value about 10,000 yuan, procurement cost 4,000-5,000 yuan;
200 Second Prizes of 21-inch color televisions, market value 3,500 yuan, procurement cost about 1,800 yuan;
600 Third Prizes of washing machines and refrigerators, market value nearly 2,000 yuan, procurement cost about 800 yuan;
2,000 Fourth Prizes of 26-inch domestic bicycles, market value about 250 yuan, procurement cost 100-200 yuan;
2,000 Fifth Prizes of gas stoves and point-and-shoot cameras, market value over 200 yuan, procurement cost less than 100 yuan;
4,000 Sixth Prizes of pressure cookers, electric shavers, skincare sets, and other goods, market value about 100 yuan, procurement cost 30-40 yuan;
5,000 Seventh Prizes of belts, electronic watches, cups, and other goods, market value about 40-50 yuan, procurement cost about 10 yuan;
1,000,000 Eighth Prizes of high-end daily necessities, market value about 3 to 5 yuan, procurement cost 1-2 yuan;
1,000,000 Ninth Prizes of washing powder, soap, towels, paper napkins, and a dozen other daily necessities, market value about 1 to 2 yuan, procurement cost about five mao;
The Eighth and Ninth Prizes had high winning probabilities, so even if a customer won an Eighth Prize, they would still feel they had profited.
The total procurement value of the above prizes was approximately 5 million yuan, and the market value was approximately 10 million yuan, which was not an exaggeration.
If successful, the gross profit margin would be 11 million yuan, taxes about 2 million yuan, donations 160,000 yuan, event costs and other expenses estimated at several hundred thousand yuan, with a profit of no less than 7 million yuan.
As for the risk, it was just investing several hundred thousand in event costs; the goods purchased could be sold in the mall or returned.
If the total procurement cost was only one or two million yuan, Fang Bai estimated that sales would be unfavorable, they would be cursed by the public, and earn less, and he was even more afraid of relevant departments settling accounts later.
Moreover, this was to promote Xinghai Plaza, at least to appear more "conscientious." Conscience did not mean earning less; Fang Bai had "calculated" everything carefully.
Fang Bai didn't have that much cash for procurement, but his purchasing volume was large, so prepaying half the funds was feasible, and besides, some goods were not purchased in such large quantities all at once.
After Fang Bai finished speaking, everyone took turns asking questions, brainstorming ideas.
Fang Bai also missed some details, but in the general direction, he was well-informed and had no problems.
For example, Xiang Tianhai and Chen Yang did not know the specific budget, and Fang Bai had only set up a plan without detailed calculations for these.
If temporary staff were needed, they would have to hire them themselves and negotiate the fees.
For this event, Fang Bai gave these students who had not yet officially joined a great deal of autonomy, hoping they could solve problems independently, and everyone was under immense pressure.
But Fang Bai also said that with triple salary and generous bonuses, they had to get it done even if it meant working to death.
Fang Bai's mother was mainly responsible for finance, and also for the operation of the appliance mall.
Everyone discussed for over an hour and had mostly figured out their respective tasks. Finally, Fang Bai said some words of encouragement.