Entertainment: 1990

Chapter 34 Desperate Measures
The reason Ma Yuan instructed Yan Xiaoming to listen to Zhang Yan's opinions was mainly because he was worried that Yan Xiaoming and the director would collude to arbitrarily change the script.

After all, this is not a rare occurrence; it's quite common in the film industry.

As for the 'unexpected gain' and so on, it was just something I said offhand.

To Ma Yuan's surprise, there was an unexpected gain, and it came so quickly.

He scratched the bald patch on his head and sighed again, "There are talented people in the Writers' Association. It's a pity that he is now a pillar of Tianjin literature, and he was just transferred there. Otherwise, it would have been great to poach him to our TV station."

At this point, Ma Yuan suddenly had a brilliant idea: "By the way, do you think we could ask this young writer Zhang to give some advice to our tertiary industry enterprises as well?"

"This……"

Yan Xiaoming hesitated, as if he wanted to say something but then stopped.

Chen Zhipeng, as always, spoke his mind: "Director Ma, you're asking too much of us. Our tertiary industry companies are simply lacking in product quality. We did advertise last year, and what happened? They're all hopeless cases!"

Chen Zhipeng is known for his youth and talent at the TV station, and he has been outstanding in advertising business in the past two years. The reason why he is still in a deputy position is because he can't keep his mouth shut.

Although these words are unpleasant to hear, they are the absolute truth.

The television station's tertiary industry businesses are indeed disappointing, or rather, it's not just the television station's tertiary industry businesses; there are very few good tertiary industry businesses nationwide.

Tertiary industry enterprises were originally affiliated enterprises established by state-owned enterprises to solve the employment problem of their employees' children. They were generally overstaffed and had low technical content.

With the proliferation of township enterprises in the past two years, they could not compete with large state-owned factories in terms of quality, nor could they compete with township enterprises in terms of price, and their operations quickly fell into difficulties.

This problem stems from the root cause. Even though the TV station has tried many methods, the financial hole in the tertiary sector is getting bigger and bigger. Unfortunately, it involves the interests of all parties, so it cannot simply be shut down.

"Let's give it a try first."

Although Ma Yuan also felt it was not very reliable, how could a leader's words be changed just because of a few words from a subordinate?

So he insisted, "You should discuss this with Comrade Zhang first. If he can really come up with a good idea, we can agree to any requests that don't violate our principles."

He paused for a moment, then continued, "I agree with advertising in TV dramas in principle, but it can't be too much or too obvious, otherwise it will be troublesome if people find fault with it. Here's what I'll do: I'll report to the station director later and see how to strike a balance."

This can be considered a sweet treat for the advertising department.

So Yan Xiaoming and Chen Zhipeng returned to the reception room.

Zhang Yan was chatting idly with Wei Liben about all sorts of things when he saw that the two main figures had finally returned. He quickly stood up and asked, "Director Yan, may I ask if our production center has any specific plans for the filming process?"

Actually, he wanted to ask about the casting, but he couldn't just take the initiative right away.

"Is this it?"

Yan Xiaoming casually replied in an official tone, "Our TV series is highly valued by the higher-ups, so the specific filming process needs to be carefully discussed before it can be finalized—we will definitely communicate with you, Teacher Zhang, at that time."

As he spoke, he glanced sideways at Chen Zhipeng.

He didn't approve of Ma Yuan's impulsive decision, so he hoped Chen Zhipeng would relay it to him.

But Chen Zhipeng also acted as if it were none of his business.

Yan Xiaoming couldn't help but secretly regret that he should have brought Wei Liben with him—but if he took Wei Liben with him, who would entertain Zhang Yan?

In the end, he could only briefly explain Ma Yuan's thoughts to Zhang Yan.

Then he added in advance, "Our Deputy Director Ma was just mentioning it casually. It's okay if he can't think of a solution."

Zhang Yan secretly considered this and felt that it was a way to expand his influence—even if he couldn't help in the end, it could lay the groundwork for the 'missing person notice'.

So he readily agreed, "What a coincidence! I have a favor to ask, but I don't know how to bring it up."

There really are requirements?
Yan Xiaoming frowned slightly, just about to ask Zhang Yan what he wanted, when he heard Zhang Yan say again, "Could you first give me a brief introduction to the situation of our TV station's tertiary industry enterprises?"

Yan Xiaoming didn't rush to speak, but instead turned to Wei Liben.

As the deputy director of the office, Wei Liben was quite familiar with the situation of tertiary industry enterprises, and immediately gave Zhang Yan a brief introduction.

As a large unit in a municipality, Tianjin TV Station has four tertiary industry enterprises, two of which are relatively large.

Zhang Yan quickly jotted it down on a piece of paper. When he heard that one of the companies was an instant noodle factory, he asked in surprise, "Instant noodle factories are also losing money?"

In his memory, instant noodles were a hot commodity, and at least the instant noodle factories in Hengjiang were doing quite well.

"The competition is quite fierce in Tianjin."

Wei Liben sighed and said, "There are several local companies, plus those from Beijing, Hebei, and even the Northeast, all wanting to get involved. There are almost twenty instant noodle brands on the market."

Unfortunately, our Guangming Flour Mill bought secondhand, old machinery, so the taste was slightly inferior, and the price... well, you know, it's a tertiary industry enterprise after all.

"Yes, it's a tertiary industry after all, so it's not surprising." Zhang Yan accepted this explanation, and then said to Wei Liben, "Director Wei, could you help me find a few bags of instant noodles from Guangming Flour Mill?"

"Yes, yes, yes."

Wei Liben hurriedly replied, "Our TV station cafeteria has them; we've stocked up on over a hundred boxes."

Chen Zhipeng muttered to himself, "The stuff that can't be sold can only be pushed onto us. At the end of the year, we'll probably have to give each of us a box as a bonus."

If it were given away for free, that would be fine. The problem is that more than half of the money he painstakingly earned from advertising went to fill these huge holes in the tertiary sector.

"Then let's go check out the cafeteria."

Zhang Yan made this suggestion, and the others naturally did not object, so the group moved to the TV station's cafeteria.

"Oh, Director Wei, what brings you here at this hour?! Is there something to arrange...?"

Here, Wei Liben, the deputy director of the office, clearly had more influence than Yan Xiaoming, the official director. After all, a local official has more power than a distant one.

"I have important business to attend to today!"

Wei Liben interrupted the chef, his face stern, and said, "Where are the instant noodles? Bring out a few packets."

"Those produced by Guangming Flour Mill?"

"Correct."

The chef was a little confused. It's one thing for ordinary people to be interested in instant noodles, but these middle-level managers are not people who have never eaten or seen instant noodles before. Why did they suddenly want to eat this?
However, he quickly retrieved a few packets of instant noodles. After Zhang Yan opened them, he found that there was only one powder packet inside, and when he casually broke it open, the noodles were a bit damp.

Moisture is a common problem with instant noodles these days. Although it doesn't affect edibility, it definitely diminishes the taste.

Zhang Yan felt that there should be a way to avoid it in the future, but that was not what he needed to focus on right now.

He wandered around the kitchen on his own, and the chefs, thinking he was there to inspect the hygiene, scrambled to clean up in a chaotic frenzy.

The supervisor in charge of the canteen also rushed over after hearing the news, and immediately began to complain to Wei Liben: "Old Wei, you didn't even notify me before coming to inspect, and you called me..."

"We're not here for an inspection."

Wei Liben gave a brief explanation, which eased the tense atmosphere.

One chef scoffed, "This stuff produced by Guangming Flour Mill is so bad that even a dog wouldn't bother eating it—it's hopeless, they might as well just go bankrupt."

"You put it lightly."

Wei Liben retorted angrily, "How are you going to arrange things for the more than one hundred people in the factory?!"

At this moment, Zhang Yan seemed to have noticed something and picked up a plastic bag from the spice rack.

Wei Liben leaned over to take a look and found that it was a garlic chili sauce produced locally in Tianjin.

Zhang Yan cut open the button with scissors, smelled it, and wasn't particularly satisfied. So he said to Wei Liben, "Could you fry some minced meat sauce, add a little of this chili sauce and some regular soybean paste, but not too much?"

Seeing that he seemed to have a real idea, Wei Liben quickly ordered the chefs to fry some minced meat.

Zhang Yan personally prepared two packets of instant noodles, one plain and the other with freshly fried minced meat sauce.

In front of the leaders, the chefs naturally had to show off their skills. The meat sauce was fried until it was fragrant, and the minced meat was piled up like a 'small mountain' on the instant noodles. Just looking at it made one's mouth water.

But Yan Xiaoming couldn't help but question, "Of course it tastes good this way, but the meat costs more than instant noodles, and besides, it's not convenient!"

"Then let's try to create a similar flavor using a cheaper method!" Zhang Yan shouted. "Then, just like the powder packet, make a meat sauce packet, using heavy oil and strong aroma to cover up the shortcomings of the noodles and enhance the flavor and fragrance!"

Zhang Yan had never eaten instant noodles in the future, but he had seen instant noodle advertisements in his dreams. Stripping away the false advertising of big fish and meat, there was a fairly obvious difference between instant noodles now and instant noodles in the future.

That is the diversity of seasoning packets.

These days, you usually only get powder packets, maybe with a vegetable packet at most, but you never see the sauce packets like in later generations.

Before Yan Xiaoming and the others could even react to Zhang Yan's explanation, one of the chefs excitedly slapped his thigh: "That's right! Isn't this the method we usually use? For dead fish and rotten meat, we have to use heavy oil and spices... Waaah~"

The head chef quickly covered his mouth and turned to Wei Liben with a smirk, saying, "Don't worry, the leaders eat special meals, so there's definitely no... ugh, I mean there's no such thing at all, don't listen to his nonsense!"

Wei Liben was too preoccupied with these thoughts to care about anything else. He had already realized what was happening and excitedly pulled Zhang Yan along, saying, "Writer Zhang, you are truly a great talent! Come on, let's go report to Deputy Director Ma right away!"

[PS: In the early 90s, instant noodles had already entered a period of intense competition, with instant noodle factories all over the country, and even slightly larger prefecture-level cities had their own instant noodle brands.]

When a certain chef's braised beef noodle soup suddenly appeared in 92, bringing with it the meat sauce packet and dominating the mainland market, these factories began to close down en masse.

(End of this chapter)