Flowers in full bloom

The next day, Xiaoyuan went to the private school, and Hualei followed Brother Ping'an and Xiaoxiao to a printing house in Beiting Lane, the northern part of Shangjing City. The bookstore had purchased secondary goods here. The bookstore had been open for a month, but business was slow. The revenue was not only far from Hualei's expected target, but sometimes it could not catch up with the old house.

Hualei was a little anxious. She had also visited the main streets of Dongcheng District a while ago and found that there were not many bookstores in Dongcheng District. In such a large area of ​​Dongcheng District, there were only about four or five in total.

The larger one was the bookstore called "Zhiyuan" on the main street of Dongda Street. The other bookstores were about the same size as Huaji Bookstore, with the same storefront and the same things sold as Huaji Bookstore, including the writing brushes, inkstones, and handwritten copies of the Four Books and Five Classics. Of course, their business was also very slow.

However, the business of the larger "Zhiyuan" bookstore is relatively better. Hualei had taken Xiaoxiao there several times and wandered around the bookstore for most of the day. She found that the biggest revenue of "Zhiyuan" bookstore should be calligraphy and painting. There are many real masters of calligraphy and painting in this era, and many people are chasing calligraphy and painting, so there are also many imitations of calligraphy and painting. It is said that the calligraphy and painting of the masters of the previous dynasty that are slightly realistic and good can be priced at several hundred taels per foot, and the price is very popular.

Huaji Bookstore did not mention this. The writing brushes, ink, paper and inkstones sold in Zhiyuan Bookstore were much better than those sold in Huaji Bookstore, but because of their high quality, they were more expensive and not many people patronized them.

However, the various books sold in the "Zhiyuan" bookstore are already woodblock printed. Now woodblock printing has been popularized among the people in Shangjing City for three or four years, and is slowly spreading to the surrounding cities.

However, the production of engraving plates was troublesome and time-consuming, and the requirements for the wood used for engraving plates and the craftsmen who carved the characters were extremely high. Therefore, it was not possible for ordinary people to produce a set of engraving plates. Basically, they were produced by government workshops, with a small number of aristocratic families participating. As a result, the printed books were expensive and few people were interested in them.

When the old house was in operation, the bookstore sold the most handwritten books, and occasionally an engraved edition was sold to correct the errors in the handwritten books. However, after the students had seen the engraved editions, it was no longer attractive to buy handwritten books, so many students would rather stand at the "Zhiyuan" bookstore to look at the engraved editions than patronize small bookstores to buy handwritten books, after all, the error rate of handwritten books was too high.

Therefore, if we continue to follow the old house's business model, it will not work in Shangjing City. We still need to find a new way out for the bookstore. So Hualei plans to go to the printing house first.

Hualei went to the woodblock printing workshop in Beiting Lane, Chengbei District. This woodblock printing workshop is a family-run workshop. I heard that the owner behind it is a clerk of the Imperial College, but I don't know if it's true or not. The entrance of the printing workshop is very low-key, with a "print" word directly hung on the left side of the gate.

There was no surname or explanation, so people who didn't know would think it was a loan sharking place. Brother Ping An took Hua Lei and Xiao Xiao into the unremarkable gate, but there was a different world inside.

The entire printing studio is very large, with an area of ​​nearly 2,000 square meters, divided into four large spaces. The first is an area where various types of woodblocks are displayed. Pieces and sets of woodblocks are arranged in different categories, including the Four Books and Five Classics, historical Confucian classics, storybooks, picture albums, Yin and Yang Bagua, Qi Men Dun Jia, and Hua Lei.

As soon as Hualei saw these engravings, she began to believe the rumor that the owner of the house was the bookkeeper of the Imperial College. After all, ordinary people were unlikely to have such a large collection of books. Even if aristocratic families could afford such a rich and complete collection of books, it would take a lot of money and time to make engravings. So this printing house was probably an official printing house as well as a workshop printing house. So it was very likely that the owner of the house was the bookkeeper of the Imperial College.

Hualei looked at it carefully for a long time. Next to the woodblock printing area is the printing area, where various books are printed on order, including official and private editions. Dozens of people are working inside, applying ink, placing paper, and pressing. Each of them performs their duties, and it is busy but not chaotic.

The next area is the binding area, where the printed papers are dried and bound into books according to the page numbers. Similarly, dozens of people are busy working in an orderly manner.

There is also a finished product warehouse, where finished products that have not yet been shipped are piled up. Next to the finished product warehouse, there is a small room of 100 square meters with the door ajar. Hua Lei took a look and casually asked the guy who was unloading the goods nearby what this room was. The guy said it was a defective product room. Hua Lei asked if he could go in and take a look. After asking the manager, the guy let Hua Lei in. The room was also full of bookshelves, and on the shelves were some defective printed products and leftover books after completing the orders.

Originally, printing houses usually worked on an order-based basis. In order to avoid the finished books not meeting the order quantity, they would print a few more copies during printing. This is what we call floating orders in the past. Therefore, this defective warehouse contained both official and privately printed books, with varying quality and small quantities. Some even had only one copy.

But they were arranged neatly and in different categories. This shows the respect for books and knowledge in this era. Hualei was very interested in this. She asked the manager of the printing house if these could be sold. Perhaps no one had ever asked this question before. The second manager looked surprised and could not make a decision. After asking the clerk to get a positive answer from the boss, Hualei and the other two went into the defective goods warehouse and went straight to the bookshelves of the Four Books and Five Classics, Classical Classics, History and Poetry.

After roughly flipping through the books of different batches on the bookshelf, he started to load them onto his mule cart. Then he picked and chose from several shelves of defective books, choosing the good and the bad. After several hours, he had selected a large number of books.

Finally, he spent several hours sifting through the bookshelves for picture albums of storytelling novels, Yin-Yang, Eight Trigrams, and Qi Men Dun Jia, and found a large number of books. The second manager was stunned and surprised at the same time. He was afraid that Hua Lei's mule cart could not fit them all. Hua Lei regretted her decision and asked the printing shop's clerk to drive a mule cart to deliver the books to her door for free.

At this point, the manager got thirty taels of silver and Hualei got two carts of books, and both parties were very happy. And what no one expected was that from then on, the two parties had a long-term cooperation and found a way to make money by turning waste into treasure.

Hualei returned to Qingyun Lane with two carts full of books. She placed the books in the west room like treasures and turned the west room into a place for repairing books. Of course, this repair meant repairing books.

First, sort out all the unordered books of the Four Books and Five Classics. Each order may only have one or two extra books, but the printing house prints many batches. Over the years, the number of books has increased. These books are just printed in different batches, but the content is exactly the same, and they are basically official prints, with very good quality. They can be directly sold in bookstores.