Bright Sword: Follow Kong's fun and build the strongest military industry

Hearing this, the others were immediately excited, but they were still hesitant and wanted to see other people's reactions first.

At this time, a man who specialized in selling wontons and noodles squeezed into the crowd and said loudly:

"Manager Zhang, I want to order a stove first, and half a month's supply of honeycomb coal. This good stuff is specially designed for small vendors like us. I will buy one today and try it out."

After he finished speaking, he smiled and explained to the others: "I have been looking at this kind of thing for a long time. I believe everyone knows that we in the snack business need to boil water frequently to cook wontons or noodles."

"It's too troublesome to use a fire pit to burn coal balls. Sometimes when I'm busy, I don't have time to change them. I can only choose to burn wood, and I have to burn good wood that comes from big trees."

"To be honest, the reason why our wontons and noodles are expensive is that a large part of the cost is the cost of buying firewood. Now if it is true as Manager Zhang said, we can burn at most five honeycomb coals a day. With only the price of one pound of grain, we can get the convenience of boiling water at any time. No matter how you calculate it, it is a cost-effective deal."

As small vendors in the market, they are very careful about costs. And just now we could indeed feel the temperature of the stoves. Just when we were talking, the water on several stoves had already boiled and was emitting steam.

If it were an ordinary family, as soon as the water boiled, they would immediately take the firewood out of the stove and bring the boiling water down. However, Manager Liu did not ask anyone to bring it down. Instead, he let the kettle continue to boil. The sight of the steam rising gave the whole area a fairy-like feeling.

How much firewood would be wasted? It's really a wasteful behavior. But I have to say that the effect is still good. Ordinary Chinese people rarely see this kind of scene. It gives people a feeling of wealth.

With someone taking the lead, everyone's interest in buying suddenly aroused, and some people paid for the stoves and honeycomb coal. Shopkeeper Zhang asked the buyers to leave their addresses and he would send someone to deliver the items later.

However, although today's transaction volume is not large, it is mainly because everyone is just in the wait-and-see stage. However, once people who buy stoves realize the benefits, they will promote it vigorously, and it won't be long before people who want to buy stoves and honeycomb coal will flock to them.

After all, everyone likes good things that are inexpensive and of good quality. Life is not easy for everyone these days, so every penny saved is a penny earned.

In addition, burning coal balls will produce a lot of smoke, which can easily cause problems if not handled properly. Honeycomb coal is made of crushed coal, which burns more completely and produces very little smoke. Comparing the two, everyone knows how to choose.

After a week, stoves and honeycomb coal became the hottest topics in the major bases of the Eighth Route Army, and many families were proud to own a stove.

After using it for a few days, everyone found that using a stove can save a lot of money, at least it can reduce the cost of living by 20%, which is a considerable amount.

As a result, the logistics department's stores in various places were suddenly crowded with customers who came to buy stoves and honeycomb coal. Many people even directly purchased a year's supply of honeycomb coal.

Some shrewd businessmen also saw business opportunities and sent caravans to the base to buy stoves and honeycomb coal, which they then transported to other cities and sold at high prices.

For example, in the territories currently controlled by the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army, many people also need this kind of high-quality and low-priced goods. As long as they are transported there and sold to wealthy restaurants and hotels, they can make several times the difference.

The Eighth Route Army did not impose any restrictions and even offered some discounts on prices to caravans from other places, such as discounts for large quantities.

The caravans mainly transported stoves and honeycomb coal from the base. It was impossible for them to come from other places empty-handed, so they would transport some supplies needed by the base. As long as there was a certain price difference, there would be people doing business in this area.

As a result, the economy of the base area will become active, and the Eighth Route Army will be able to gain more benefits from it, such as relevant taxes, or with more supplies, prices will become cheaper. This is a virtuous circle.

Half a month after the stoves and honeycomb briquettes were put on the market, Minister Zhang received statistics from the following departments:

The secretary pushed up his glasses and said with a cheerful face:

"Commander, after half a month of promotion, the total sales of stoves in the base have exceeded 100,000. Among them, there are about 95,000 ordinary stoves and 5,000 large stoves. As for honeycomb coal, nearly 20 million pieces have been sold."

"According to our cost statistics, ordinary stoves can earn 20% profit, large stoves can earn 50%, and honeycomb coal can earn 20%. In this way, we can earn about 20,000 yuan."

"Moreover, as time goes by, the sales of these stoves will increase. When the sales reach a certain level, we can make a lot of money every month even if we sell honeycomb coal."

After hearing this, Minister Zhang was very excited. This was a good start, and the next things would be much easier.

This is only the profit of half a month, and it has only been spread in a small range, but it has achieved such significant results. After it is fully rolled out, the profit will definitely be even greater.

This also means that the Logistics Department has an industry that can be shown off and can provide a steady supply of funds. This is a very important thing for the Eighth Route Army.

Suddenly, Minister Zhang thought of something and asked, "I heard that many merchants from the Jinsui Army's territory have come to our base and want to buy a large number of stoves and honeycomb coal?"

"Yes, Minister, I have to say that the people of Jin Province are born businessmen. As soon as we launched the stove, some people started to buy low and sell high. Not only did they buy in large quantities from our store, but they also bought from ordinary people at high prices. This is an extremely rare thing."

"This has caused a shortage of goods in major stores. Many people who want to buy goods cannot buy them all of a sudden. All the responsible persons have asked for instructions on how to deal with this situation?"

The logistics department had not anticipated this situation. After all, even if they had overestimated it in advance, they had not expected that the sales of stoves and honeycomb coal would be so popular, which made everyone panic.

Minister Zhang thought about it for a while, and suddenly remembered the countermeasures for this situation when he was chatting with Kong Hao before, and then replied with a smile:

"Notify all furnace workshops in the bases to increase production and double their scale. Recruit more military families to participate in the work. This will help them solve some of their life difficulties."

"We can definitely agree to those big orders, but the time will have to be postponed a bit, and there will also be additional conditions. We can ask them to help transport some critical supplies from other places to the base, and we can buy them at a high price."

"As long as these caravans can make money on both sides, we can increase the enthusiasm of the merchants. Moreover, these people have great power in Jin Province. We can fully use this to collect important supplies for the arsenal."

There are still many capable people in the Eighth Route Army, especially in the economic field. In the past, they didn't have anything good in their hands and couldn't give full play to their strengths. Now is the perfect time for them to show their talents.