Chapter 366: Jiang Longcheng’s Pledge

After leaving the cotton mill, Li Yi rushed straight to the city center!

He needed to find a suitable location in the city as soon as possible to set up a clothing boutique that would really catch people’s attention.

With An Hong and the experienced Director Tan on board, production shouldn’t be an issue; now it was all about how to quickly promote these garments.

And for promotion, a physical location was essential—and a boutique was undoubtedly the best choice!

If it were just the small batch of clothes Li Yi had on hand, he likely wouldn’t have gone to such great lengths; he could have simply wholesaled them to others to sell, sparing himself all this trouble.

But now that Jiang Longcheng is the director of the cotton mill, reviving this stagnant enterprise will require some serious effort.

Given the current situation, for the cotton mill to make a comeback, in addition to adjusting its industrial structure, establishing its own sales channels is of the utmost importance.

Otherwise, given the management skills of the current staff, it wouldn’t take long for competitors to copy and surpass them.

But after wandering around the city for most of the day, Li Yi still hadn’t found a suitable location.

Every storefront in the city larger than 5 square meters had been rented out, and even the slightly better spots on the streets had been snapped up for street stalls—so there was no way a large store of several hundred square meters was waiting for him.

There was no way around it: over the past three years, 300,000 educated youth had returned to the capital, and while a small fraction had secured jobs, the rest had all become unemployed.

With the implementation of policies allowing them to operate food stalls and sell small goods, a large number of them turned to petty trade to make a living—which is why finding a single shop in Beijing right now is next to impossible!

By the afternoon, Li Yi realized that continuing his search like this would likely be fruitless, so he decided to return to the cotton mill to talk with Jiang Longcheng again and see if he had any suitable space available.

By the time Li Yi returned to the cotton mill, it was already 5:30 p.m.

Jiang Longcheng was in his office, just about to pack up and head home, when he suddenly saw Li Yi push open the door and walk in.

“Speak of the devil! I was just thinking about coming to see you, and here you are!” Jiang Longcheng said with a smile.

“What do you need me for?” Li Yi asked, sounding a bit weary.

“I’ve already put you in touch with the reporter from the Workers’ Daily. We’ve set up a meeting for tomorrow evening. Does that work for you?” Jiang Longcheng said.

“That’s fine with me!”

“That’s great!”

Jiang Longcheng continued, “The factory leadership held another meeting this morning and approved the plan to establish a sales channel. You need to come up with a concrete proposal so they can implement it as soon as possible!”

Noticing the slight hoarseness in Jiang Longcheng’s voice, Li Yi immediately asked, “Has it been a bit rough?”

“It’s not too bad…”

“Be honest!” Li Yi said.

Jiang Longcheng was silent for a long moment, then said, “It really hasn’t been going smoothly. We had meetings all day today, mainly focusing on the future direction of the cotton mill. Since most of the fabric produced by the weaving workshop this year hasn’t sold, many people think we should cut the weaving operation and focus solely on spinning.”

“Others, however, believe the current situation is still unclear and that we should wait and see how things develop before making a decision…”

Hearing this, Li Yi couldn’t help but furrow his brow.

I have to say, the executives at this cotton mill really aren’t cut out for business; their thinking is a bit naive.

They think that if the fabric they weave doesn’t sell, they can just cut that part of the business and focus solely on spinning to turn the factory around.

That’s just plain crazy!

The main reason their fabric isn’t selling is that the yarn quality is subpar.

And the substandard yarn is primarily due to issues with some of the raw materials. Once they switch to better raw materials, these problems will disappear. Therefore, the factory’s profitability has absolutely nothing to do with the weaving workshop.

More importantly, there are at least several thousand cotton spinning mills of all sizes across the country right now, but very few of them have weaving workshops.

In the textile industry, spinning and weaving are distinct processes.

Spinning is the process of turning cotton, flax, wool, and other materials into yarn, while weaving is the process of turning yarn into fabric.

Currently, many factories only engage in simple cotton or wool spinning and do not weave fabric; only large factories are capable of both spinning and weaving.

So, in Li Yi’s view, having the ability to weave their own fabric was not a burden for the State-Owned Second Cotton Spinning Factory, but rather their greatest advantage at the moment—it allowed them to be more flexible and adaptable when adjusting their industrial structure.

To cut the weaving operations—who would even think of such a thing?

It’s not that Li Yi looks down on them, but if they stuck solely to spinning, he estimated they wouldn’t even last three years before having to file for bankruptcy.

“What do you think?”

Jiang Longcheng replied immediately, “I don’t think we should cut it. In fact, I believe selling ready-to-wear clothing has great potential. So I proposed that we not only keep our existing operations but also expand into clothing production and sales, and establish our own sales channels.”

“And what happened?”

“Well, the whole group vehemently opposed it—none of them agreed with my idea!”

“So how did you convince them?” Li Yi asked curiously.

“I made a solemn pledge to all the factory’s executives!” Jiang Longcheng said, making a startling statement.

“A written pledge?”

“That’s right. I gave them a year to see what I could do. If the factory hadn’t turned things around within a year, I’d resign in disgrace!” Jiang Longcheng said.

Li Yi said with a mix of amusement and exasperation, “So you basically staked your own future to shut those people up?”

“What else could I do?”

Jiang Longcheng continued, “Brother-in-law, I’ve staked everything on you. Don’t let me down!”

Hearing this, Li Yi fell silent for a long moment.

After a moment’s thought, he said, “Here’s what we’ll do. When I get back today, I’ll draw up a detailed action plan based on your factory’s situation.”

“Then you just follow the plan, and six months will be more than enough to turn the factory around!”

Hearing this, Jiang Longcheng burst out laughing immediately: “Brother Li Yi… my dear brother-in-law, you really are my lucky star! With you saying that, Third Brother here can rest easy!”

Before he could finish, Li Yi interjected, “Don’t get too excited just yet. This plan touches on every aspect of the cotton mill, and there are quite a few areas that might infringe on other people’s interests. You’d better be mentally prepared!”

“Prepared for what? Are you worried they’ll try to hold me back?” Jiang Longcheng frowned.

“Mm-hmm!”

Jiang Longcheng continued, “I made it very clear to them at the meeting today: we’re setting a one-year deadline. Within that year, they’ll give their full support to my efforts to establish the garment factory. If it succeeds, I’ll continue as factory director, and you’ll all share in the credit.”

“If it doesn’t pan out, I’ll walk away—no need for them to take the fall! And if anyone dares to hold me back during this time, don’t blame me for being ruthless!”

Hearing these defiant words, Li Yi couldn’t help but nod.

Although Jiang Longcheng had a somewhat cynical streak, he was still quite decisive when it came to getting things done.

He might not be a great leader, but he was a capable executor.

As long as the plan was well-prepared, given his personality, he should be able to carry it out effectively.

“By the way, I’m planning to open a clothing boutique downtown, but I’ve looked around and haven’t found a suitable location. Do you have any connections?” Li Yi asked.

“What do you mean by a ‘specialty store’?”

“It’s a store that exclusively sells the clothes we produce. The specific requirements are…”

After hearing Li Yi’s explanation of the boutique, Jiang Longcheng immediately replied, “I get it—it needs to be in a bustling downtown area with enough space, right?”

“Exactly!”

“Alright, leave it to me!”

“Mm-hmm!”

“Brother-in-law, I’m planning to head to the hospital in a bit to check on Aunt San. Are you coming?” Jiang Longcheng asked again.

“Sure!”

“Alright, let’s head over right now…”

However, before Jiang Longcheng could finish speaking, the phone on the desk suddenly rang…

…….

PS: I’m really sorry for skipping yesterday’s update. This illness is truly dreadful. The day before yesterday, my fever had gone down and I felt pretty good, so I thought I’d resume updates. I ended up writing 8,000 words that day, but then it flared up again that night—and it was even worse than the first day. What followed was over forty consecutive hours of severe insomnia. It was worse than death.