Chapter 7: Surveying the Market
After Xu Heping left, Xu An dug out a pen and paper from his bedroom and started calculating.
The boxed lunches could be made at home. In this weather, he wouldn’t need insulated containers; two large styrofoam boxes would be enough. They only had oil, salt, soy sauce, and white sugar at home, so he’d need to buy a lot more seasonings. A conservative estimate for that expense would be about twenty yuan.
For boxed lunches, you need takeout containers, plastic bags, chopsticks, and spoons. But those aren’t expensive. Since this would be his first try, he wouldn’t be making too many, so five yuan should be enough to cover it.
Next came the most important part: the food inside the boxed lunches.
Xu An recalled videos he’d seen on short-video platforms of boxed lunches being sold at construction sites. They usually had three items: a meat dish, a dish with meat and vegetables, and a purely vegetarian dish.
He decided to calculate the cost for ten servings based on that setup.
For the meat dish, he’d start with braised pork belly. Each serving should have about 100 grams of meat and sauce, so one kilogram of raw pork would be enough. Braised pork belly required using pork belly, which was pricier at thirteen yuan per 500 grams. One kilogram would cost twenty-six yuan.
For the mixed dish, stir-fried tomatoes and eggs would do. They grew their own tomatoes. He could buy a whole tray of eggs, since they could eat them at home too. That would be twelve yuan.
The last item, the vegetable dish, could be a simple stir-fried bok choy. It was light and refreshing, perfect for cutting through the richness of the pork.
Tallying it all up, the total initial cost came to sixty-three yuan. The ingredients cost thirty-eight yuan, and if he factored in the market price for their homegrown vegetables, it would be around forty-five.
The larger the purchase quantity, the lower the cost. If he could buy a fixed amount every day, the price of meat could drop by two or three yuan per 500 grams, and the total cost could decrease by another eight to ten yuan.
The only problem was, he wasn’t sure what to charge for them. If the price was too high, the workers wouldn’t go for it.
Before graduating and starting his career, Xu An had never eaten takeout. He either cooked for himself or ate the food served in bulk at the school cafeteria, so he had no idea what fast-food boxed lunches cost at this time.
He started eating boxed lunches for lunch after he began working, but that was in 2016, when one cost fifteen yuan. A price like that would never fly at a construction site.
’I’d better go check out the area around the construction site first, then decide.’
When he got to Xu Heping’s house, the door was locked tight. Heping wasn’t home, and Xu An had no idea where he’d run off to play.
After a loop around the village, he finally found him under the banyan tree at the entrance to the village. Heping was gleefully playing marbles with a group of seven- and eight-year-olds. Judging by the large pile of marbles next to his feet, he was winning by a long shot.
"Heping, I’m going to head over to the construction site to check out the food situation. Want to come?"
"Yeah, yeah, I’ll go! Just let me finish this round. I’m about to win."
Xu An knew Heping meant he would come, but it sounded a lot like he was being told to scram.
After two minutes, Xu Heping finally won the round. He stuffed his pockets full of marbles and left with Xu An, trailed by the resentful gazes of the children.
It was a half-hour trip from the village to the town, and another half-hour from the town to the construction site in the city.
Xu Family Village wasn’t very big. Tracing its history back three or four generations would reveal that its residents were all descended from outsiders.
During his great-great-grandfather’s generation, a famine struck. As large groups of people migrated south, two brothers chose to settle in this desolate, coastal land.
After many years of recovery and growth, the original two families flourished, branching out into the twenty-odd households that made up the Xu Family Village of today.
There was a bus stop just outside Xu Family Village, with buses heading to the city at 7:00 a.m., 11:00 a.m., and 12:00 p.m. The two of them managed to catch the noon bus.
After boarding the bus, Xu Heping took out the marbles and began to count his winnings one by one. When he finished, he grinned, ready to share the joy of his victory with Xu An, only to find his friend looking troubled.
"What’s on your mind, Anzi?"
Xu An explained his plan. Xu Heping’s eyes lit up as he listened, and slapping his chest, he volunteered himself. "I’m useless at cooking, but I can definitely help out with the prep work."
Then, he once again offered up his family’s fish pond.
"This counts as a proper business venture, right? I’ll hit my parents up for some sponsorship tonight when I get back. They probably won’t give me cash, but I can definitely get some fish."
Xu An understood what Heping was thinking. He wasn’t some simpleton just giving away his family’s assets for free. He knew about Xu An’s difficult situation and wanted to help however he could.
"I appreciate the thought, but this is a business. We have to keep things professional. If I really end up needing fish, I have to pay for it. I’ll pay whatever the market price is."
"He’s offering it for free and you’re turning it down? Is there something wrong with your head?"
"Even good friends should keep clear accounts. This isn’t like sharing a meal once or twice. If the business really takes off, I’ll be needing a lot of fish."
"Alright, alright, I can’t out-argue you when it comes to principles. I’ll just ask them for a discounted price, happy now?"
Seeing Heping’s nonchalant expression, Xu An knew the guy hadn’t really listened to a word he’d said.
’The plan is still in the early stages, anyway. Even if it gets off the ground, I might not even need fish. If I do, I’ll just bypass this guy and talk to his parents directly.’
The bus passed by a construction site where workers were laying the foundation. The location sparked a strange sense of familiarity in Xu An.
Xu Heping noticed Xu An’s focus and glanced out the window. "Hey, isn’t that the site where Uncle Dongliang works? I think they’re building a residential complex. Zijing Garden, I think it’s called."
Zijing Garden!
Xu An finally remembered. Every time he came home from college for winter and summer break, he would pass this place. He had watched it transform from a desolate lot into a bustling hub, had watched its property value soar from five thousand to twenty thousand yuan per square meter—a full three thousand yuan per square meter higher than any of the surrounding complexes.
This was because the complex was a self-contained community, with its own residential, commercial, educational, and medical facilities that met all the residents’ daily needs.
Most importantly, the construction site was massive, the workforce was huge, and the project timeline was long. It wouldn’t be one of those jobs where you work for a month or two, just long enough for people to start recognizing you, and then the project ends, forcing you to find a new site and start all over.
The pre-sale for the first phase of apartments would start next March. It was only after more and more buyers flocked to the area that the surrounding snack strips and commercial streets began to form.
Right now, the area was still barren. Competition was low, but demand was high.
This was an excellent option.
After leaving the city bus station, the two got on a public bus. After only two stops, they came across a construction site.
There was security at the gate, making it difficult to just slip inside. However, it was lunchtime, and plenty of workers were milling about outside the site on their break.
Xu An spotted a burly, honest-looking man sitting in the shade of a tree just outside the site, wolfing down a boxed lunch.
The man’s deeply wrinkled, swarthy face and his large, misshapen hands, as big as cattail fans, were all testaments to his many years working on construction sites.
He had already devoured most of the meal, but Xu An could still make out what the dishes were from what was left.
The container was divided into two sections. The larger one was filled with white rice, while the smaller one held stir-fried cabbage and half a chicken leg.
Xu An pulled out a pack of Double Happiness cigarettes he’d bought at the village’s small store, took one out, and offered it to the man. As the man accepted it, Xu An casually squatted down beside him.
"Brother, you work at this site? How’s the pay and everything?"
The man finished the rest of his meal in two large bites. He carefully scraped every last grain of rice into a small pile, scooped it into his mouth, and then licked his chopsticks clean, still looking unsatisfied. He then stacked his empty container on top of another one on the ground, which was so clean it looked brand new.
"The pay? It’s decent. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have come all this way to work here."
"Was that boxed lunch from the site? The food looked pretty good. It even had a chicken leg."
The man scoffed, his tone disdainful. "Pfft."
"You saw the chicken leg, didn’t you? How could that be from the site’s canteen? I’ve been a migrant worker for over a decade, been on twenty, thirty different sites, big and small. Not a single one of them serves food with actual chunks of meat. You’re lucky if you even get a sheen of oil on top."
Xu An understood but played dumb. "So that meal just now was...?"
"See that place across the street? Happiness Restaurant. Bought it there. This kind of work takes brute strength. No rich, oily food, no energy. You’ve gotta have a proper meal with meat every few days, or you can’t get the work done."
"Why not eat inside? It’s so hot out. You could be in there with a fan, maybe even get some free soup."
"You two are a couple of greenhorns, I can tell. Never worked a day of construction." The man tucked the cigarette he’d been toying with behind his ear and went on, "You know what it’s like on-site? You work for one hour, and your white shirt turns black, and your black shirt turns white from all the dust. When you walk, you leave a trail of dirt. If just two or three of us went inside to eat, the owner could forget about serving any other customers for the rest of the day."
Saying this, the man suddenly broke into a sly grin.
"Even though he won’t let us eat inside, the owner gives us an extra box of rice to make up for it. We get a whole free box of rice just for eating out here by the road. It’s not a bad deal for us."
Seeing the man’s smile—a mixture of pride and slyness—left Xu An at a loss for words. Most of the men on these sites were honest, hardworking, middle-aged guys from poor regions. They left their homes and families behind just to earn a little more money.
They didn’t care about things like discrimination. In their minds, an extra box of rice was worth far more than sitting inside with a fan.
"So, how much does one of those meals cost?"
At Xu An’s question, the man’s expression turned pained, as if the mere thought of the price hurt him.
"It ain’t cheap. Any meal with meat costs eight yuan."
After handing the man another cigarette, the two got up and left.
Over the course of the afternoon, the two of them visited four or five different construction sites. Some sites flat-out refused them entry, and the workers wouldn’t give them the time of day. At others, the workers were very friendly, gathering around to answer Xu An’s questions and eagerly chiming in with everything they knew.
After his survey, Xu An had a good grasp of the going rate for boxed lunches near the sites. A meal with one meat and one vegetable dish cost eight yuan, while one with two vegetable dishes was just six. An extra box of rice cost one yuan.
To tempt the workers into buying from his stall, a one-meat, one-vegetable combo was the bare minimum. He needed an extra selling point to really win them over.
The things that would really win the workers over were obvious: more food, plenty of rice, and ideally, a hot soup to warm their stomachs and comfort their souls.
And so, the specifications for his boxed lunches were set: three dishes and a soup. One of the three dishes had to be a hearty meat dish! He’d tentatively price it at eight yuan and aim for a business model of small profits but high sales volume.
At every construction site, the demand for boxed lunches was high. As long as he could get his foot in the door, he was sure he could make a profit.