1339 A Small Business That Earns a Few Cents (1/2)

The next day.

Life carried on as usual.

Zhang Zian felt very fulfilled. If his proposal could be realized without a problem, hundreds of stray dogs that terrorized people would disappear, and in their place would be hundreds of diligent pick-up dogs...

Vladimir was a little envious of whatever he had witnessed. He kept asking if there was anything that the stray cats could do to improve their own situation. Doing so would allow them to worry less about food and shelter. Most of the stray cats couldn't eat much good food. Even small dried fish had to be collected and fed to the soldiers who needed it the most. If only stray cats could also pick up bottles...but this was not realistic. After all, the cat's mouth was small and couldn't hold a bottle in place. In addition, the garbage dump was currently occupied by stray dogs.

After breakfast, Zhang Zian made a few phone calls and asked about the location of and route to the nearby waste-collection station. He asked about pricing because he did not know how many bottles the stray dogs ​​could pick up every day. Thus, he needed some form of clarity. How much could a few hundred bottles earn? How much could a few thousand bottles earn?

Because he only had one precious Wuling Hong Guang MPV that was used for carrying cargo and aquarium creatures, it was impossible to use it to carry garbage. Thus, he hoped that the other party could send a car to the designated place to pick up the bottles. He would not mind even if the vehicle came once every few days. The other party said that it depended on how many bottles were collected. That would allow him to determine if the trip was worth making. However, Zhang Zian could not give him an exact number at the moment.

Then, he also called up a manufacturer who provided dog food for the pet shop to discuss the price of buying dog food in large quantities.

The staff listened to him making one phone call after another. They secretly speculated with one another as to what business he was going to carry out. It sounded like he was...picking up scraps?

The business in the store was not so bad that he needed to do this...

People who did big business and made calls discussed millions of dollars with every invoice. However, Zhang Zian's was a small business. Even so, it did not make sense to bargain so hard over the price of an empty bottle, did it?

The only possibility was that the store manager's problem with stinginess had become more and more serious. Now, he was not even willing to give up on garbage.

Zhang Zian offered no explanation for the time being. If things went well, they would know later, as inevitably, he would need them to help. Of course, they would also receive corresponding compensation. Although their work was not directly in contact with garbage, it was, after all, dealing with garbage. If the compensation was not high enough, everyone's work enthusiasm would be somewhat diminished.

As for the price of empty bottles, perhaps at a few cents for a bottle, it might not be worth bothering. However, if there were thousands or even tens of thousands of empty bottles per week, the accumulation of a few additional cents could end up being a lot more. If he could keep this in his own pocket, why must he give it to others?

After making calls for almost an hour, his mouth was dry from all that talking. He grabbed a cup of tea and stood by the door.

It was the afternoon—exactly four o'clock. The sun was no longer hot, though the air was still a bit stuffy. However, it did not mean much to Zhang ZIan, who'd managed to survive much worse in Egypt.

He looked up at the sky. The weather was fine, and there was no sign of rain, though he was not sure. The weather forecast in summer was not reliable at all, and a gust of wind might cause heavy rain.

The swallowtail larva on the glass door next to the store had moved two times in the morning, and by now, it seemed to have begun to slowly digest the caterpillar inside.

”Ha ha ha ha!”

There was loud and arrogant laughter coming from the end of the street.

Zhang Zian followed the sound and turned his head. He saw Xu Zhuang Zhuang and a few boys around his age yelling and joking around. It seemed that they had just left school. They were heading for the pet store.

Xu Zhuang Zhuang spoke to them animatedly. ”Hey! When I went to school this morning, I met two dogs.”

”Whose dogs?”

”What happened to the dogs?”

”Yeah, did they bite you?”

Xu Zhuang Zhuang smiled proudly and said, ”They're my neighbor's. However, there was no adult around at the time. I saw that the two dogs' buttocks were glued together as they walked and shook weirdly. So I went forward to kick their butts and separated them!”

”Great!”