Losing Money to Be a Tycoon

After singing for more than an hour, Chen Lei took a break. Ma Yang immediately called him over to explain to him simply how his wages and the alcohol commission would work. Chen Lei scratched his head as he decisively said, "Alright."

Ma Yang was now a little abashed.

"It's alright; if you feel that the basic salary is too low, I can add to it." Ma Yang said.

Chen Lei blinked, "In that case… let's add a little to it."

Ma Yang, "…"

Look at this lad's honesty! Ma Yang felt as if he had been cheated. He had thought that Chen Lei would be polite and say 'no, it's okay'; Ma Yang could then follow suit and conveniently end the conversation.

In the end, Chen Lei had conveniently managed to ask for more pay from Ma Yang's words. However, since Ma Yang had said as much, he couldn't go back on his word now.

Ma Yang was conflicted for a while, "Alright, I'll give you 1800 yuan for the base pay, together with the alcohol commission. The next time you go up to sing, you must encourage people to buy more drinks, understand?"

Chen Lei looked a little uncomfortable as he said bashfully, "Brother Ma, I'm not very comfortable with that. Why don't I just take the 1500 yuan? Please don't make me talk to the audience."

Ma Yang was speechless; this kid was so thin-skinned.

"Forget it; you'll just focus on singing while I'll do the announcement. Your base pay will still be 1800 yuan, but you do not need to care about anything else."

Chen Lei nodded as he went to drink some water and take a break.

Ma Yang gave Zhang Yuan a look as the latter immediately understood what that meant and went up the platform.

"Hello, hello. Hello, everyone, let me introduce myself a little. I am the manager of Fish-Catching Internet Cafe; my family name is Zhang."

Someone among the crowd tittered, "Weren't you the resident singer last week? Once Chen Lei had replaced you, you actually have been promoted?"

Zhang Yuan saw that many people weren't very interested in what he was going to say as he hurriedly spoke, "I appreciate everyone for your continued support. This time, I want to share with everyone a special perk for our resident singer!

"From today onwards, whenever Chen Lei sings—from seven to eleven at night, these four hours; a portion of all drinks expenses would become his commission.

"As for the specifics of this…

"In a few days, we'll have new custom-made menus; and the cut for Chen Lei would be written clearly. In any case—if everyone likes our singers, you guys can order a few more drinks to support them. Thank you, everyone!"

Zhang Yuan immediately got off the stage after speaking and did not waste his breath further. This also was in line with Fish-Catching Internet Cafe's mantra: saying less and doing more while service needed to be like a breeze, only to be felt by customers when they needed it.

The customers immediately started to talk among themselves.

"To give a cut for the singer?"

"They're so generous?"

"They're giving half of the stated price as well! If I go up and sing now; will that work?"

"Hehe, only if you can sing better than Chen Lei."

"That's great; I'll support him! Please give me another glass!"

"Me too."

"Over here, over here!"

The few servers actually started to get busy. Ever since Fish-Catching Internet Cafe opened for business, this was their first time!

Ma Yang and Zhang Yuan smiled and looked at each other. This actually seemed to work!

…

Late night…

Many people were already tipsy but still were not willing to leave. Before Chen Lei got off the stage, he kept on thanking everyone as he blushed and hid himself in the internet area.

Ma Yang, Zhang Yuan, and the few servers all went to send the customers on their way.

"Thank you for your support!"

"Please take care."

"We await your next visit!"

All the way till ten-thirty did the customers finally all leave.

"Hurry up and tabulate how much we have sold for drinks!" Ma Yang couldn't wait as he rushed to the cashier.

A few minutes later, Ma Yang's excited state receded.

"We had sold quite a lot of drinks; however… we only made this little?"

Ma Yang was very disappointed. He thought that he could immediately start making profits. However, after looking at the sales figure, he became dejected. They indeed sold many drinks tonight; it was also an eighty percent increase from the previous few days' average!

That meant that many of the customers here had ordered a second drink after hearing that part of the money would go to Chen Lei. Furthermore, some expensive cocktails had been ordered as well.

However, they were still very far away from making a profit.

Zhang Yuan was more rational. "This is very normal. Brother Ma, although our drinks sales have gone up, we have too few customers.

"Think about it. We only have these many seats; even if we hit full capacity with some people even standing around, selling more than a hundred drinks, would that be enough? We would only earn a few hundred or at most a thousand a night. Minus off the half that goes to Chen Lei, that would only be twenty to thirty thousand a month."

"Wait." Ma Yang frowned. "Doesn't that mean that if we made twenty to thirty thousand, Chen Lei would earn that much commission as well?"

Zhang Yuan was rather speechless, "Brother Ma, what are you saying? Of course, this is the case; you were the one who decided that Chen Lei would get fifty percent…"

Ma Yang's face collapsed, "…I regret that decision now. How about we don't give half to Chen Lei? Just five percent; maybe one percent?"

Zhang Yuan was livid. "Brother Ma, you can't possibly go back on your word on the same night. Are you trying to chase him away? You were the one who decided on fifty percent commission."

"It was me. However, I didn't expect it to be so much money…" Ma Yang was rather pained as he scratched his head repeatedly.

Zhang Yuan was speechless for a while.

No wonder Ma Yang had been so generous; he had not done the sums up at all! However, seeing that Ma Yang seemed to really be considering going against his word, Zhang Yuan hurriedly tried to dissuade him.

"Brother Ma, there's really no need. We are making losses of three hundred thousand monthly now. Even if you took all of Chen Lei's commission, that would at most be twenty or thirty thousand more; it is not feasible in the long term."

"If we give Chen Lei more, the audience would support him more as well. When this place becomes popular, we would naturally have more customers; and things would look better then."

Ma Yang frowned. "What would be considered enough? Based on your calculations, we need to sell more than a thousand drinks a night to recoup our losses; that is not possible. For this size of a place, we can't even sit two hundred—what more a thousand?"

Zhang Yuan didn't know what to say at the moment. "Err… in any case, now that our drinks sales have gone up, let's monitor the situation a while more. We definitely cannot kick someone to the curb when he outlived his usefulness."

"I'm still feeling vexed." Ma Yang massaged his temple as he was so pained he almost couldn't breathe. He was really unhappy with this.

"No, I cannot suffer just like this! We must let our customers feel this as well!'

Zhang Yuan was bewildered, "How can we let our customers feel this?"

Ma Yang looked over at the wall next to the stage; there still was some empty space there. He pointed, "Hang a small screen there.

"Every time someone orders a drink, a message will appear on that screen with the table number, what type of drink, as well as how much money goes to Chen Lei. After that, a well-wishing message to Chen Lei would follow.

"This way, every time someone orders a drink, everyone would be able to see. Let's add a line on the top of the screen tabulating how much Chen Lei was going to get each night.

"I've paid such a heavy price; I cannot suffer silently. I must let all customers know that I have given so much!"

Zhang Yuan contemplated this. "This could work; it's only a small screen and wouldn't cost much. Leave this matter to me. I'll have it done by daytime tomorrow."