Chapter 134: Collapse Talk at the Reception

All groups engaged in the secondhand goods trade would eventually face a very awkward situation. First, they lacked sufficient supply. Second, the quality of the goods was difficult to guarantee.

In reality, up to now, the reason William’s Secondhand Goods Auction in Sabine City had been so successful was, most importantly, the partnership he had reached with Mr. Fox.

Large quantities of quality secondhand goods had passed from Mr. Fox’s hands into William’s. They did not collect worthless things, so the products William currently possessed were all of very decent quality.

But as he prepared to spread this business across the entire state, he would have to face the biggest problem of all: where could he obtain enough secondhand goods to satisfy people?

High quality, along with relatively rigid demand, was the foundation that allowed the Secondhand Goods Auction to continue operating and turning a profit.

This seemed like a difficult problem to solve, but in reality, he had long since prepared a plan: use brand-new goods to replace secondhand goods, and simply sell brand-new products directly.

It looked like a somewhat contradictory business model. If new things were sold as secondhand things, would that not lose money? Would it not be a bad deal?

At the same time, because the goods were brand-new, they would be even more attractive to participants. They would be more willing than they were now to spend a little more on these brand-new “secondhand” goods.

In truth, from the very beginning, William had never considered making his profit by selling goods. From the start, he had fixed his profit target on the seats at the table that salesmen had to possess.

After resolving all expenses, he could even hold such consignment auctions for free and provide everyone with enough goods and the necessary environment. But every salesman had to pay for the seat at the table he controlled.

A dozen-plus cities, each with as many as four or five thousand seats, or as few as two or three thousand. If all were calculated at three thousand, that meant forty to fifty thousand seats at the table, bringing in close to one million dollars a month. Even if that was cut in half later, he could earn five hundred thousand dollars a month without doing anything at all. What higher profit did he still need to pursue?

Only by distributing money to the people around him would they firmly gather at his side and defend his interests. If he only thought about making money for himself, people like Richard would soon begin leaving him one after another.

So where would those brand-new, low-priced goods come from?

Without question, they would certainly be produced by plants. Then how to control costs became William’s current mid-to-long-term goal. As the wave of bankruptcies pushed closer to the major metropolises, more and more large factories would collapse.