CHAPTER 318: CHAPTER 315: GRAND OPENING OF THE NEW SHOP

After acting as the bridesmaid for Gu Jingyu, Lin Wanwan returned to the Tang Dynasty and took a long nap.

Getting married is truly exhausting, especially the toasting part—pouring drinks for all kinds of people, enduring their greasy remarks and challenges, meeting guests’ expectations while failing to satisfy herself. An inability to lose temper means keeping up a forced smile, which is absolutely draining.

Lin Wanwan imagined herself in that role, declaring, "I’m afraid I can’t manage it!"

So, she’d rather stay single! Only a destitute spinster becomes the butt of jokes, whereas a wealthy single woman is forever respected.

Earning money is the most secure undertaking!

Regarding making money, Lin Wanwan truly applied herself. Two days after Gu Jingyu’s wedding, Lin Wanwan celebrated the grand opening of her first shop in the Tang Dynasty.

This shop is established with a courtyard layout, originally intended as a cosmetic shop, but upon actual renovation and design, Lin Wanwan expanded it to the size of a beauty salon, named "Red Face Smile".

Now, all staff and the shopkeeper, along with the assistant shopkeepers, are in place, with the pre-opening publicity and hype well carried out.

For today’s launch of Red Smile, Lin Wanwan sent out quite a few invitations.

She sent invitations to any aristocratic women and noblemaidens in Mao County who had even the slightest connection or dealings with her, just to see how many would show up to support her today.

It shouldn’t be few, considering several noblewomen had inquired about the foundation she had on hand, and she had told them it would be sold in the Red Smile store soon—they had no reason not to come.

The workshop markets of the Great Tang all started business in the afternoon, closing before sundown. So did Red Smile, choosing noon for its opening hour. What to do in the morning then? Stock up and prepare to open of course!

In such a slow-paced era of horse-drawn carriages, opening in the morning would mean many couldn’t even make it to the city—whom would you sell to?

Modern half-hour car travel took at least two hours in the Tang Dynasty, unless speeding by horse. But there are few who could afford a horse.

Horses for Tang citizens are roughly equivalent to BMW cars for ordinary people nowadays. Even with domestic and imported options, it’s undeniable that no BMW, no matter how affordable, is something everyone can buy. The same ban applies to horses—being able to own a horse signifies being upper-middle class.

But opening market stalls for business cannot focus solely on nobles with relatively fast and convenient transportation. The commoners walking on foot are an unignorable consumer demographic, hence operating in the afternoon fits well with the era’s characteristics.

Half a day traveling, half a day shopping, then slowly returning home. Tang citizens lived such a languid pace.

During the fourth year of the Zhenguan era in Tang Dynasty, official households nurtured musicians by rank (both male and female), while ordinary citizens lacked this luxury, as entertainment houses such as Li Garden, greatly favored by the inner residences in later generations, hadn’t appeared yet!

Currently, people mainly self-entertain by singing, dancing, enjoying outdoor recreation, and gatherings. Other entertainment consumption, particularly among women, is rare.

The eventual emergence of Li Garden owes thanks to Tang Xuanzong. This Emperor, passionate about singing and dancing, with a fondness for the Feathered Robe Dance, established music and dance institutions within his court and often personally supervised rehearsals, allowing the industry to gradually develop, eventually flying from the palace to ordinary households.

Tang Dynasty emperors genuinely loved entertainment, and Li Shimin was no exception.

Never assume hardworking diligence from the emperor during the thriving Zhenguan era, tirelessly handling affairs within the Imperial Palace and meeting ministers. In truth, Li Shimin’s style is decidedly laid-back!

Like in the fourth year of Zhenguan, February, when Li Jing fought the Turks at Yin Mountain and defeated them. On the day of Bingwu, he returned from Hot Springs.

What signifies "Hot Springs"? They’re the springs especially popular near Chang’an during the Great Tang—beloved by everyone from commoners to the Emperor.

Modern business interactions take place over dinner tables; Tang people preferred meeting naked in communal hot spring pools, sharing a jug of wine for leisurely chats.

While Li Jing dealt with the Turks, our Emperor Li Shimin comfortably soaked in hot springs—how worried could he be? With frequent spontaneous travel, a hot spring visit here, a spring hunt there, impromptu getaways were common occurrences, feeling the responsibilities of an emperor as leisure.

When an emperor extravagantly indulges, the people beneath naturally imitate. Concepts like today’s societal 996 or 007 work blessings simply aren’t marketable in the Tang Dynasty—everyone detested exploitation.

Given the Tang’s fondness for fun yet lacking entertainment options, Wanwan’s Red Smile opening organized a variety of performances.

Puppet shows, archery competitions, harp playing, and poetry recitals all arranged. Even the embroideresses dwelling within mansions were summoned to lend support.

An opening must be lively and bustling. Despite targeting aristocratic women, one must holler loudly for business at least the first few days, otherwise relying solely on Wanwan’s personal promotion during interactions wouldn’t suffice!

Wanwan isn’t some idle person who mingles daily; she’s truly busy.

She has farming duties, medical studies, acupuncture and music practices, fishing—where’s the time to attend banquets daily?

Thus, promotion had to adopt modern methods, distributing flyers to various women’s cosmetic and powder shops, clothing stores, fabric stores, Treasure House, jade stores, etc.

While others are overly careful with paper, Lin Wanwan lavishly distributes and prints promotional material!

Against her in the Tang Dynasty, compete in anything, but don’t compete in wealth. Competing in wealth ensures defeat; Wanwan stands as a national treasure in Tang Dynasty.

By Shen Hour, wives connected to the Lin Family—the Zhang, Wang, Shi, Fang, and Fan families—had surely shown up, along with other aristocratic women having heard the news, attending in curiosity.

Everyone’s rear-courtyard life seemed so dull. Rarely does something novel arise; how could they miss such an occasion?

Thus for Red Smile’s first day, guests poured through the doors, with New Luo maids applying facial masks till their hands turned pale. However, despite the turnout, few were willing to spend real silver for membership.

They couldn’t grasp depositing money upfront into someone else’s shop, then consuming little by little. This concept greatly differed from Wanwan anticipated.

Her membership system faced a setback on its first day—after half a day, only the Zhang family’s daughter-in-law, Mrs. Wang, bought an elementary membership with a gold coin. Even this was due to Wanwan’s influence as Village Lady, patrons leveraged through face rather than marketing persuasion.

Wanwan assumed mimicking modern marketing tactics would leave Tang’s rear-courtyard women bewildered. Alas, she was too naive!

Regarding money, everyone proved surprisingly cautious instead, siphoning off quite a bit of free masks from the opening!

But Lin Wanwan couldn’t be defeated by such trivial difficulties; she remained unconvinced, setting her first small goal: one thousand high-level members within a month, capturing all wealthy rear-courtyard female aristocrats in Mao County!