Chapter 189 – The Rich Old Feng
But when he found out that some of these goods were from his Son-in-law, his mood changed for the better. Feng Xingtai knew that his daughter was pregnant and he decided to visit his in-laws on the third day of New Year and at the same time visit his daughter.
There were lesser people during this year new year, but the Feng family’s tradition did not change. Eight meat dishes and two vegetables dishes. All the dishes were completed within an hour. The only difference was the dumplings. This year’s dumplings were using chives and eggs fillings. They were sick of eating meat as they had been eating meat for the whole year!
When Feng Yu returned to the current life, his family’s financial situation was not very bad, but it was still difficult for them to eat meat. Many times, they could not buy meat even when they had the money. Although people at the farms did not care about food tickets and used cash to purchase meat, there were still very few people slaughtering their pigs in summer.
Now the situation got better. Tian Peng Pig Farm had a batch of pigs for sale every month, and it supplied not only to the district but also the surrounding towns. People in the cities also heard of Tian Peng Pig Farm. Tian Peng Pig Farm was currently the biggest pork supplier in Bing City.
Everybody was saying the pork from Tian Peng Pig Farm was the best. The meat was tender and fresh. Also, Tian Peng Pig Farm guaranteed that they were not using sick pigs or dead pigs. It was not sure when it started, but when people in Bing City went to the market, they would ask the pork seller one question: Is there Tian Peng pork today?
After a year of operation, Tian Peng Pig Farm’s brand had gained awareness in Bing City. Even some pork sellers from cities in the northern region also came Tian Peng Pig Farm to buy pork. They said that the pork was for the leaders in their cities.
Feng Xingtai was proud to hear that the leaders were eating his pork. He had forgotten that he had tried to stop Feng Yu from buying this pig farm and expanding and converting it into a modernized pig farm.
During the New Year, the Provincial TV station, led by Professor Su, interviewed Tian Peng Pig Farm. The program was a 90 minutes program, and Tian Peng Pig Farm was featured for about 60 minutes. The viewers did not really remember the sophisticated machines used in the farm. They only remembered the couplets hanged at the entrance. Pigs thinking of getting fat; People thinking of getting famous. These couplets became the talk of the town.
Professor Su, an agriculture professor, had lots of connections. Previously, he did not get any sponsors, and the other professors in the university felt that his concept of a modernized pig farm could only exist in theory and not practical.
The fact was that Professor Su did not get the support of other professors because if the limited funds. A modernized farm would use up a lot of the University’s funds, leaving little for research in other areas. Every year, the university got limited funding from the government, and as it was an agriculture university, it receives lesser funding compared to an industrial university.
The Professor Su’s modernized pig farm would cost at least 1 million RMB. The average funding each professor gets for their research was less than 10,000 RMB.
Professor Su’s modernized Pig farm would be using up the fund of 100 other studies. This was a large sum, and even if the university had this amount, they would also not give it to Professor Su.
Luckily, Feng Yu approached him about the animal feeds and found out that he had stopped his research on the modernized pig farm due to a lack of fund.
Both of them hit it off. Feng Yu had wanted to set up such a pig farm. Although the initial investment was a lot, once the brand was established, the pork from the farm could sell higher than average.
At first, Feng Xingtai was worried that the pork could not be sold and wanted to import a sausage production line. The unsold pork could be made into sausages.
But unexpectedly, there were a lot of consumers buying pork. Tian Peng Pig Farm was producing about 10,000 pigs a year, and all were sold to the surrounding areas of Bing City and Lin Province.
Feng Yu did not even do much marketing, and the market for the animal feeds opened up along with his pork. Currently, the profits of the animal feeds were more than soybean oil. Feng Xingtai was very satisfied with this result.
Initially, there was a lot of unsold animals feeds in the warehouse and Feng Xingtai was very worried. But a few months later, these animal feeds were Tai Hua Food Processing Factory’s bestselling product. There wasn’t even a TV commercial, and it was selling better than the advertised Soybean oil.
Feng Yu felt that this was normal. Granules animal feeds were better and cheaper than using corn or wheat. Pigs feeding on pellets feeds were still growing faster than other pigs.
Furthermore, Tai Hua Food Processing Factory started to give credit to their customers. Tai Hua Food Processing Factory would supply the animal feeds first, and an IOU would be signed, After the pigs were sold, then the customer would repay the amount. Those farmers that could not afford or did not want to buy those animal feeds saw this opportunity. They rushed to buy the animal feeds on credit. This was almost like a zero-interest loan.
Using this sales model, the animal feeds penetrated the market and quickly expanded its market share. From the market research conducted by Tai Hua Food Processing Factory, their brand of animal feeds had 80% market share of the granule animal feeds market in the Longjiang Province, 60% of Lin Province and 20% of Liao Province.
Liao Province also had a factory that produces granules of animal feeds, and it was still a state-owned enterprise. This factory was set up much earlier than Tai Hua Factory, but they do not allow credit terms. Wu Zhigang and the rest had promised that with this payment method, they would be able to increase Liao Province’s market share by one-fold within a year and continue to lead Longjiang and Lin Provinces’ market.
Feng Yu had used this credit terms payment scheme, and if he still can’t even occupy the 3 provinces in the northeast region, then he would be very disappointed with Wu Zhigang and the rest of the staffs. He does not expect them to be sales genius, but they should not be flops either.
The increasing sales of the animal feed meant that there were more and more people rearing pigs. While there was still a huge demand for pork, Tian Peng Pig Farm’s sales would still be affected.
Feng Yu had the confidence to continue to control Bing City market, but for the other areas, the pork sales would be affected by the local pig farms. After Tian Peng Pig Farm appeared on Longjiang news, Feng Yu could foresee that leaders from other provinces trying to push for Pig farms projects. In this era, many government leaders only knew how to copy others. They just imitate whatever that was profitable and did not consider the market demands.
But this was still fine. Tian Peng Pigs would be more established, and even if the pork sales were affected, there would still be the ham products coming out. The demand for the current ham market still outweighs the supply.
Feng Yu could even set up a chain of related brands. He would name it as Tian Peng Fresh Pork. If he could get the majority of the market share of the 3 provinces in the Northeast, there would be endless profits, and it would be even possible for the company to be listed.
This past year, Old Feng became rich!