Last year there were some milk scandals over here in China and many people stopped drinking the milk here locally for a good amount of time. Prior to this scandal, Renee and I had been looking for the best milk available for our kids as we always thought the local milk had a weird taste. After talking with friends, we found a brand of milk named NGF that I believe is produced out of Ningbo. It is the same milk that is used by Starbucks and that Starbucks continued to use throughout the whole scandal last year. This is what solidified it for me that this was the only local milk that I wanted to buy for my kids, if Starbucks is willing to serve it to millions of customers, then my two kids should be okay.
Anyway, there are only two ways to buy the milk, either buy it in the foreign grocery store or from someone (like a coffee shop owner) who already purchases the milk. The price in the grocery store is twice that of what the actual retail price to shop owners is, so luckily we had a connection with a shop owner and were able to order the milk via this owner. So it started with getting milk for my kids and then people started trying the milk at our house and hearing about our arrangement, so they asked us to get them milk and now I think we are getting it for 4 or 5 different families. In fact we take orders for the milk from friends and call it in to our point person and then once we get the milk we call our friends, they come by, we exchange money and they take their milk. I think the basic makeup of this arrangement mirrors that of a formal cartel, if not at least an informal drug dealer on the street corner. I feel like I should get extra inventory of the milk and start selling it for a profit to try to make my business legit, but I haven't taken it that far yet. I also might be under this impression because I have been watching a lot of The Wire lately…this is most likely why I feel like I need to hire some young'ens and hoppers.
Anyway, there are only two ways to buy the milk, either buy it in the foreign grocery store or from someone (like a coffee shop owner) who already purchases the milk. The price in the grocery store is twice that of what the actual retail price to shop owners is, so luckily we had a connection with a shop owner and were able to order the milk via this owner. So it started with getting milk for my kids and then people started trying the milk at our house and hearing about our arrangement, so they asked us to get them milk and now I think we are getting it for 4 or 5 different families. In fact we take orders for the milk from friends and call it in to our point person and then once we get the milk we call our friends, they come by, we exchange money and they take their milk. I think the basic makeup of this arrangement mirrors that of a formal cartel, if not at least an informal drug dealer on the street corner. I feel like I should get extra inventory of the milk and start selling it for a profit to try to make my business legit, but I haven't taken it that far yet. I also might be under this impression because I have been watching a lot of The Wire lately…this is most likely why I feel like I need to hire some young'ens and hoppers.
2 comments:
Matt, this is great...are those what the actual milk cartons look like? cause they are awesome!
I wish that is what the milk cartons looked like, if so I think I would have to start a real cartel. Unfortunately, someone more creative made these milk cartons and I just stole their picture.
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