Chapter 301 - 213: Dismissal

Futong Commerce, General Manager’s Office

Li Yang was on edge. Recently, sales for all their brands had been in continuous decline, especially NLB, which had seen a sharp month-over-month drop. This was unacceptable to him.

He knew from Yanghe Commerce’s performance that the brand itself was strong—one that could rake in a lot of money. But his operations team had run it into the ground. He blamed it on their lack of effort.

He also hadn’t forgotten the promise he made at the last meeting to break fifty million in sales this year. At the current rate, forget fifty million; they’d be lucky to hit ten million. This wouldn’t do. He had to drive growth by opening more stores—good stores.

But now, their plans to open stores in Xinyue Group properties were blocked, which severely impacted his entire strategy. The best stores in the province were almost all under the Xinyue Group. The thought of this only deepened his hatred for Yang Hui.

"Xiaohan, while you’re keeping an eye on Xinyue Group, I want you to negotiate with other properties too. We have stores with Yida Department Store in other cities, but we haven’t partnered with any of their Qingzhou locations yet. Go talk to them. The sales figures won’t be as high in a department store, but they’re commission-based, so we basically can’t lose money. The operations department is useless. If they can’t raise the performance of a single store, then we’ll just have to make up for it with quantity.

"Especially the Yida Department Store on Qingzhou Pedestrian Street. That store is in the main business district. Even if its sales aren’t that different from the others, the project has a greater influence. We need to open a store there. Get on it."

Han Chao noted everything down. Just then, he recalled something he’d learned from a call that morning with a leasing manager from Xinyue Group’s regional office. "Boss, I heard from Xinyue Group that Yanghe Commerce isn’t partnering with them for all of their locations. For those few malls that are still in their development phase, Yanghe Commerce doesn’t plan on moving in anytime soon."

Upon hearing this, Li Yang immediately said, "If they won’t move in, we will. Those projects are bound to take off after a while. We’ll grab the spots first."

After speaking, he noticed Han Chao’s head was lowered, not responding. "Did you hear what I said?"

With a pained expression, Han Chao said, "Boss, I already suggested it. They said if Yanghe Commerce isn’t opening a store for now, they’ll just wait. They’ll only consider the brand again when Yanghe Commerce is ready to open."

Stunned for a few seconds, Li Yang’s face turned livid. He roared in a low voice, "Fuck! This is fucking outrageous! I’m cooperating with so many of their brands, and they won’t even give me this little bit of face?"

Han Chao kept his head down. ’What’s the use of this impotent rage?’ he thought. Ever since the boss took on the NLB brand and went head-to-head with Yanghe Commerce, they had lost every bit of face with Xinyue Square.

"Just get to Yida Department Store and start negotiating. Report any problems to me immediately. My relationship with Wang Qing is still pretty good. If you can’t handle it, I’ll go to him myself. Also, for Jiang’an City, ask President Wu for her availability. I’ll pay her a visit. That’s one of the best properties in Qingzhou; we have to lock it down."

"As for Xinyue Center, you can start by talking to the local stores, but that side of things is tricky. Their leasing is centralized at the Shanghai leasing center, and we don’t have a direct line in. If we ask the NLB Brand Company to make an introduction, I’m afraid they’ll be more inclined to work with Yanghe Commerce. Dammit, I get pissed off just thinking about it. That useless bunch in the operations department has really screwed us over."

Because there are only about thirty-some Xinyue Center locations in the entire country, all leasing authority is consolidated at the leasing center in their Shanghai headquarters. The individual stores are only responsible for operations, management, and assisting with leasing, but they have basically no decision-making power.

As a local enterprise, Futong Commerce naturally didn’t have the reach to connect with the Xinyue Center Group’s headquarters leasing department.

Meanwhile, an email from Xinyue Group sent the entire Qingjiang Region—and even the greater administrative region—into an uproar.

[Effective July 1st, Tian Jing will no longer serve as the General Manager of Xinyue Group’s Qingjiang Region. Further work arrangements will be announced at a later date.]

At the regional headquarters, President Zhao’s first reaction upon seeing the message was, ’The whistleblower email worked.’ But then she had a second thought. If headquarters believed the region was abusing its power for personal gain with those business terms, then why did they approve the deal between San Yang Xinyue Square and Yanghe Commerce?

While she was racking her brain over it, there was a knock on her office door. It was President Liu, the one who had joined her in opposing the terms of the San Yang Xinyue Square and Yanghe Commerce deal. For a man, he loved to gossip even more than President Zhao did.

"President Zhao, I heard that President Zhang got a call from the chairman first thing this morning in his office, and this email was sent out right after."

’The chairman?’ President Zhao’s mind raced. ’Could it be that even though the CEO approved the terms, the chairman didn’t? So he used the whistleblower email as an excuse to remove President Tian, as a warning to the others to rein it in?’

President Liu whispered, "I think his removal is just the beginning. They might send someone to investigate later. After all, the fewer the words, the bigger the issue."

"President Zhao, who do you think was really behind that whistleblower email?"

Looking up, she saw him watching her with a meaningful expression. President Zhao kept her face calm, but inwardly she was cursing, ’Are you suspecting me? Am I that despicable?’

"Congratulations, President Zhao~!"

??? A series of question marks appeared over her head. "Congratulations for what?" she asked, her guard up.

President Liu chuckled. "President Zhao, you were already being groomed as a potential regional general manager. Now that there’s an opening, you’re the top candidate. Plus, I did some digging at headquarters, and they said the person taking over President Tian’s position is a woman. I thought about everyone in the area, and you’re the only one who fits the bill."

President Zhao’s heart skipped a beat. President Liu was a company veteran and always well-informed; his words were highly credible. ’Could it really be me this time?’ But so far, no manager or HR representative from headquarters had spoken to her. ’Maybe it’s because this all happened so suddenly they haven’t had the chance yet.’