Chapter 654 - 334: Fu Zhan: Collapsed! Burn It All Down

Chapter 654: Chapter 334: Fu Zhan: Collapsed! Burn It All Down

He could tell that once their Hanfu was produced, it would sell extremely well. ’The design fee couldn’t have been cheap.’

Chen Jincheng was open about it, smiling as he said, "A few designers, each earning a salary of 15,000 a month!"

"A salary of 15,000?" Fu Zhan suddenly clutched his chest.

’They had paid 5 million, almost sinking all their reserve funds into it.’

’So the stuff they’d spent 5 million on was just a pile of crap compared to what these guys had?’

"Mr. Chen, are you sure that’s the price?" Fu Zhan asked, his expression full of resentment.

Chen Jincheng smiled and said, "What’s there to be unsure about? The salaries we offer are publicly listed in our job postings."

This was already a high salary for people in the Hanfu industry; costume designers in film and television earned even less.

Some people might wonder: if costumes and props in the film and television industry are so astronomically expensive, how could the designers’ salaries be so low?

The investors are the ones who make that money. Surely no one believes it actually lands in the pockets of the regular, salaried designers?

Their salaries are just a little over 10,000. As a result, they don’t have much motivation to be creative.

At Second-Life Star, the 15,000 salary was just the base pay. There were also benefits like year-end bonuses. On top of that, designers received a 1-3% share of the profits from Hanfu sales. This was the way forward for the industry—a way to ignite a passion for design.

When Fu Zhan heard this, he felt such a sharp pain in his chest that he could barely breathe. ’How dare she? How could she! She charged a five-million-dollar design fee and came up with *this*?’

"Vice President Fu, what’s wrong?" Chen Jincheng asked quickly, noticing something was amiss.

"I-It’s nothing..." Fu Zhan said, quickly waving his hands. ’This is already humiliating enough. If I let him know how much we spent on design fees, that we paid that much for these piles of garbage Hanfu, what face would I have left?’

But when he thought about the inevitable online humiliation that was to come, his heart sank.

Chen Jincheng looked at Fu Zhan, and seeming to have guessed something, offered a subtle reminder. "Director Fu, when you’re making Hanfu, try to avoid hiring people from the film and television industry. That industry has its... problems. The prices are absurdly high, and some cases might even involve money laundering."

Fu Zhan was visibly startled when he heard the words "money laundering." ’Doesn’t our price tag sound a lot like that?’

’Fortunately, the person who charged the fee was a director’s daughter. She couldn’t possibly be involved in something like that. We can still build a factory, produce and sell the Hanfu, and make our money back. After all, not everyone can afford to buy the kind of Hanfu Mr. Chen makes, right?’

’Soon, you’ll have to wear Hanfu to enter Jinglan City, so plenty of people will still buy ordinary ones. This will create an entire industrial chain, which is why the higher-ups are paying so much attention to this project.’

’For now, as long as the netizens don’t find out that we paid an exorbitant design fee for a pile of crap, the humiliation won’t be too severe.’

With that thought, he immediately winked at Wei Weiwei. ’We have to tell the director’s daughter not to do any promotion for us. If the netizens find out, it’ll be a total disaster.’

Wei Weiwei, on the receiving end of his wink, looked completely bewildered. She winked back, trying to ask what he meant.

Fu Zhan was speechless. He quickly pulled out his phone and sent her a text: "If you don’t want us to be humiliated, tell the director’s daughter not to promote this for us on her social media accounts. Tell her not to mention designing the Hanfu, and especially not the price."

"Er!" Wei Weiwei replied awkwardly, her text accompanied by a helpless-looking emoji: "She already posted about it. I even liked it."

With that, she sent him a link to the director’s daughter’s post. Sure enough, it was already live.

"Have her delete it, quick!" Fu Zhan quickly texted back.

Wei Weiwei complied, immediately sending a message to the director’s daughter asking her to delete the promotional post.

But a moment later, she sent an embarrassed text back to Fu Zhan: "She refused. She said it’s her passion project and has been praised by a master designer in the field. She also said... we have no right to ask her to delete her post."

"Fuck..." Hearing this, Fu Zhan couldn’t stop himself from cursing inwardly.

’What did I do to deserve this?’