As Ding Yun completed a series of verifications and successfully uploaded her products, it wasn't long before people started following her shop and inquiring about price reductions through private messages.
Ding Yun, naturally, took on the role of customer service.
She communicated with potential customers.
And stopped them from haggling.
Within an hour, Ding Yun felt utterly annoyed. Some people were incredibly slow when buying things, asking endless questions. They even inquired about the manufacturing dates of the phones, asking if they were 9.9 new, 9.8 new, or 9.5 new.
Even more outrageous were the questions about the source of the goods.
And whether they were stolen and being fenced.
On top of that, some people started haggling by slashing prices to the bone. A seller asking for 2,999 yuan would be offered a mere 998, with a question asking if Ding Yun would sell it for a fixed price.
Ding Yun directly retorted, "Why don't you just rob a bank?"
And then blocked them.
In just one hour, Ding Yun understood why people online often said they wouldn't be customer service. She wondered if the world was simply full of oddballs, and some people, Ding Yun suspected, had no intention of buying anything at all, simply coming to cause trouble.
For example, the one who tried to haggle for a ridiculously low price, Ding Yun could barely comprehend, but asking if Ding Yun could give them a phone? Wasn't that just to cause trouble?
Even a child asking their own parents for a phone.
Wouldn't be as entitled as that.
Not wanting to be upset any further, Ding Yun quickly revised her product page. She added clauses stating that prices were non-negotiable, discounts were not offered, not a penny would be reduced, the items were guaranteed to be at least 90% new, the source was legitimate, customer service was temporarily unavailable, and direct orders were preferred. Private messages would only be accepted for requests of product images, videos, or packing videos.
Then, she closed the second-hand trading app.
She planned to reopen it an hour before the courier pickup cut-off time that evening. If there were any direct purchases, she would communicate with the buyers and arrange for the courier.
If not, she would simply wait longer.
Besides this, Ding Yun also specifically searched on professional shopping platforms for keywords like "electronic waste" and "used phones." She then realized she didn't need to go through the trouble of finding phone repair shops and devising excuses to buy old phones. Although the online shops selling used phones couldn't be described as countless,
their numbers were by no means small.
There were even dedicated sellers on second-hand trading platforms.
Some sold them individually, some by brand, some by the extent of damage, and some, directly by the ton.
Ding Yun immediately bypassed the "sold by the ton" options because she couldn't afford them. The old phones sold by the ton were mostly feature phones or phones from over a decade ago. Even if those phones were repaired to look new and sold at a cheap price, not many people would want them.
After all, they were already in the 5G era.
Who would want to buy a 2G or 3G phone, let alone a feature phone? Besides, feature phones were not expensive to begin with.
Even if she refurbished dozens of them,
she wouldn't earn as much as from one decent smartphone.
So after careful selection, Ding Yun chose a shop that was more expensive but sold phones that were relatively newer from the factory, and also all branded models. She spent all her money at this shop.
She only kept some cash for later to pay for the courier fees.
Next, of course, was waiting.
At the same time, she didn't forget to go square dancing in the evening.
Since there was nothing much to do at home, she might as well go out and dance, stretch her muscles, and live a few more years.
For the next few days, besides being busy receiving express deliveries to replace the glass in her bedroom, Ding Yun spent most of her remaining time learning various magic, witchcraft, and immortal arts and spells that interested her.
Only a small portion of her time was spent checking the second-hand trading app, communicating with a few potential customers who showed strong purchase intent, and successfully completing three orders, earning about six thousand yuan. However, this money wouldn't be credited until they confirmed receipt, so she was still in a state of poverty.
With her life so full,
Ding Yun had almost forgotten about her daughter and granddaughter.
But her daughter, Liu Lan, hadn't forgotten. In fact, she had been extremely anxious for the past two days. She had initially thought that her mother would be worried after she and her son had been away for two or three days and would have come looking for them to return home.
But who would have thought that a week had passed?
They were also struggling to bear living in the basement apartment they had rented for 300 yuan a month after being forced to move out of the hospital.
Her mother still showed no signs of concern.
Let alone looking for them, not even a phone call.
This made Liu Lan unable to help but worry.
If this continued, her money would soon run out. Her mother's pension card wasn't under her control, so wouldn't she have to bow her head first? If she bowed her head first, how could she find a way to get her father to move in with her?
Because of this, while applying for basic living allowance for her father,
she was somewhat distracted.
She was constantly thinking about her mother's attitude.
In the end, believing she had no choice, she secretly returned to the village to inquire about the situation at home.
When she learned that her mother had been living just like usual for the past few days, attending square dancing twice a day without fail, and even splurging on half a rack of pork ribs to eat a couple of days ago, her dissatisfaction grew.
She, her son, and her father could only live frugally in the basement.
But her mother was eating and drinking heartily at home.
Feasts and delicacies.
Was this how a parent should behave?
Didn't they worry about their situation outside? How could there be such an unkind mother in the world?
Despite feeling depressed and dissatisfied, Liu Lan had not given up on the idea of bringing her father to live with her. So, after returning and sulking for a while, she called her son over and instructed him to pretend to secretly call her mother and complain about their hardships.
Perhaps her mother, out of affection for her grandson,
would soften her heart.
Over the years, Liu Lan could sense her mother's dislike for her. If she weren't worried that her granddaughter might not be willing to continue spending her pension on them, she wouldn't have chosen to involve her son when Ding Yun had remained indifferent during this period.
This was her last hope. After all, apart from this son, she truly had no other leverage over her mother.
Then, of course, there was Ding Yun's grandson, Hu Huanhuan.
He dialed Ding Yun's number.
Her son-in-law, who had died in a car accident, was named Hu. When the original owner divorced her husband, she hadn't changed her daughter's surname to hers, let alone encouraged her granddaughter to change her surname. Thus, their family of three originally had different surnames.
As soon as the call connected, Hu Huanhuan, following his mother Liu Lan's instructions, began to cry and complain. He primarily expressed that he was not sleeping or eating well recently, lacked energy in class, and so on.
He even said that he could only sleep on the floor at night.
And that the lights were too dim and yellow when he did his homework.
Of course, it wasn't entirely untrue, as they were living in a basement; the conditions couldn't have been that good.