Chapter 274: You're Told to Open a Food Shop, But You Operate at 3 AM

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Protagonist:

Lu Feng

In the hall of the Lu Family Restaurant, the minor commotion that had just occurred did not dampen the diners' enthusiasm for the food.

The diners queued up, ordering and collecting their meals in turn.

"Hello, welcome to Lu Family Restaurant. What would you like to eat?"

Hu Xiaoyun stood behind the counter, a warm smile on her face, addressing the diner at the very front of the line.

At the front of the queue stood a girl with a ponytail.

She carried a small blue backpack and, from the moment she entered the shop, had not once glanced at the price list on the wall.

Hearing Hu Xiaoyun's greeting, she stepped forward a little. Instead of ordering, she smiled at Hu Xiaoyun and said, "Hello there, little miss. Could you trouble yourself to call your boss? I'd like to talk to him again. Just two minutes."

"You're looking for Lu Boss?"

Hu Xiaoyun froze for a moment, instinctively glancing toward the kitchen.

In the kitchen, Lu Feng was currently cooking Stir-fried Pork with Chili with a focused expression.

Hu Xiaoyun withdrew her gaze and said tactfully, "I'm terribly sorry, but the shop is busy right now. Lu Boss doesn't have time at the moment; he really can't step away to discuss business."

Ever since Lu Feng's shop became popular, people would come looking for him from time to time.

Some came from other restaurants trying to poach him as Head Chef.

Some wanted to cooperate and become his exclusive ingredient supplier.

Some wanted to learn culinary skills from him.

After a while, Lu Feng found it somewhat tiresome.

He simply instructed Hu Xiaoyun that from now on, during business hours, anyone claiming to have business with him was to be refused outright.

Faced with Hu Xiaoyun's polite refusal, the girl didn't listen. Instead, she rose on her tiptoes and shouted toward the kitchen, "Boss! Boss! Please come out for a moment!"

Her shout brought the hall to a sudden hush, and puzzled looks were cast their way.

The two troublemakers from earlier had just left; surely this girl wasn't about to stir up another mess?

"Miss, if you're not here to eat, would you mind waiting to the side first?"

Hu Xiaoyun frowned slightly, looking at the girl with some difficulty. "Look, there are still so many customers waiting behind you to order. Please don't delay everyone's meal, okay?"

"What's going on?"

Hearing the girl's shout, Lu Feng stopped what he was doing, turned off the gas stove, and walked out of the kitchen.

"Boss, this customer says she has business with you. I told her you don't discuss business during business hours, but she..."

Hu Xiaoyun looked at Lu Feng walking out of the kitchen, explaining with an apologetic tone.

"It's fine. You go attend to the customers behind her."

Lu Feng nodded at Hu Xiaoyun, signaling her to get back to work.

He then looked at the ponytail girl and said flatly, "I'm sorry, but during business hours I must ensure normal dining for customers. If it's a private matter, please come back after business hours."

Having said that, he turned to head back to the kitchen to continue cooking.

"Wait! Boss!"

The girl hurriedly shouted again. She swayed slightly, her tone carrying a hint of coquettishness. "Boss, it's not easy to see you in person. I've made several trips to Food Street, and today I finally managed to see you. Just two minutes of your time, really, just two minutes!"

She was hogging the counter; the queuing customers behind her couldn't order, and complaints of dissatisfaction had already started.

Lu Feng didn't respond. He pointed to the side. "If you're not ordering, please step aside. Don't block the customers behind you from ordering."

"Okay, Boss."

The girl hurriedly nodded and yielded the counter space.

She stepped closer, her tone turning somewhat solemn. "Boss, let me introduce myself first. I'm the business manager for Tuan Tuan Waimai. My name is Lin Xiao. I'm here today mainly to invite you to join our Tuan Tuan Waimai Platform."

As she spoke, the girl pulled a business card from her bag and handed it over, her eyes full of anticipation.

"We don't do takeout here. You can go back."

Lu Feng didn't reach for it. His gaze swept over the card, and he said flatly.

These days, as long as a shop is in the catering business, most of them do takeout.

But Lu Feng had never considered it.

The reason was simple.

Every day at closing time, there was still a large crowd of diners who couldn't get a seat even after queuing.

If takeout were added on top of that, he'd be even more overwhelmed.

Faced with Lu Feng's refusal, Lin Xiao felt a bit surprised.

As far as she knew, almost every shop on Food Street had joined their Tuan Tuan Waimai.

Even five-star hotels had quite a few cooperating with their platform.

A roadside little shop like Lu Feng's should have been more than happy to agree.

The business card Lin Xiao held out froze in midair, but she didn't take it back.

She pushed the card forward again, her tone growing urgent.

"Boss, don't be so quick to refuse! Look, your dish prices here aren't low."

"Once you join our platform, we'll have various subsidy promotions every month. You can completely use the subsidies for discounts — like full-reduction offers, discount coupons, and so on."

"That way you can attract more customers, and your shop's business will be even better."

"And think about it: after joining a takeout platform, those customers who don't want to go out can eat your cooking without leaving home. Isn't that killing two birds with one stone?"

Lin Xiao spoke a whole pile of words at extremely fast speed, but Lu Feng's face still showed no heart-moving expression.

"Pretty good, but I don't want to do takeout."

Lu Feng still shook his head, speaking with a very firm tone.

"Boss, are you worried about our platform's delivery quality problem?"

Lin Xiao still didn't want to give up; she blinked her eyes, pulled out a stack of documents from the pack behind her back: "Boss you take one glance, our platform has a dedicated delivery team, every single delivery person has been trained, for the dishes' delivery time there are strict requirements, even if it's blowing wind and raining, the delivery people will on time deliver the dishes to the customer's hands."

"And our platform will also continuously optimize the delivery people's delivery speed, to guarantee customers can even faster eat the ordered takeout, so this point you completely don't need to worry."

Lu Feng frowned slightly.

Continuously optimize delivery speed?

To put it bluntly, isn't it just the platform continuously squeezing the delivery brothers' delivery time?

Delivery time becomes shorter and shorter, delivery fee instead becomes lower and lower.

Those delivering takeout, in order to let income not become less, have no choice but to increase on the road driving speed.

Speeding, running red lights, driving against traffic these are all everyday occurrences.

In the hospital every day there are quite a few delivery brothers who encountered traffic accidents while delivering.

Could it be they are willing to ride fast?

Aren't they all forced by the platform.

"Little girl, didn't Lu Boss just now already say, not doing takeout anymore?"