by David Hockey
Chapter 16 Boxes and dreams
He called Salisbury Boxes as soon as he arrived home and made an appointment for 1:30 the next day. Supper that night was the salmon he’d bought last weekend; he grilled it. Afterwards he opened the road map and circled the forty four retailers who wanted toys as soon as he could provide them then put their cards in an envelope to take with him. To make sure he didn’t forget anything he made a to-do list for Friday: ‘Take map. Buy more detailed maps of the area conference members came from. Take receipt book and pen. Put the sets in three bags in the van.’ He added, ‘Take sandwich lunch’, thinking that this would give him time to travel to more shops as well as save money, and ‘Thermos of tea’ if he could find where Betty stored the ones they took on picnics.
His first call Friday morning was typical of all the calls he made that day. The shop owner recognised him, thanked him for coming so quickly and was glad to take five of each set. Only one of the retailers questioned the rate, asking for a fifty percent commission, but when told that everyone else was selling them at a forty percent the man said, “Okay, I’ll do the same.” The visits took, on average, about twenty minutes, so there was time for him to call on two of the stores in Salisbury whose owners or managers hadn’t gone to the conference. None of them wanted any of his toys which was good, in a way. He didn’t have enough to provide them right now.
He ate his lunch on a table in the park next to the Avon. ‘Salisbury’s a pleasant town,’ he thought. ‘It’d be nice to live in a house overlooking the river. I might be able to do that if we made enough money.’ It would be much better than living in a giant Small End and next to a bustling Community Centre. But all his friends lived in or near Small End and he didn’t want to move away from them.
He stayed in the park watching people feeding the ducks until it was time to go to Salisbury Boxes. Once there he parked the van, put one of each set in his carrier, entered the office and was greeted by a man standing behind the counter.
“Hello. It’s Mr. Barns isn’t it?” Bob nodded and the man continued “My name’s Bill Watford. We spoke on the phone. I understand you’re interested in buying boxes from us.”
“Yes but not like the ones I have here,” and Bob pointed to the three in the carrier. “Something more attractive.”
“Well there are some we make,” and he pointed to the walls. “Any of them look better than a plain cardboard box, don’t you think?. Do you see one that might suit you? Don’t worry about the size, we can easily change that.”
“Just a minute. No, I don’t think so. You see our toys are all made of wood. I was wondering if you could make a cylindrical box for us and colour the outside to make it look like a log.”
“A cylindrical box? Oh, yes, I think we can, though I’ll have to check with my brother.” He put his head through a door behind the counter and shouted “Dan. Can you come here for a minute?”
“Be right in.”
“Dan this is Mr. Barns. Mr. Barns, this is my brother, Dan Watford. Dan and I own the business. Dan is the designer and manages the factory; he spends most of his time there. Dan, Mr. Barns asked me if we sell cylindrical boxes!”
“Well, well, well! That’s interesting. A client ordered cylindrical boxes about two months ago. He imported linens from China and wanted a distinctive box for his napkins, table cloths, sheets and so on. but he was killed three weeks ago in a car crash and his business has closed down. So we thought the design and the cutters we made were wasted. Just a minute, I’ll fetch one of the samples we made to show him what we could do.”
Dan left the room and returned carrying a piece of cardboard. He put it on the counter then rolled it twice to make a cylinder. He then bent the outside ends inwards to make the cylinder into a box. With one hand he held the cylinder firmly and used the other to pull a tab that turned out to be the edge of a flap that was cut through two sections of the cylinder.
“That’s how you open the box. We’d add the design you chose to the outside and parts of the inside would be coated with an adhesive and protected with waxed paper. We ship the boxes flat and your staff would have to remove the waxed paper and roll the pasteboard around a large wooden cylinder we provide to make the boxes. The adhesive will hold it in shape. Then they fold one end like I did and the adhesive will fasten that end together. Lastly they pull out the cylinder and fold the other end. It sounds like a long job but I can fold ten boxes in a minute. What do you think of a box like this?”
“I think it’s excellent! I’ve never seen one like that before, especially the way it opens. But wouldn’t it roll? That would be inconvenient.”
“No. Since I didn’t roll it on the cylinder I wasn’t able to bend the bottom of the box and shape its ends properly. The cylinder is slightly concave along the bottom. Pressing the pasteboard into the concave part actually forms the bottom. The top is on the other side when the board is rolled correctly.”
“Can you colour the outside to make it look like a log?”
“Easily. Just tell us what kind of log you want, maple, oak, silver birch, or whatever. We could print any of them.”
“Wow. People would buy our toys just to have one of the boxes! How much would they cost?”
“Are those boxes in your carrier holding your toys Mr. Barns?”
“Yes, and please call me Bob. I think we are going to be doing quite a bit of business together.” Bob pulled out one of the boxes and opened it to show the village set that was inside. “The other boxes hold a farm set and a train set but they all fit into the same sized box.”
“I’m Dan. Well, the smallest order we take is a thousand boxes. What would we sell a thousand of these for Bill?”
“A box a bit bigger than those cardboard boxes you use would be £250. We give twenty percent off if you order in quantities of five thousand.”
“£250 for a thousand, that’s twenty five cents each. These cost five cents, but yours are so much better I’d like to order a thousand right now. Can you show me what the outside would look like?”
“I can show you photographs of tree barks on the computer,” said Bill, “and you can choose one. Come and look,” and he walked behind the counter and did something to the keyboard. Several different tree barks appeared on the screen.
“How did you do that?”
“I used a search engine and looked for royalty-free pictures of tree barks. Now I’ll enlarge some and you could choose the one you’d like.”
“Can I have that silver birch? This part of the bark,” and he circled a section of it with his finger.
“Of course. I’ll copy the photo and enlarge just that piece. Dan’ll use it when setting up the printer’s computer.”
“And we would want our company name printed too. Small End Wooden Toys. Can you print the label on one side so it can be read when the box is on the shelf? I think it could be put here,” and Bob showed Dan where he meant on the sample cylinder.
“What colour ink?”
“Black I think. That would stand out.”
“Do you want the name of the toy that’s inside printed on the box?”
“No. I think we’ll use a sticker for that. We don’t know how many of each we would need.”
“I can print a check-off box on one end then all you’d have to do is tick the box that names the toy you’ve put inside.”
“Yes. That’s a good idea. Put in four lines, leaving one blank because we’re probably going to make some different toys. The label would list Train, Farm and Village. Thanks. How long would it be before I received the boxes Bill?”
Bill stopped copying Bob’s instructions for a moment and said, “How long Dan?”
“It’ll only take a week right now because the time I reserved on the cutters for the client who died hasn’t been taken by anyone else. All I have to do is program the computer and adjust the cutters. Cutting and putting adhesive on the pasteboard doesn’t take very long. You’re lucky.”
“Do you deliver to Small End, a
village near Big End?”
“Yes we do. No charge for delivery for that distance. We’d fit it into our other deliveries. But that might add a couple of days to the time before you get it.”
“Then call me when they’re ready and I’ll pick them up. I want them as soon as possible. Here’s my card. I’ll give you a cheque for all of them now.”
“Thank you. Then let’s do the paperwork.”
“Can I take that cylinder you made to show my partner?”
“Sure. Here it is. How’s the business doing?”
“Very well. We anticipate selling two hundred sets a week and we hope to sell more. Almost a hundred retailers showed interest in buying these toys at their conference this week. That’s where I met Tina Liscome. She told me about your factory. She buys her boxes from you. There’s one of them there,” and Bob pointed to one of the boxes that Tina used that was hanging on the wall.
“Ah yes. We both know Tina. Say ‘Hello’ to her from us next time you see her.”
“I will.”
‘What luck,’ thought Bob, as he left the factory. ‘A box like that will surely increase sales.’ Then he started to worry, what are the retailers who only have the old boxes going to think? ‘I bet they’d be unhappy. What can I do. Oh, I know, I’ll replace their old boxes with new ones.’ That being settled he drove to the next nearest shop on his list.
It was about 4:30 when Bob parked at the Small End workshop. He carried the pasteboard cylinder into the office. Ken was arranging the furniture that had arrived. The desks, chairs, cabinet, shelves and a few boxes filled most of the space. “Which desk do you want Bob? You get first choice.”
“It doesn’t matter Ken. You’ll be using the office much more than me. Which do you want?”
“This one. It’s near the phone outlook and I can see through the window into the waiting room if I sit here.”
“Okay, that’s your desk. I’ll take the other one. Move it anywhere that suits you. Where’s Craig? I didn’t see his bike when I came in.”
“It’s Friday Bob. Craig told me he had a date and I let him go at four. I might do that each week as a small bonus. I’ll think about it. I paid him, gave him a cheque for £125. I think he’s happy with that; we’d have to pay a man twice that. I want to pay the staff at the end of each week like I said Bob. We could make it every two weeks but I think it better if we pay weekly and it’s easier to make changes if they take a day off, for instance. They feel better once they have the week’s pay in their pockets, too.”
“Whatever works Ken. Hey, look at this,” and he held up the cylinder. “Do you know what it is?”
“It looks like a cardboard cylinder to me.”
“Well, yes, it is, but it has a lid,” and Bob opened the top. “I’ve ordered a thousand of them. The outside will be coloured to look like a log, a silver birch log. We’ll use them for our toys. I think they’ll add to our sales when people see these on the shelves, it makes them look more like a gift than the our cardboard boxes. They cost £250 and I gave them a cheque.”
“I think they’ll look very attractive once they look like a log.”
“I’m still a bit worried about all the money we’re spending Ken. I’ll list all of our expenses this weekend and find out how we stand. It’s near the end of the month so we’ll soon have to pay the bills. I’ll phone you if we don’t have enough in the bank. I hope we don’t have to add more.”
“Okay.”
“How many sets do we have now?”
“We made another fifty farms and are working on a hundred villages. We’ll make them in lots of a hundred from now on. Altogether there are seventy five villages, a hundred and five farms and a hundred trains at the moment, minus the ones you handed out today.”
“I gave five of each to nine retailers. So we’ve got thirty villages, sixty farms and fifty five trains. I’ll mark it on the sheet. Do you have it?”
“Yes,” and Ken pulled it out of his pocket. “I’ll pin it to the notice board when its up. How many sets do you think you’ll need each day?”
“I can probably go to ten shops if I spend time talking to the owners. More if they’re together in a town and many more if I just simply hand the sets over and don’t talk to anyone. Right now I’d need fifty of each set each day.”
“Okay, then we’ll have to hire more workers. Craig and I can only make about a hundred sets a day.”
“Of course it’s only now I need that many. Later they’ll only need to replace the ones they sell.”
“Yes but they might sell a lot more than we expect. You might have to deliver a hundred of each every day.”
“A dream Ken.”
“If we ever sold that many do you know what that’d bring in each week?”
“No.”
“Well, after all our expenses are paid it could be as much as a thirteen thousand pounds.”
“No. I don’t believe that.”
“Nor did I at first, but think. Retailers sell our sets at different prices, fifteen, twenty two fifty and twenty five pounds and we receive sixty percent of that. Here, let me write it on a piece of paper,” and Ken picked up the pad and wrote ‘£9, £13.50 and £15.’ “That’s what we get from them. Let’s say, on average, we get £12.50 a set and that we sold the same number of each set. Now I’ve roughly calculated what it costs each week and, after paying for wood, paint, distribution costs, Craig’s salary and so on it’s a bit less than three hundred and fifty pounds. When you do the rest of the maths we’ll make about nine pounds on each set. That shouldn’t be a surprise, you used to take home more than that for each set you sold to Rose. The big difference is that we can make more than a hundred a day whereas you made only a few. So if each set sold gives us £9 net and if they sell a hundred of each set a day, what do we get?”
“£9, times three, times one hundred.”
“Which is £2,700. And five days a week gives us £13,500.”
“And £13,500 for fifty weeks makes nearly seven hundred thousand pounds a year! No, it can’t be right Ken. A hundred of each set, that’s three hundred sets each day! That means we’d need a hundred retailers because each might only sell three a day. And five hundred retailers if each sold only three in a week.”
“It is right Bob. However, for that to happen we’ll have to expand our distribution area. We might need four or five hundred retailers.”
“I couldn’t possibly deliver to that many.”
“Yes I know. We’d have to hire drivers and more vans. Or find a distributor to handle our stuff.”
“We wouldn’t get as much money from each sale if we hired drivers, rented more vans or used a distributor.”
“No I know. But all this is in the future. We’ll just see what happens over the next two or three months.”
“I can’t think about what’s going to happen over the next two or three months Ken. It’s too much to handle and gives me a headache. Two many things might go wrong.”
“Well it is a lot to think about, I agree, but that’s the way I am. I’ve always liked to think about the future, even if what I think might not happen. In the long run we’ll just have to see what happens Bob.”
“Yes. Just don’t change too quickly Ken. It worries me, aiming so high and spending so much money as we go along. Spending money is the worst part for me, I don’t have that much.”
“Ah, don’t worry Bob. We’ll not go too fast. Now, let me help you load the van.”
They put all of the sets into the big cardboard boxes that were in the van and Bob drove off, his head reeling. To think that he could be earning over a quarter of a million pounds in a year! He couldn’t imagine it. ‘What could I do with that much money? Give it all to the children? That wouldn’t help them live a sensible life,’ he thought. ‘Give it to charity? That might be the answer. But do I want to work that hard just to give the money away? Ah. It’s not sensible to think about this. It’s like imagining what I’ll do if I won a million pounds in the lottery; it’s a
waste of time. But Ken thinks it might be possible.’
It wasn’t until Bob had finished his supper and switched on the television that his mind stopped thinking about such a future. Slowly he focussed on what else was happening in the rest of the world, the real world, not the fantasy world that Ken described.
He changed his Saturday routine that weekend, thinking it would be nice to have a couple of days at home for, in future, he’d be sitting in the van most of the week. He wouldn’t even drive to Big End; any shopping he needed he’d do during the week in between calling on the retailers.
It was a bright, sunny Saturday morning. He checked the vegetables and did a little weeding. There were a few radishes big enough to eat so he pulled them. After coffee he took the sign and some screws, a level and a screwdriver to the workshop. Jane saw him as she climbed into her car and shouted, “I’m glad you’re putting that up. It’ll stop people knocking on our door. You’ll be at the Crown tonight?”
“You bet.”
The day continued to be a bright and cheerful one so he decided to take a longer walk than usual. He crossed his garden, went to the back of the station’s parking lot, made his way carefully down the slant where the bulldozer had dumped the bricks and wood from the station and onto a lot where the builders had just dug the foundation. He walked along the edge of the lot then along the road toward the T-junction, passing five houses that were in various stages of construction and three finished ones that had a ‘For Sale’ sign pasted on the front door. Half-a-dozen homes were already occupied, with cars in their driveways and people were working in their gardens, seeding grass, putting down sod, planting bushes and small trees.
At the junction, where the road heading south met the road to Big End, he turned north, walked between two unoccupied houses to the remains of a barbed wire fence, climbed the slope and crossed the railway lines. He stopped on the far side for he could already see several changes. There were no more fields. The hedges had been removed and the trees that used to grew in some field corners had been removed. He hardly recognised the place. Muddy tracks ran from the torn-up acreage to the main road. There were signs where they intersected. He worked his way down the slope and crossed to one of them and read ‘Section Eight.’ Presumably these ‘sections’ would be sold to developers. The cleared land extended for what seemed to be a mile to the north and about the same to the west.
He remembered playing there when he was young. In those days there were farms, barns, hedges, trees, fields, crops and cattle. He and his friends would pick apples from the ancient trees that grew in the hedges. His Mum would wash the apples, cut away the many bad parts and conjure apple pies or apple sauce from what remained. Sometimes they stole carrots but they never took them home for their fathers would have told them off or hit them. Mostly they ate the carrots raw but sometimes they made a fire and cooked them in a tin can. They also stole potatoes and cooked them with the carrots although he preferred his potatoes baked in the hot ashes. They tasted much better than the boiled ones, even though the outsides were burned and covered with ash. One year he and two other boys made rabbit snares and placed them in the runs. A farmer came by while they were doing it and told them to catch all of them if they could, he didn’t want them eating his crops. The only bad part was killing the ones that hadn’t strangled themselves with the wire noose. His Mum didn’t enjoy eating them so he didn’t do it often.
It was depressing to see the changes so he returned to the rail track and followed it back to where it crossed the road above his house. He joined the road and walked along it until he came to the bridge over the river then he took the river path. He was glad that that part hadn’t changed. He took his normal route for the rest of the afternoon. He stopped to admire the view occasionally and when he came to the riverside pub he drank a pint in the garden, looking at the river and almost fell asleep. Afterwards he took the footpath that crossed the fields and led to the village. There was still time for a nap before having his bath and going to the Crown.