average american beauty

The day before Caroline's 20th birthday was a Sunday.She received her first letter from Isabella at noon that day.

The letter was brought to her by Francis.Perhaps for convenience, Isabella sent this letter to her home along with other letters. After all, Caroline was away from the apartment most of the time, and the mailbox in the apartment was sometimes unreliable.

"Isa has adapted very well there," Francis said, sitting on the other side of the sofa, with his head slightly lowered.

This is the first time that Francis met Caroline privately after Isabella left. They met once at Max’s, but because Caroline had a lot of work to do, they only exchanged pleasantries with him briefly. After a while he left.

Without Isabella, the gentle middleman, the most important link between them seems to have been lost.Francis no longer had an excuse to visit the apartment from time to time, and he was too embarrassed to invite Caroline out to dinner or to the theater alone.

Because when Isabella was still here, every once in a while, she and Francis would invite Caroline to visit her home or Uncle Andrew’s factory to chat about the Chicago shoe industry and the latest fashion ideas. .So even Uncle Andrew asked Francis why he didn't invite Caroline again.

Francis didn't know why, but he couldn't say a few simple words. It wasn't until his sister sent a letter to Caroline a few days ago that he finally had an excuse to come to the door. visit.

Caroline thanked Francis, made another pot of black tea for him, and couldn't wait to tear open the envelope.

"Dear Caroline,

I finally arrived in this dream city.At this moment, I am writing this letter to you sitting at a terrace café on the banks of the Seine..."

Caroline quickly read the whole thing.The letter was sent when Isabella had just arrived.In the letter, she described what she saw and heard along the way, and how excited she was when she arrived.She is now temporarily staying in a hotel with the mother and daughter who went with her, and she has already met Mr. Rizzo on the second day of her arrival.

All in all, everything went well.Isabella wishes her a happy 20th birthday in advance.Also counting the time, when the next letter arrives, the preferred store in charge of Caroline is estimated to have opened, so I also wish the new store a smooth opening in the letter.

Isabella also mentioned that future replies can be sent to Francis.

Francis clasped his fingers together, silently watching the girl reading the letter opposite.Her shaggy brown hair was simply coiled up, leaving only a strand near her cheek, hanging from her ear, and the end of her hair accidentally fell on her lip.

He let go, wanting to raise his hand to brush Caroline's lock of hair.In order not to make such an untimely move, he had no choice but to grab the cushions on the sofa and turn the tassels on them.

"Do you want to read this letter?" When Caroline put down the letter in her hand, she saw Francis' eyes that she didn't have time to look back, thinking that he also wanted to read this letter from Isabella.

Francis nodded subconsciously at first, then shook his head after reacting, "This is from Isa."

"Then what are you thinking?" Caroline saw that the boy opposite was a little restless, as if he wanted to say something.

"I", Francis held his breath and paused for a while, "Tomorrow is your birthday, I wonder if I can invite you to Brett's restaurant for dinner."

Caroline didn't answer right away.

Of course she knew that tomorrow was her birthday, and Sister Carrie's original birthday happened to be on the same day as hers.

Caroline didn't really care about her birthday. Last year's birthday also caught up with the working day. During that time, she was busy with counter rotation and special member activities, and almost forgot about it. It was her sister Minnie who made two dishes that day. Her favorite meal was delivered in advance, and she just remembered it.Isabella was there at the time, and gave her a temporary sketch portrait of herself as a gift.

"Issa told you?" Caroline's eyes fell on Francis' face, and she felt a little amused by the tension hidden in his warm brown eyes.

"Yes, but I knew it a long time ago." Francis looked up, calmed down, and looked at Caroline's expression, "If you have no other arrangements for the time being, I hope I can have the honor to have dinner with you on this day .”

Francis is not a sociable person, but in the past six months or so, he has been trying his best to improve his abilities in all aspects, and he no longer rejects going out to discuss business with his uncle.

Both Andrew and Isabella could see the changes in him.It's just that every time Francis is in front of the person who most wants to show his good side, he still always feels at a loss.

Just like just now, he had obviously tried his best to look calm and calm, but from Caroline's sudden, slightly mischievous smile, he realized that his performance might be different from what he imagined.

According to Caroline's original thinking, she should refuse, because the construction of the Meisi Premium Store has come to an end, and she needs to coordinate many things.

But looking at Francis' tense expression, she blurted out the answer,

"Okay."

The expression on Francis' face changed from nervousness to joy. He stood up and clenched his hands together again, "Then I'll pick you up tomorrow after Meisi Department Store closes?"

It is impossible to say no now.Caroline thought about the list of things to be dealt with tomorrow, and then calculated the approximate time when she would finish checking the accounts with the counter accountant the soonest.

"I'll meet you at Brett's Hotel. I'll be there about seven."

"No problem," Francis immediately agreed. He was afraid that Caroline would repent. After all, he knew how busy Caroline was at work recently.

Afterwards, Caroline had to visit Minnie's house, and it was inconvenient for Francis to stay here for too long, so he said goodbye to her politely.

What Caroline didn't know was that after leaving the apartment, Francis trotted home like an excited child.

Because of the arrangement at night, Caroline naturally had to finish the work on time during the day the next day.

According to the current plan of her and Ms. Green, part of the new preferred store will become a "affordable clothing area".Ms. Green has basically negotiated a cooperation intention with a manufacturer, but the two now have a point of contention, that is, whether to set up a so-called standard number for clothing, and whether to cancel the service of clothing modification.

Caroline's idea is that since it is the "affordable clothing area" with the premium counter style, it should also adopt the standardized style like the premium counter.Like the clothing brand stores of later generations, they produce clothing of the same style and different sizes according to standardized sizes.

But Ms. Green doesn't think so. She insists that clothing is different from other products. Just like the clothing counter of Max's Department Store, although it also sells ready-made clothing, it can slightly change the size according to customers' requirements.

"According to your point of view, making clothes in standardized sizes so that customers can directly choose and buy ready-made clothes is mainly to reduce the service time for individual customers, save manpower, and ultimately reduce the average cost." Ms. Green looked at Caroline and said.

"But have you ever thought that this may lose a large part of the original customers? And according to the order quantity we are talking about with the manufacturer now, if we want to make dozens of or even more styles of clothing in different sizes, The cost will not be much lower."

"But it also allows customers to adapt to this clothing shopping method in advance. After our sales increase, this problem will naturally be solved." Caroline still insisted on her own opinion.

The clothing section of Youyou store is different from other areas, and the main customers are middle-income earners.If we don't change the existing production and sales methods of ready-made garments, what's the point of building a new clothing section in a premium store?Where can we increase profits to ensure that the clothing is of high quality and has a lower price?

"And we don't necessarily get customers to accept this approach from the beginning. In the early stage of opening, we can treat it as an opening event, providing services for free or at a very low price. Later, we can treat it as a commodity, by time frame or The number of adjustments is sold." Caroline finally added.

After nearly two hours of discussion, Ms. Green finally agreed after thinking about it. Just like the current Meisi Premium counter sells the packaging separately as a commodity, a clothing modification counter will be specially set up in the future, and the modification service of the optimal store will also be regarded as "Commodity" for sale.