County masseur who grabs the order to ＂walk the hole＂
Editor’s press
In recent years, the "small but beautiful" new economic format has become popular. By providing on-site service, consumers have more choices. In-depth Weekly interviewed three practitioners from different industries, including mobile coffee shop owners in Jinan late at night, masseurs who grabbed orders in the county town, and private tutors who came to teach yoga to pregnant women. Their common feature is that they are on the road, making the service flow.
At about three o’clock in the afternoon in downtown Yucheng, Texas, 39-year-old Zhang Mei hurried into the pedicure shop.
Zhang Mei is a mother of two children and a member of the "Mobile Masseur" in Yucheng District. She ran around the streets of the city, grabbing the bill with one pair of hands. When she walked into the store, due to the large temperature difference between indoor and outdoor, Zhang Mei’s glasses were covered with mist. First, she took off her helmet, and untied the scarf around her neck and hung it on the hanger, confirming the service items with customers, and bringing a wooden basin filled with hot water to soak her feet for customers …
◎ Text/Figure Shandong Business Daily Su Bao News Network reporter Zheng Yinan Jin Lihong from Yucheng, Dezhou
Zhang Mei rode an electric car to the next pedicure shop.
> > into the business
When I first met Zhang Mei, her long hair was tied behind her head, and the position where the hair rope was tied was deformed by the helmet, which seemed a bit messy. It was freezing outside, and the air conditioner was turned on indoors. As soon as Zhang Mei entered the room, it was foggy. She took off her glasses and smiled a little. "I went back to my hometown in town to visit relatives this year, and I just came back to Yucheng to live."
Zhang Mei’s hometown is rural, more than ten kilometers away from Yucheng City. After she left her relatives, she rode an electric car back to the city, and when she got to the city, she "grabbed" the list. The reason why Zhang Mei is called a "mobile masseur" is that she has not signed a labor contract with the pedicure shop, and when the pedicure shop has a job, she will send a message in the group, and she and her peers in the group "grab the bill".
In Yucheng, a small county town, mobile masseurs are not uncommon. They have several fixed group chats with the owner of the pedicure shop. If the pedicure shop has a job, it will "shake people" in the group, and whoever grabs it will be the one. Several married women from the same village as Zhang Mei are all in this line of work.
After waking up at six o’clock in the morning, Zhang Mei always goes through some "chaos": making breakfast, washing and dressing her daughter, sending her to school after her daughter has a good meal, and returning home to clean up the toys that her daughter put everywhere the day before … This whole set of "actions" is already at ten o’clock in the morning, and then she can lie down and brush her mobile phone and wait for the "order".
Zhang Mei is a 39-year-old mother of two children. Her eldest daughter is in junior high school and her youngest daughter is in primary school. Since the birth of her youngest daughter, Zhang Mei has quit her regular job in an electronics factory to take care of the children at home. It was not until her daughter went to kindergarten that she had time to find a part-time subsidized home.
Although her husband is working outside and her two daughters are not at home during the day, Zhang Mei has little time to spend on her own. In order to make a living, she wandered around different foot massage shops and got a "share" after her efforts.
"I have considered a lot of jobs, but few have free time and high wages, so I choose to do this business." Zhang Mei said frankly that the first few years after giving birth seemed to be divorced from society, and there were many maladjustments when he returned to society. She once tried to work as a restaurant waiter and workshop worker, but these jobs have fixed requirements on time, and Zhang Mei needs to cook for her children in the morning and evening, so she doesn’t have enough time to work. On the other hand, "the salary is too low to reach the level she wants."
> > grab the order
Zhang Mei finally chose to engage in the pedicure technician industry. "After studying as an apprentice in the store for a while, you can’ grab the job’ in the order group." Zhang Mei introduced that there are roughly 100 foot massage shops in Yucheng, of which more than 50 are concentrated in Yucheng Mall area. "There is a group chat of more than 100 people in the mall, in which there are mobile masseurs besides merchants." Other stores are scattered in the streets and alleys of Yucheng City, taking the streets as "camps", and several businesses have jointly formed many small groups. "After the guests come to the store, the merchants will ask if there are technicians nearby in the group. We won’t know how much it is until we receive the order, but no matter how much, I am willing to do it. Earning more and earning less is better than being idle."
Zhang Mei told reporters that mobile masseurs and stores are divided into 50-50 according to the final consumption of customers. "For example, if the final consumption of customers is 88 yuan, the store will give me 44 yuan." The reporter saw in a store where Zhang Mei worked that 88 yuan’s consumption included pedicure, head treatment and back massage.
On the afternoon of December 29th, 2021, Zhang Mei hurried back from his hometown after leaving relatives, and received the first order of the day before he arrived in Yucheng. An hour later, she got 44 yuan’s income. Later, Zhang Mei received a new order. She rode an electric car to another massage shop not far away. Compared with the previous order, this order included an ear-picking project, but the project time was similar, and the final consumption of customers was 138 yuan. For more than two hours, Zhang Mei earned more than 100 yuan. There is no new list in the group for the time being. She sat on the sofa of the foot massage shop and rubbed her shoulders, while inquiring about the other party’s income today. "Everyone’s income is good recently. During the Chinese New Year, I can earn more money than usual, and people who work in other places are back."
After visiting a number of stores, the reporter found that the charging standards of foot massage shops in Yucheng are similar, ranging from 50 yuan to 60 yuan to 300 yuan depending on the time and service items. Zhang Mei admits that he can earn about 200 to 300 yuan a day, and even if he has something to rest for a few days in the middle, he can get a reward of 6,000 yuan or more.
> > flow
Yucheng Mall, located in the main urban area of Yucheng, is the main gathering place of foot massage shops, and there are probably more than 50 large and small foot massage shops. These doors are almost the same size and similar pattern. Almost all of them have a double sofa and a coffee table with a price list against the wall.
At two or three o’clock in the afternoon, pedestrians hurried by, and there were no guests in the store. Someone covered a blanket and lay on the sofa to close their eyes. The owner of the pedicure shop said that the pedicure technicians in the shop are divided into two types: mobile technicians and fixed technicians, and the "share" of fixed technicians is higher than that of mobile technicians. After nine o’clock in the evening, the number of guests in the pedicure shops on both sides of the street in the mall increased. The reporter walked into one of the shops. There are five fixed technicians and eight rooms in this shop. Each room is different in size. The largest room can accommodate eight beds, and all the rooms can receive dozens of guests at the same time.
Li Yue, a 33-year-old fixed technician who has worked in this store for a long time, told reporters that she can get 60% of the customer’s consumption price and earn more than 10,000 yuan a month. "I probably serve five or six customers every day, but my salary in this business is not high." When it comes to mobile pedicure technicians, Li Yue said that there is not much competition between mobile technicians and fixed technicians. "There are too many pedicure shops in the mall. In some shops, there is only one boss. When guests come, they will find technicians in the group. Technicians who are closer will go to the store to earn this money." In Li Yue’s view, mobile technicians are not as high as fixed technicians, but they are free. "I go to work at two or three o’clock every afternoon, and I have to stay in the store until two o’clock in the evening even if there are no guests, but the mobile technicians can take orders if they want to take orders, and they can go home and rest if they don’t want to stay up late."
> > daily
Li Yue’s foot massage shop charges ranging from 108 yuan to 388 yuan. Li Yue told reporters that he is 33 years old and lives in Linyi. He has been in Yucheng for nearly two years. During the chat, the reporter learned that Li Yue has a ten-year-old son who goes to school in his hometown. "My son was sent to the nursery by me when he was two years old. I didn’t want to be a housewife, so I went out to find a job and stayed in a company that trained pedicure technicians for two years. After learning, I worked in pedicure shops in Jining and Jinan. This is my eighth year as a pedicure technician."
For eight years, Li Yue went home every three months. "Every time I go back, I will buy a lot of things for my children. I can’t accompany my children during this trip, so I can only make up for it with gifts." Li Yue said that he tried other jobs in the middle, but there was a wage gap. "It’s not easy to find other jobs after working in this business for a long time." Li Yue admits that although the salary of a pedicure masseur is high, he still feels wronged when he meets a guest who has drunk alcohol. "But if you think about what to do without being wronged, everything is worth it."
Li Yue’s working hours are from 3 pm to 2 am the next day. "Even if there are no customers at night, you have to stay up until two o’clock to go back to the dormitory to sleep. If there are guests all the time, sometimes you will stay up until dawn." Li Yue told reporters that the foot massage shop in the mall will arrange accommodation and lunch and dinner for regular employees. "Breakfast is not important because we are all sleeping at that time.". Li Yue went back to the dormitory to wash after work. She would brush her mobile phone for a while before going to bed. She was used to the black-and-white schedule.
After staying up for several nights in a row, Li Yue will give himself a day off to go shopping. "My current salary is enough to buy what I want, which is why I have been doing this business." Li Yue sighed, "I didn’t earn enough money to work in a factory. I’m used to this kind of life now, and I don’t have to ask my family for money if I want to buy something. It’s good."
At one o’clock in the morning, there are still neon lights flashing in the streets, and Zhang Mei and Li Yue are running for their lives.
(At the request of the interviewee, Zhang Mei and Li Yue are both pseudonyms.)