1986: My Happy Life in Provence

Chapter 356 A Tribute to the Classics

Ines set a date to meet her client in Grasse and invited Ronan to accompany her.

Taking this opportunity, Ronan gave himself a short vacation in the last few days of February.

It's called a holiday, but it just means we won't be going into the mountains.

There are still many things to deal with if I stay in Lourmaran.

Ronan first invited Batty and Cafu over to discuss the future development of the 'Lourmaran Handicraft Cooperative'.

Gold's temporary stall had been dismantled a few days ago, and Cafu had placed an order with Ronan for nearly 10 francs worth of garlands, woven lamps, and ornaments over the past two weeks.

However, before this batch of orders was even finished, Cafu started talking to Ronan about the next batch of orders.

"Wreaths are still selling well, and lamps and ornaments are gradually gaining traction in the market, but we have too few products. Customers browsing Gold's booth always ask us if we have anything else." Although he wasn't meeting with clients today, Cafu was still dressed in a suit and shirt, seemingly already used to his new persona.

Batty is capable of many things; he's not worried about creating new product categories, but rather about how to sell them.

"Gold's event is over, our stall is gone, and now that we've made new knitted items, how are we going to get customers to see them?"

Batty glanced at Ronan, his voice trailing off, sounding increasingly hesitant:
"As it turns out, going door-to-door to sell things is not a good method. We've been trying to sell our lights for so long without success, but recently we've sold dozens."

Before Gold Artworks, Cafu's sales strategy involved taking samples made by Ronan to the decoration market in Apte and also trying to sell them to wealthy clients he knew. However, apart from Christmas wreaths, the sales of other woven items were not ideal.

However, Cafu has now changed his mind, and he has realized that his previous strategy was not working:
“I still need a shop. I plan to rent one in the decoration market in Apt.”

Gold's makeshift stall brought him some success.

Cafu also looked at Ronan:
"May I?"

Both Batistuta and Cafu regarded Ronan as their 'backbone,' and any proposals they made had to be approved by Ronan.

“Sure, of course.” Ronan nodded. “Let’s open one in Apte first.”

Batistuta keenly noticed that Ronan used the word 'first' and asked curiously:

Do you have any other plans?

Lourmaran’s future development plan is to become a high-end, niche medieval village, and Blanco has instructed Sylvie to focus on supporting niche art categories.

If all goes well, opening a shop in Lourmaran would be a good idea, but that would take a while, until the second and third phases of the shopping street are completed, and they can't wait that long now.

However, it wasn't convenient to discuss these details with Batistuta and Cafu right now, so Ronan gave a brief, perfunctory answer and changed the subject:
"The ideal store environment is one that can cater to high-end customers, but we can take our time to find that. Let's focus on the new product categories first."

Cafu was in charge of sales, and the product styles were within Batti's domain.

"I've already started working on new jewelry designs."

Ronan asked Batty:
Do you only make jewelry?

Barty thought for a moment:
"We can also make chairs, two kinds of chairs, and a coffee table."

Barty doesn't know many furniture styles; he mainly learned about decorative items from the master craftsman.

Ronan tapped the table a few times with his index finger:
“Two chairs might not be enough. How about this, Barty will be in charge of the decorations, and Cafu will need some time to find a shop. By then, the truffle harvesting season should be over, so I will be in charge of making the woven furniture.”

Barty asked in surprise, "Two models aren't enough? How many do you want to make?"

Ronan's restaurant only has one style of woven chairs.

Ronan stroked his chin and said calmly:

"Let's make a dozen or so designs first."

Before Ronan traveled through time, he was a fan of a high-end woven furniture brand. Due to his work, he would study the furniture that the brand released every season and had a lot of styles in mind that he could make.

How about we 'pay tribute' to a few games that don't exist yet and try selling them?
Ronan didn't appear at the restaurant during the day for a while.

Upon learning that he hadn't gone into the mountains that day, Claude went to Ronan's restaurant at noon.

Ronan wasn't very familiar with this government official in charge of tourism, and they didn't interact much usually. When he saw him arrive, he nodded as a greeting.

But Claude blocked Ronan's path, seemingly having a lot to say:

Do you have time to have lunch together?

Ronan had no other plans for lunch and accepted Claude's invitation to have lunch.

The official didn't keep Ronan guessing for long; he had barely poured the wine when he stated his purpose directly:
"It's a good thing that Lourmaran is seeing a large influx of art professionals, but there are also hidden dangers. We can't follow the same path as Bonijo, Ronan. I would like to ask for your help."

Ronan looked at Claude opposite him with some surprise:
"What bad thing happened in Bonnillo?"

Bonnillo doesn't have the same strong art scene as Gordes and Mena, but you can still find plenty of galleries, art shops and workshops in this small village nestled in the hillside.

It looks fine. What potential problems might there be?

Claude sighed:

"It's a conflict between the artists and the local villagers. Although the probability of it escalating into a problem is small, we can't ignore it."

He recalled the information in the records and began to explain:

"The core issue is the difference in social circles. Most of the artists are more educated than the local villagers, and their thoughts and vision are broader. Even if they open shops, they don't like to hire villagers, which means that even though there are job opportunities in the village, young people still have to go out to work."

Another key issue is the differing attitudes towards tourism and tourists. Artists welcome tourists and enjoy the tourist season, but local villagers become very irritable during the tourist season, feeling that tourists disrupt their peaceful lives.

Claude paused here, looking quite troubled, and said:

“In the past eight years, there have been five or six cases of conflict between artists and local villagers in Bonnillo. There have even been cases of angry villagers throwing donkey dung at art shops and slandering local shops to tourists.”

Ronan's face looked even worse than Claude's.

This is indeed an issue that needs attention.

His restaurant is actually a small microcosm of Lourmaran society, where many villagers and artists gather every day, but the two groups rarely interact and sit in a far-off area.

Claude said to Ronan in a pleading tone:
“You have a high reputation among the villagers. They may not believe Blanco, but they cannot disbelieve you. Similarly, you have a very high reputation among the artists of Lourmaran. These people all regard you and Zoe as the center. So Ronan, I hope you can help me prevent Bonijo’s ‘tragedy’ from happening in Lourmaran.”

(End of this chapter)