Free Web NovelChapter 476: Chapter 472: Digging a Pit for Mr. Jiu
Gu Jiaojiao’s facial soap was always meant to be a product for the masses. Therefore, the patterns on the packaging were designed to be simple and pretty—eye-catching, but without much effort spent on intricate details.
For someone determined to imitate it, it wouldn’t be difficult to take her soap and find someone to copy the same pattern.
However, even if the products looked similar, the details revealed the true skill. For the same pattern, the colors Gu Jiaojiao formulated were far more refined, and the small details were perfect. The other one’s pattern was much cruder. It looked fine from a distance, but up close, it was full of flaws.
Anyone with a truly discerning eye would look down on such packaging.
With just one glance, everyone could see some issues, and they began to believe Lu Yuanbin’s words a little more.
Lu Yuanbin, however, was in no hurry. In front of everyone, he unwrapped both bars of soap. Aside from the crude pattern, the packaging was otherwise nearly identical, making it hard to tell them apart.
Next was the facial soap inside.
One was filled with the faint scent of soapberry, while the other had a medicinal fragrance. Moreover, the aroma of the second one was very pleasant. When the bars themselves were compared, even an amateur could tell which was superior and which was inferior.
By this point, they already believed most of what Lu Yuanbin had said.
Lu Yuanbin didn’t rush to explain. He held up the unwrapped packaging. There was nothing on it. Then, he took out a kettle and poured some water onto the wrapper.
As the water soaked the wrapper, the crowd saw a pattern appear on it.
This was the trademark Gu Jiaojiao had designed for herself.
Long ago, after the facial soap was launched, she had guessed that someone might try to imitate it.
The soap’s formula was simple; the difficulty lay in the proportions. To copy it, one would only need to find an experienced doctor to smell it and guess the general ingredients. Then, it wouldn’t be impossible to find a skilled artisan to produce the soap.
But a formula was a formula precisely because its proportions were perfect—a little more would be too much, and a little less would be too little.
To prevent imitators from trading on her facial soap’s reputation, Gu Jiaojiao had concocted a chemical solution to create this invisible pattern.
It was applied with a stamp. After drying, the pattern would disappear, only to reappear when it came into contact with water again.
Seeing this, the people in the crowd immediately sprinkled some water on their own wrappers. But after waiting for a long time, nothing appeared.
Many of them lived nearby and had also bought Lu Yuanbin’s facial soap. They had kept the packaging because it was too beautiful to throw away. They brought their wrappers over and tested them all in front of everyone. Out of five wrappers, four had the mark, but one did not.
Someone asked, "Why doesn’t this one have it?"
The woman explained awkwardly, "These are the ones I bought. This one, my sister-in-law bought from the black market in the East Market. It’s the purple facial soap. It wasn’t as good as mine after I used it, but at least it didn’t cause any other problems."
At this, the crowd fell silent.
Four out of five had the so-called trademark, and the one that didn’t was bought from somewhere else.
Now, everyone roughly understood what had happened. Someone had seen how well Lu Yuanbin’s facial soap was selling, grew jealous, and started producing these counterfeits.
"No, we can’t let this go! Let’s go to the black market in the East Market right now and demand an explanation from them."
As they spoke, the crowd headed toward the East Market together.
Lu Yuanbin’s subordinate didn’t understand.
"Third Master, you knew the facial soap they had was fake. A simple explanation would have been enough. Why go through all the trouble of proving it like this?"
