Gasp! She's a Time Traveler Using Modern Tech to Improve Ancient Life-Chapter 596 - 594: Soap and Music Workshop

Today, a cosmetics shop in East Market of Chang’an City suddenly placed a sign at its entrance, announcing: Inside, special palace-supplied skincare fragrant soap is available for sale.

Soap? The recently rumored soap that’s better and cheaper than bath beans?

Passersby were curious, and some female customers came in directly to inquire: "Shopkeeper, what does this soap look like? Let me have a look."

A maid, neatly dressed, approached with a wooden box in her hands, the lid already opened.

"Dear Madam, this is the soap. Smell it; it contains flower petals and milk. After bathing with it, your skin will be smooth and tender, and your body will carry the scent of flowers!"

"Oh, is it really that good?" The lady curiously took the soap, feeling its smoothness in her hand, and gently brought it to her nose to sniff. It indeed had a strong floral fragrance, much more pleasant than the medicinal scent of bath beans.

"How much does this soap cost?"

"This large piece of soap can be used for bathing daily and it will last three to four months, yet it only costs 288 wen!"

"Two hundred eighty-eight wen?" The lady silently calculated. A box of bath beans wouldn’t last that long, and due to high costs, the price of bath beans was very expensive, nearly half a string of coins.

She just wondered if this soap was really as good as rumored, said to be something Princess Changle made out of boredom.

While hesitating, the maid added fuel to the fire: "This is the soap that Princess Changle and Her Majesty the Empress both love to use. It’s also very convenient for daily hand washing."

"Alright, I’ll buy it. Wrap it up for me." The lady finally made up her mind.

"This piece is for display and not for sale. I’ll get a brand new one from the warehouse for you."

From ancient times to the present, palace-endorsed products are the best. Whatever is popular inside the palace naturally becomes even more popular outside.

Not to mention the supreme royalty of Great Tang, but even in modern times, anything worn or used by the royal family of the now-almost-mascot-like John Bull, once seen by the public, sells out immediately. Its influence is global, much more aggressive than current celebrities.

That’s why Lin Wanwan initially bought a few bars of Lux Rose Soap from modern times for Princess Changle, to have her distribute them in the harem to create momentum. There’s no need to advertise in the market; the Imperial Palace is the best source of advertisement.

"By the way, Madam, apart from the soap for bathing and handwashing, we also have soap for laundry, which is much better than soap nuts. Would you like to add one? It’s only twenty wen, and it can wash clothes for at least half a year!"

A square yellow bar of soap was brought up by the maid, with a slightly fragrant scent but relatively harsh compared to the soap, and not comparable at all.

"Is this useful?"

"Very useful! You can take it home and try it, after all, it’s only twenty wen."

"Alright, then give me one of those too."

"Alright, just a moment!"

This was the scene in the East Market cosmetics shop, while in the West Market, among the shops selling cloth, clothing, and household items, there were a few small stores specializing in affordable soap.

There’s a rumor going around that this soap was invented by Princess Changle after she saw a maid being punished for failing to clean the beloved Moonlight Skirt of an Imperial Concubine, feeling sorry for the struggling palace maids, hence she invented a powerful cleaning soap.

No matter how dirty the clothes were, they became clean after a wash with soap.

The key is, the price of this soap is very affordable! Twenty wen, an amount both nobles and commoners can afford.

For the commoners who couldn’t afford bath beans and soap nuts and could only wash clothes with plant ash, the arrival of this soap was indeed a blessing.

Everyone who tried it praised it. It could wash clothes and even wash hands!

The official slaves (which referred to the craftsmen) who worked hard in various workshops all day would come home to find their wives enthusiastically handing them soap, and surprisingly, it easily cleaned their filthy hands!

Though the soap cost twenty wen, which was still pricey for such families, it was not unaffordable.

Lin Wanwan and Princess Changle’s joint venture, the "Soap and Music Workshop," focused on two major products: soap and fragrant soap, both of which were a huge success upon market release. What surprised Princess Changle was that, despite the low price of the soap, its gross profit turned out to be higher than that of the fragrant soap.

That’s because the alternative to fragrant soap, bath beans, still held a place in the high-end noble ladies’ market.

After all, bath beans made from precious spices like clove, agarwood, musk, combined with more than ten types of flower petals, ground together and added with pearl powder and bean powder to create a fine product, though expensive, were truly effective, making skin smooth as jade and body moisturized with fragrance.

How could the fragrant soaps made by Lin Wanwan with materials like soybeans, pork fat, mirabilite, soda stone, petals, and milk compare in skincare to bath beans?

Bath beans, aside from being expensive, had no major shortcomings.

But would the noble ladies lack money? They wouldn’t! Bath beans unaffordable to commoners were merely ordinary items for them, essential consumables, so the soap market could be imagined.

After trying fragrant soap several times, the noble ladies still preferred high-end bath beans, but their maids showed quite an interest in the fragrant soap.

However, soap was different. Despite being inexpensive, it had a broad market; from the commoners to the nobility, everyone needed it. Taking the approach of low prices with large sales (which, compared to future profits, wasn’t considered low), it quickly gained a reputation in Chang’an City.

The first batch of fragrant soap and soap at the Soap and Music Workshop were dried for half a month, and only after enough stock was amassed were they sold. Afterward, production continued alongside sales, seamlessly meeting demand.

In the workshop, some of the workers were draftees sent by Princess Changle Li Lizhi, some were Lin Wanwan’s own household slaves, and additionally, Lin Wanwan recruited a batch of family members from the tenants of Mozhu Village (a village she named) depending on her farmlands. 𝐟𝚛𝕖𝚎𝕨𝗲𝐛𝚗𝐨𝐯𝐞𝕝.𝐜𝗼𝗺

The work and management in the Soap and Music Workshop were organized by Lin Wanwan based on modern planning and analysis that she paid someone to do, then adapted according to practical circumstances.

The fundamental difference from standard workshops of the Great Tang was—assembly line production.

An assembly line is a work method with a clear division of labor, where each person focuses on their segment, quickly completing tasks, increasing production as proficiency grows, saving labor costs, and also maintaining the secrecy of the formula.

Of course, in the Great Tang, for Lin Wanwan and Princess Changle Li Lizhi, labor costs were negligible.

The wages for household slaves, draftees, and tenant families were so cheap, Lin Wanwan felt she was a capitalist—Li Lizhi even initially believed there was no need to pay wages at all since they were her slaves, so why pay them?

However, she ultimately listened to Lin Wanwan’s advice and paid the workers’ wages. Consequently, the workers at the Soap and Music Workshop greeted Lin Wanwan with great respect, sincere gratitude, and reverence.