Black pigs in high demand, beautiful woman keeps watch at slaughterhouse late at night

On Chongning North Lane in the city, there is a shop specializing in black pork. The proprietress is a young beauty, slender and tall, with a smiling face. "The proprietress is not only pretty, she also specializes in black pork," said staff from the Fengle community where the shop is located.

Her husband works at a slaughterhouse, so she took the chance to sell pork

Chongning North Lane is a food lane in the Meiling area. At 9 a.m., the reporter came to this meat shop at the north end of the lane. Not much meat was left on the cutting board, and the customers who came did not need to pick and choose; they just picked it up and weighed it. The proprietress did not try to drum up business either. "They are all regulars; they have been coming for a long time, and everyone knows each other."

The reporter said they had come to interview her after hearing of her reputation. The proprietress introduced herself: her name is Li Rongrong, she is 30 this year, and her hometown is Hefei, Anhui. Her husband's hometown is Huai'an. The two met and fell in love while working in Shanghai, and later came to Yangzhou together.

After coming to Yangzhou, Li Rongrong's husband worked at a slaughterhouse, and Li Rongrong also worked at a workplace. "A friend knew my husband worked at a slaughterhouse and said your husband must know what meat is good." Li Rongrong thought so too, and since they could get the best pork, it would be better to just sell pork. So she set up a meat stall over in Douzhuang, and later someone suggested: "Yangzhou still doesn't have a shop specializing in black pork. You might as well specialize in black pork; business will surely be good."

"That is how I started selling pork." Li Rongrong said that not long after she started doing business, she joined a fresh food supermarket. Because she had many regular customers, business quickly took off. "Later the supermarket closed down, so I rented a street-facing house on Chongning North Lane. At first it was at the south end of the lane, and only in December last year did I move to the north end of the lane."

To get black pigs, she kept watch at the slaughterhouse late at night

Li Rongrong explained that black pigs normally take more than 1 year to grow, while ordinary white pigs have a growth period of only a few months. "Black pigs take a long time to grow, so of course the meat is fragrant."

"Very few black pigs come to Yangzhou. Pig trucks from out of town normally arrive in Yangzhou around 3 or 4 in the afternoon. When I first started selling pork, in order to get the best black pigs, I kept watch at the slaughterhouse entrance. When I saw a black pig, I would climb onto the truck to pick one and mark it with a pen." Once the mark was made, that pig was settled. Sometimes the pig trucks from out of town did not arrive on time. In order to wait for black pigs, Li Rongrong stayed until 11 or 12 at night. "If there were none that day, I would rest."

"Although I no longer keep watch at the slaughterhouse entrance waiting for black pigs, the pig farmers and I are all familiar with each other now. As long as black pigs arrive, they call me."

"When I first started selling meat, many friends in the circle still did not understand. What I thought at the time was, if others can do it, why can't I? Once you start selling, there is really nothing to it. Business depends on the person." Because the black pork was good quality, and because she was amiable and treated customers honestly, Li Rongrong's business went smoothly. Last year, Li Rongrong's husband quit his job at the slaughterhouse and sold meat together with Li Rongrong. The "black pork Xishi" now had a male helper as well.