The young couple left the town to return to their hometown, selling thousands of knives every month

At 24 years old, Do Thi Thu Thuy holds the position of Project Manager for an enterprise with good salary, wide promotion opportunities. But in her mind, she always thought about going back to her hometown to do something to be in control of her time and life.

One day, after being scolded by her boss, her desire for a free life arose. Thuy dreams of a day without a “deadline”, not having to travel every morning, not having to sit in the secret space of the office.

At that time, Thuy had just known Khoa through the Tinder dating app for more than a month. But because they were from the same hometown, they had attended the same high school, so their relationship was determined to be long-term. At this time, Khoa is an employee of a foreign bank with a high income, good capacity, and a bright future.

When he heard his girlfriend’s intention to quit her job and go back to her hometown, Khoa immediately agreed and said: “If you want to quit, you can take care of me. Khoa holds a bunch of money for her to spend in the coming days to prove it. his words.

Thuy resigned from her job to everyone’s surprise. In less than a month of “playing” at home, Thuy thought about what she would do next while convincing her boyfriend to go back to her hometown with her. At this time, Khoa had a house in Hanoi, work was going extremely smoothly, but after a very long conversation with Thuy about future plans, the next morning he submitted his resignation.

Family, friends, and colleagues were surprised because they did not understand what the two of them were thinking, did not understand what “amnestic charm” of the girl born in 1997 made a guy who has everything in his hand give up everything to return home. home to rent a house with me.

During the time of unemployment in the countryside, Thuy still has not thought of what she will do next. “When the two of them had spent most of their money, he confided that his hometown – Ly Nhan commune, Vinh Tuong district, Vinh Phuc province – had a knife-making village. His parents also had a smithy and his father was a craftsman. I want to try selling goods produced by my parents.” At that time, Thuy was not interested because she thought it was a waste of time to quit her job, thinking that she had to go back to her hometown to do something grand, but selling knives would be “silly”. “Especially a village knife, it is black and ugly, but not as beautiful and aesthetic as a branded knife.”

But seeing that her boyfriend earnestly wanted to help her parents, but had nothing to do, she clicked her tongue in agreement.

So from an office girl who wears skirts and high heels every day, Thuy now only wears flip flops and shorts, every day drives a motorbike to her husband’s hometown, 20km away from home, to get knives to sell.

Thuy’s first orders were sold on her personal Facebook, to her friends and acquaintances. Thanks to her talent in sales and the ability to speak words from the time she had to work hard to earn money to study, Thuy quickly sold the first 20 knives.

“I didn’t think people would care and support the craft knife so much. Of course, I ordered my parents to make a beautiful white knife to ensure the aesthetic factor and market demand.”

With the mindset of an educated person, Thuy immediately thought that she had to develop the brand of knives in Ly Nhan craft village professionally. She began to put the product on the e-commerce platform – something that no one in the village had done, or if it did, the product would look very bad.

“I took pains to take pictures, make videos, apply all the knowledge I know and learned to bring products to the market, and aspire to one day be as famous as Da Sy knife” – Thuy said. .

In order to sell online goods with good revenue, Thuy is very diligent in learning how to make “content” from experienced people. “Every time I see someone selling a lot of goods, I send messages to ask to talk to learn.”

Regarding the quality of knives, Thuy is assured that her father-in-law has censorship. But according to her, the most important step is still taking care of customers. “Even if I send the wrong item or have any problems, I try to handle it as best as possible so that the customer can rate me 5 stars. Some customers shared that if they compare their knives with Japanese knives, German knives costing millions are not equal, but they like the way they take care of their customers and feel loved.”

According to Thuy’s survey, up to 50% of customers buy her knives for the second time or more. There are even record customers ordering up to ten orders to give to friends and relatives.

Thuy said that the products of craft villages often have the disadvantage of not being aesthetically pleasing, the service is not good, and they are not professional. Therefore, she and her husband always try to overcome those disadvantages so that the product becomes a famous brand in the market.

With these efforts, after only 5 months, Thuy and her husband had a stable number of orders. Up to now, after more than a year of starting a business, she sells about 1,000 knives every month. This month alone, sales spiked up to 10,000. Her customers mainly come from a famous online sales site today, others are her wholesale and retail via her personal Facebook. The family knife has also been given a name by her to have its own brand format.

There is a memory that Thuy still remembers until now about the early days of starting a business. “That day, the couple returned to their hometown to get a knife on their motorbike. On the way back to the city, it was pouring rain, thunder and lightning. I was worried about being struck by lightning in the back of a truck carrying knives. Knives that got wet in the rain were damaged, so the two of them used raincoats to cover the goods. Both were wet like mice, their clothes were ragged.”

“At that time, I thought I was very sad, suddenly I had a stable job, the rain did not come to my face, the sun did not reach my head, but I left to sell knives. At that time, I just sold it, I didn’t sell many goods, so I thought about it and didn’t know if the path I chose was right or not.

Until now, after going through the most difficult period, Thuy is very proud that she is “owning”, contributing to the development of handicraft village products, creating jobs for her parents and relatives in the village. . The couple’s income from selling knives also helps the family have a comfortable life.

Thuy’s upcoming plan is to expand the market to foreign countries, and at the same time to find new materials for knives of higher quality and better aesthetics.

Nguyen Thao

Photo: NVCC