Signing the Mold Storage & Custody Agreement (1)

Kim Chirok couldn't help thinking how wonderful it would be if their sales really reached two billion won. Then he could raise not only the Plant Manager's and Manager Cho's salaries, but his own as well.

The truth was, Hyangdong Tech had been incorporated, but they still hadn't set anyone's pay. Now, at last, he felt confident enough to do it. He even found himself thinking they might be able to pay themselves more than what they'd earned back at Hyangnam Tech.

Kim Chirok smiled.

"And the Mitsutec Team Leader told me to register in the ERP system right away."

"Did he, now?"

"He said to go into the ERP, complete the vendor registration, and submit a service request. Once we're in, the orders will start showing up there."

"Once President Kim gets moving, everything just falls into place."

"There's a catch, though. Once we're registered as a vendor, we have to maintain the account. He said the president made a special exception to approve us, but from here on out we're expected to raise our standards."

"That's fair enough. Our operation's nothing to look at, honestly. And as for technical staff, we might as well say we don't have any."

"For starters, they want us to get ISO certified. To pull that off, I'm going to need a lot of help from you and Manager Cho."

"We don't really know the first thing about that kind of work..."

"We still have to do it. Certification systems like that take company-wide participation. A president can't handle it alone."

"Sounds like a headache."

"Manager Cho, would you be willing to take the lead on it?"

"Me? Put me on an injection machine and I'm fine. That, though? Not a chance."

"Should we ask Assistant Manager Choi from Hyangnam Tech's quality team to come back?"

"I can't stand that rude bastard. Why don't we just hire someone new?"

"Haha. All right, we'll talk it over later. I'll get the ERP registration done first. And I'll pass the ID and password along to both of you once it's set up."

The Plant Manager grinned.

"I was really worried we'd get flagged on technical staff during this vendor registration. Glad it worked out."

"While we're at it, why don't the two of you pick up a national certification? You could start preparing for the Injection Mold Engineer exam."

Manager Cho's face crumpled at once.

"That one you need to know injection mold design and machining, so..."

He let the sentence trail off. He clearly had no confidence in it.

"Not with my brain and Manager Cho's, it won't," the Plant Manager said. "Why don't we just hire people who already have those credentials?"

"We can't afford to hire anyone in our current situation."

"Well, of course not. If we'd had qualifications like that, we wouldn't have started our own company in the first place. And we wouldn't have hidden Mitsutec's molds, either."

"But what if they start requiring that kind of thing to keep our vendor status? And if we want to break into other companies' supply chains, we'll need it for sure."

"Then hire someone. You don't even have to raise our salaries."

"Understood. We'll revisit this later. I'm going to get the ERP registration done."

Kim Chirok completed the ERP registration and submitted the service request. Hyangdong Tech appeared in the system, and the order status screen came up. For now, every field was still blank.

He wrote the login ID and password on a Post-it note and stuck it on top of the Plant Manager's computer, where both the Plant Manager and Manager Cho would see it.

Two days later, word came that the Mitsutec Purchasing Team Leader and Manager would be visiting Hyangdong Tech. They would tour the factory and sign the Mold Storage & Custody Agreement.

Kim Chirok, the Plant Manager, and Manager Cho dressed neatly and waited.

A little after eleven in the morning, the Mitsutec people arrived.

"Welcome. Please come in."

Kim Chirok greeted them with careful formality. The Plant Manager and Manager Cho, standing beside him, bowed just as respectfully.

The Mitsutec Team Leader looked the Plant Manager over and delivered a single remark.

"You. You won't need to grab my pant leg and cling anymore."

"I'm truly sorry about last time. I was desperate. That's the only reason I did it."

"You're the plant manager, you said? From now on, you'll be the one sending ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠us the product quality test reports."

"The test reports..."

"You people take in raw rubber compound from a mixing house, so you'll at least need to obtain that mixing house's test reports and pass them along."

"Y-yes. We'll do that."

"But as you grow, you'll need to run product quality tests here yourselves. And you'll need to do the compounding in-house, too."

"Understood."

"We registered you as a vendor out of consideration for your president. From here on, everything has to be done at this facility."

"Yes, sir."

Kim Chirok led the Mitsutec visitors into the office.

"Sorry the office is so small."

"It's fine. Better to have a big shop floor than a big office, anyway."

"What would you like to drink? Coffee?"

"Coffee's for after a meal. How about a cup of green tea?"

Kim Chirok started to get up to make it, but Manager Cho was already on his feet, quicker than anyone.

"I'll take care of it."

He returned with two cups of green tea and set them in front of the Mitsutec Team Leader and Manager.

The Team Leader looked at Manager Cho.

"You're the one who was production manager at Hyangnam Tech."

"Yes, that's right."

"Didn't I chew you out once when a defect slipped through?"

"Th-that did happen. The operator had the temperature wrong that time..."

"Defects are not acceptable. They don't just degrade the product — they're a matter of consumer safety."

"I'll keep that in mind. We'll make them right."

The Mitsutec Team Leader and Manager threw their weight around freely with the Plant Manager and Manager Cho. With Kim Chirok, though, they didn't dare take that tone. They seemed to have decided he was close with the president they served.

In truth, Kim Chirok had met the Mitsutec CEO only once — and that had been the first time.

He signed and sealed the Mold Storage & Custody Agreement the Team Leader had brought. With Hyangdong Tech now a registered vendor, he pressed the company nameplate and the corporate seal onto the document without the slightest hesitation. The terms themselves were straightforward.

Two copies were drawn up. Kim Chirok even affixed the page-joining seals.

When the paperwork was finished, the Mitsutec Team Leader handed one copy to Kim Chirok.

"Thank you for your trouble, President Kim."

"I'm the one who should be thanking you, Team Leader. You've helped us a great deal, coming all the way out here."

"Then we'll place this month's order officially. It'll post to the ERP this evening, but our Purchasing Manager will give you the details now."

The Purchasing Manager who had come along laid out the order. They were placing an order for a full forty thousand units of the four MC24-series products that Hyangnam Tech had been producing all along.

Heat surged through Kim Chirok's body. He was buzzing. The Plant Manager's grin stretched from ear to ear — the look of a man who had just realized the startup had actually succeeded, and that it was because he had found himself a good president.

Manager Cho stood off to the side, looking stunned.

Of course, that two hundred million won still had to cover the cost of the raw rubber compound, plus the rings purchased from Ilryung Precision. On top of that, there were the wages of Hyangdong Tech's seven employees.

Even so, a healthy margin looked likely. Subtract materials and labor, and a thirty percent profit would leave sixty million won. Twenty percent would still drop forty million. If they could keep this up for even a year, they would be able to add more injection machines.

Kim Chirok smiled.

"It's already lunchtime. Shall we go? There's a place in Hyangnam-eup that does excellent charcoal-grilled ribs."

So the two men from Mitsutec and the three from Hyangdong Tech headed to the charcoal grill. Kim Chirok's own car was such a wreck he was too embarrassed to drive it, so they took the Plant Manager's. That one wasn't much to look at either.

They ate at Bonga Hwaro Charcoal Grill, in the heart of Hyangnam-eup.

The Plant Manager spent the meal diligently pouring drinks for the Mitsutec Team Leader. The Mitsutec Manager declined — he was driving.

The Team Leader seemed to be in a fine mood.

"To be honest, Hyangnam Tech was a burden. The president and the managing director were both so old. But President Kim is younger than I am. I like that."

"Please think of me as a younger brother."

"Not at all. You're the president of a company. I couldn't possibly. By the way, President Kim — did you already know our president from before?"

That, it seemed, was what he really wanted to know. He was probing, lightly, just how close Kim Chirok and his own CEO actually were.

"The Mitsutec CEO was close with a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠professor I admired. He taught organization theory — studied at Indiana University and Yale."

The table went quiet. However much of a grim reaper a purchasing manager might be to a vendor, there was no talking over Yale. They themselves had come out of no-name provincial colleges in Chungcheong Province.

And the Plant Manager and Manager Cho hadn't even attended those. They seemed to look at Kim Chirok with even deeper awe than before.

The Mitsutec men, for their part, appeared to have decided that even if Kim Chirok was only a vendor president, he was close with their own CEO — which meant they had better stay on his good side.

The Team Leader smiled with his eyes.

"You don't seem to drink much, President Kim. And since the plant manager is driving anyway, have a glass."

The Purchasing Manager offered him a drink as well. Watching the two of them compete to pour, the Plant Manager felt, with real force, that Kim Chirok was someone extraordinary. The grim reapers of the supplier world, vying to fill a vendor president's glass.

The Mitsutec Team Leader turned to him again.

"But can you really make a living with four injection machines?"

From Kim Chirok's point of view, having all four running was more than enough. It would put them over two billion won in annual sales. And yet the Team Leader was asking whether four machines could even put food on the table.

"Looking at the space we have, we could probably add about four more. But even if you have the machines, it's a problem if you don't have the orders to fill."

"Hyangnam Tech used to supply us more than eight billion won a year. Bring over even half of that and you're looking at four billion. Shouldn't Hyangdong Tech be aiming for that?"

"So if we add machines, you'll give us the work?"

"Hyangdong Tech is the company that succeeded Hyangnam Tech, isn't it? You should be able to bring that volume over. Though to be honest, Hyangnam Tech didn't have a great reputation."

"Is that so?"

"Defects came through from time to time. And the finishing work was rough."

"I see."

"If you can keep those problems from happening, then at the very least, we can give you the orders for the products Hyangnam Tech used to make."

"Hyangdong Tech will make sure of it."

"First, the forty thousand we ordered today have to come through with zero defects. An initial lot can't go wrong. That's something the plant manager will need to handle."

The Plant Manager poured the Team Leader a drink with both hands.

"We'll make them right."

"Watching you grab my pant leg and hang on, you looked like a man who had some confidence."

"Haha. Why do you keep bringing up the pant leg? Let's drop that, please. It's embarrassing."

"You nearly tore my pants right off. Come on. Let's have a drink and call it even."

"I'm driving, so I'll only take a little."

Once again, the Plant Manager received the glass with both hands. The Mitsutec Team Leader poured with one.

That was the difference, even in the way a drink was poured, between a man from the company that placed the orders and a man from the company that filled them.

After the meal they left the grill. The Mitsutec people said they were heading to Pyeongtaek.

Kim Chirok saw them off with a careful, formal bow. No matter that he had graduated from Seoul National University, no matter that he was close with their CEO — he was still the president of a vendor company. And if treating them this way put them in a good mood, there was nothing to lose.

He rode back to Hyangdong Tech with the Plant Manager and Manager Cho. The Plant Manager took Kim Chirok's hand in both of his.

"President Kim! We're going to make it now!"

"You think four injection machines are enough? We need to get up to ten, twenty. And we should be doing the compounding ourselves, too."

"What about the cutting and the shiage — the finishing? Instead of outsourcing it, what if we did it in-house? We'd only need to hire a couple of older ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠women."

At two hundred million won a month in sales, bringing on two older women didn't seem like much of a problem.

"You're worried outsourcing the cutting would produce too many defects? All right. Let's hire two."