Arjun woke up very early in the morning, he had to figure out how much money he could spend on the purchase and how much he had to keep aside for raw material purchases and worker wages. He had researched earlier that there were 3 different kinds of printing presses prevalent during these times.
Letterpress printing was the most commonly used printer type for small shops. But it's working was painfully slow, metal letters had to be manually arranged according to the required order which was then locked into a frame. This was then inked and was used to pressure print onto sheets of paper which were then dried. This was more suitable for printing wedding cards, small pamphlets and small notebooks which were not his required use cases. The only reason he included them in his research was their low cost of acquiring which would range between fifteen to thirty thousand rupees range perfectly aligning with his budget.
The other cheap printing option which was slowly getting popular in recent days was Screen Printing. In this a mesh screen was prepared with the template which was then placed on paper and ink was squeezed through the mesh. It was quite cheap with the whole setup costing around ten thousand rupees but the process of printing was painfully slow with it typically being used for posters and political banners as well as sometimes on T-shirts.
His last option and seemingly his only option was to go for small offset printing. These were the machines mainly used around these times for printing school books. Small offset printing works on the principle that oil and water repel each other. First the printing image is created on a aluminum plate, which is then transferred to a rubber blanked cylinder. The blanket is then used to press ink into paper. Although only one color could be printed at once it was perfect fit for his needs as it could produce around four thousand sheets per hour. But the problem lay in its cost, according to his conservative estimates acquiring a used one could cost anywhere in between thirty to fifty thousand rupees. Even though he did not have such amounts he decided to take a decision once he was done meeting with the owners and their proposed costs as the ruffian situation in Vijayawada could help him persuade people with much more ease. If worst comes to worst he decided to loan some money from Madan for this endeavor. he could see that Madan was quite interested in this venture too.
Once Bhargav was up and was done with his chores they both readied themselves and left to meetup with Karan and his dad. Arjun was in his best clothing today, he was going into his first business negotiation after all. Even though it was only a simple white shirt and black trousers Arjun felt much more comfortable and confidant in his clothing. Karan informed them it would take another half hour for them to get ready so they both continued towards the in hotel restaurant to have their breakfast. They could notice a drowsy Vladimir in there too so they went ahead and joined him.
Vladimir was very happy seeing his newly made friend and expressed how disappointed he was for having to eat food without any vodka on the side. Arjun could only laugh it off and lead him onto some other topics. He noted Vladimir's room number on a small piece of paper and folded it into his pocket. He informed Vladimir that he would be done by noon and send someone to his room once he was back to the hotel.
Madan and Karan who had just arrived were quite surprised to see Arjun conversing with some white guy left him alone and got done with their breakfast very quickly. Once everyone was ready Arjun bid farewell to Vladimir and left alongside the three. They soon arrived to the printing section of local business sector in their jeep.
Upon reaching their destination Madan cheerfully introduced his friend Gopal Rao who was the owner of Chava Printing Press a small scale printing business consisting of two offset printing presses and a half dozen letterpress printers. As they began conversing Gopal slowly began to realize in his surprise that the potential buyer was not Madan but the small kid beside him Arjun. He was alarmed at first but as the conversation went on he could only accept this fact as he too was amazed by how knowledgeable Arjun was in this industry. Half the time Arjun was the one explaining to others about the mechanization process, some of the things which even he was not aware of.
He explained that one Offset printer was in perfect condition meanwhile the other needed small repairs costing around three thousand rupees to get it into optimal condition. He had no intention of scamming or over charging these people as he was already involved with Madan for the past 5 years so he could only inform the prices at which he would not make much profit but would not make much losses either. He was already happy for being able to sell these machines and was looking forward to tsking his business elsewhere far from this messy town.
He quoted forty five thousand for the press which was in mint condition and thirty thousand for the other one which was in need of repairs and was considerably older. Arjun who was looking forward to squashing the prices down using the current conditions of the town could only shut it down noticing that the prices quoted were already quite low. If he had to purchase a new offset printer it would cost him over seventy to eighty thousand rupees at which price he was able to acquire both the available presses.
They spent another fifteen minutes observing the machines and they left to see other shops but promised Gopal to reach out to him before the next day evening. Today being a Sunday did not help their purpose as half the shops were either closed or destroyed by rioters so they had to make do with the ones that were open.
Most of the other shop owners upon noticing their clothing tried to overcharge them or tried to scam them with semi working machines which according to Arjun would fall apart within a month of their operation. So they could only return and Arjun was quite disgruntled visibly and Madan could only console him saying perhaps they could visit other shops the next day. But they both knew chances of finding something suiting his pricing needs would be almost impossible. Madan then dropped off Karan and Arjun in the hotel and went ahead with Bhargav to carry on with their original purpose of contacting local leaders.
Arjun noticing it was still too early from their agreed meet up time with Vladimir went ahead with Karan to have their lunch. Once done they both retired to the A.C room to have a small nap as they had woken up much earlier today than usual.