Where can you sell dried mushrooms? How I made money on mushrooms

The most important thing is to do everything better than for yourself. Our northern berries - blueberries, lingonberries, cranberries - are the most expensive in the world. And the hand does not rise to spoil them, ”says Ivan Petrovich Samokhvalov, founder and main ideological inspirer of the Berries of Karelia company. Here, sparing technologies for cleaning, freezing, processing and storing mushrooms and berries, a chemical-free recipe and the most environmentally friendly packaging are meticulously chosen.

Harvesting berries

For more than ten years, Kostomuksha, the third largest city in Karelia, built to service the Karelsky Okatysh mining and processing plant, has been known not only for ore, but also for the industrial processing of mushrooms and berries. Raw materials from all over the republic are brought to the local production complex by trucks: the Samokhvalov family controls 90% of the purchases of berries from the population. Only at one reception point, visible from the windows of the plant, people from all over the area deliver about 30 tons of berries daily, and at the peak of the harvest - up to 100 tons. The Murmansk region, the Komi Republic are covered, sea buckthorn comes from the Altai Territory, in case of a crop failure, cranberries can be delivered from Siberia. In the Vologda, Pskov and Novgorod regions, one has to compete with the main rival - the Vologda Yagoda company (see "Business on wild plants", "Expert" No. 35 (865) of September 2, 2013). Part of the berries are brought by pickers from Finland and Sweden, and this is a real victory. Previously, local residents stood in queues for many hours at the border to sell the collected berries to the Finns (the border checkpoint Lyttya - Vartius is just a stone's throw away - only 30 km). “We have seen what a huge flow of berries Finnish and Swedish companies receive from Russia in the form of raw materials. And how Russian people crawl through the forest for them. Not that patriotism played a major role, but it did too: why can't we do it ourselves? This is not some kind of space technology, but simply an investment of funds and effort, ”says Ivan Samokhvalov’s son Alexander, who is responsible for family business for all purchases and sales, production and logistics. It was possible to lure the assemblers by a sharp increase in purchase prices. In 2003, their choice was obvious: 52 rubles per kilogram here versus 17 rubles and the hassle of clearing customs in Finland.

Having lost the main source of raw materials, today the main processors of berries in Scandinavia - Olle Svensson AB (a division of Nordic Food Group) and Polarica AB - are forced to bring labor force from Thailand to stay on the world market.

Berries of Karelia will also soon face the problem of the lack of pickers. Now the procuring network consists of 23 buyers, each of whom manages 30-40 collection points, and about 100 people bring berries to all points. “With the help of simple calculations, it turns out that during the season we provide about 80.5 thousand people with income. That is, three populations of our Kostomuksha. And if there is other work in the city - at the plant, in woodworking and at other enterprises, then in dying Karelian villages people wait all year for these two or three months. After all, it is they who feed the residents all winter,” says Alexander. However, the rural population is rapidly declining, so it was decided to build a residential building for 1,000 people next to the plant, and by 2016 to increase the number of temporary pickers placed in it to 10,000.

Processing and storage

Having examined the berry reception point, according to strict instructions at the stand, we put on bathrobes, hats and go into a bright room - a shop for sorting cloudberries. Ignoring our delegation, the two women carefully pick leaves and overripe berries from the amber-yellow mountain by hand. It is cloudberries that open the harvest and purchase season in July, but we already have the very last batch in front of us. Here it is packaged, and then sent in the form of briquettes for freezing. “Cloudberry consumption market is Scandinavia. We control about 70% Russian market blanks. But these are only hundreds of tons - not the volumes of traditional round berries: blueberries, lingonberries, cranberries, which amount to thousands of tons,” Alexander Samokhvalov continues the tour. Crowberries, gooseberries, currants, chokeberries and red ash also come here, but in relatively small batches.

They do not stand on ceremony with other berries, as with cloudberries: an automatic conveyor line rumbles in the neighboring workshop - the harvesting of the first batches of cranberries has begun. In an hour, up to 2 tons of berries are cleaned, washed, calibrated, electronically sorted and packed. From the stream of berries moving past us, leaves, pebbles and rubbish are gradually removed. Here, with the help of powerful magnets, all metal impurities are eliminated. After a different-sized sieve system and removal of the stalks, the cranberries enter the automatic washer, are blown with compressed air and fed to the sorting unit. Equipment specially brought from England and Belgium carries out electronic control of berries using optical, laser and infrared cameras. The final manual control - and selected pure cranberries are packaged in 25-kilogram paper bags. Surprisingly, there are only seven people in the shop. In the hot season, work goes on in two shifts, but there is no rush.

Berries of Karelia are also engaged in mushrooms, their share is growing, but now it is less than 10% of the entire volume of harvesting. “Picking and preserving berries is much easier than mushrooms. But we also package and sell white, boletus and fly mushrooms: half in Russia, half abroad, for example, to Italians. There is a demand - everything always goes to zero, ”comments Alexander. All adjacent rooms are reserved for freezers. Partially, the berries are stored fresh at a temperature of 0 to +2°C. “We recently launched the sale of fresh berries. We turned to the old Karelian traditions and after two years of experiments we learned how to preserve berries without freezing. all year round. They also worked on packaging technology for a long time and found the secrets that allow the berries to breathe. Therefore, the product does not deteriorate for two months after packaging,” the Samokhvalovs show the cameras, lined up to the ceiling with racks.

In total, this production complex processes about 8 thousand tons of berries per year, this year it is planned to increase the volume to 10 thousand tons - the harvest is very large. “Every year we grow by 30%. But we have much more capacity - up to 15 thousand tons, and we are gradually moving towards at least this figure. And that's just one-time storage. But in fact, we can grow up to 25 thousand tons - there would be someone to collect and supply, ”says financial director- the eldest son of Ivan Samokhvalov Maxim, who manages finance, real estate, design and construction in the holding. Up to 60-70% of sales are exported. Wholesale supply berries are carried out in Danone, Valio, Fazer, Hortex, Miratorg. Alexander complements his brother: “Historically, we supply Scandinavia itself, while simultaneously competing with it. There we managed to reach the end users. We supply

to Denmark, Germany, Belgium and Holland. A lot of blueberries go to China. Now garden blueberries are in fashion in the world - the Chinese grow them themselves and try to sell them, including to Russia. But if you cut it open, it's white inside. And our blueberries are all black through and through - solid anthocyanins, useful for maintaining visual acuity. About 100 kg of medicinal powder is obtained from a truck of blueberries, which is then sold all over the world, mainly to Japan, America, Australia.”

Production and products

For conversations, we move to a neighboring production building. Glass bottles pass us through the bottling shop in orderly rows - they are disinfected, filled with nectar heated to 87 ° C, and immediately cooled to save vitamins, and then packed. The maximum productivity of the line is up to 6,000 bottles per hour, but sales volumes have not yet kept up with the technology. “In Kostomuksha, which is 30,000, we sell 3,000 bottles of nectar per month. On a per capita basis, this is a lot. We would sell 500,000 bottles a month in St. Petersburg, but so far we have not been able to,” Alexander complains.

I look at the composition on the label: straight-pressed lingonberry juice, sugar syrup. If you add less water, but more sugar, you get berry syrup, less juice - fruit drink. 100% juice is also made here, but it is not for everyone - it is too concentrated, sour in taste, Samokhvalov Sr. explains. It is not sold at retail - it is produced only in industrial packaging. “In Europe, enzymes are added everywhere to break down berries at the cellular level and extract as much juice as possible from them. Bacteria, even if not numerous and harmless, are still a foreign ingredient, and we decided to do without them, - Ivan Petrovich explains with pleasure, showing the conveyor line. – As you can see, this is a product that is not so difficult to make. But no one will do better than us - it is already impossible to do better. It's all too easy."

In line finished products there are jams, purees, berry fillers. The line for the production of cranberries in powdered sugar is already more than half ready for launch. And installations for freeze drying - gentle preservation by freezing with preservation of the intercellular structure - will allow you to carefully dry the berries for grinding into medicinal powder or making dragees in chocolate. There are no such drying plants anywhere else in Russia, and in neighboring Finland too. New equipment is very expensive, so the lines have to be assembled bit by bit. They order something in St. Petersburg from intermediaries of Italian companies, but this is a very long process: you need to find the right installation, agree to buy it cheaper, deliver it ... I had to build my own workshop with a lathe and milling machines, presses, welding machines. Six or seven locksmiths work here - mostly older, even in their eighties: there were no young turners and millers in the city. “Our production lines are a third or even half homemade. There are almost no productions as such in our country - everything is destroyed, and the machine park can be bought for miserable pennies. Here we are with the design engineer and develop all the equipment: we guess how it works, and we do it by example. We argue, we fight, but we do it. Even best quality than we are offered to buy, for example, in Chelyabinsk,” Samokhvalov Sr. explains.

The situation with engineering personnel in Kostomuksha is complicated. To gain experience, the father and sons go to foreign enterprises. Specialists are also invited to visit Kostomuksha. “I try to meticulously study every issue and never refuse advice. From time to time I draw to us smart people who lecture on the organization of production. In Germany there is a society of veterans - they advised a good technologist. And here is a German, an old guy with an interpreter, who taught us here. Sublimation specialists came to me from Moscow, and when I was inventing a juice plant, I persuaded the head of the department from the legendary Michurinsk Agrarian University to come to Tambov region. I proved to everyone at the St. Petersburg Refrigeration Institute: “You train boys and girls, and then in Germany they complete their education in two or three weeks and turn them into their workers. Do you have something in your soul from a moral point of view? You work, and the Germans intercept the fruits of your labor and turn the guys, in fact, into sellers of their goods. And you don’t support your own producers.” As a result, I convinced them to come and confer,” says the head of the family.

Start

Here, at the juice factory in his headquarters, Ivan Petrovich says that he started his business in the late 1980s, when the very concept of "business" in Russia was still very few people familiar. At that time, an electronics engineer worked at a mining and processing plant and moonlighted as a private driver, and also traveled to St. Petersburg, where he bought microcircuits for assembling radios, sinklers and the first computers on the market.

The turning point was 1990. “I somehow came home,” the businessman recalls. - They sat down at the table, the wife poured soup. We already had three children, and the youngest son began to cry that he wanted meat. I threw the spoon, went out into the corridor, lit a cigarette and began to think: “Mother of God, why? I studied, tried, finished school with a medal, institute. I live in the North, I work at the GOK in a very harmful conditions. I do not drink. And I can’t give the most elementary things to a child!” It was the beginning, the starting point. At that time, my friends kept computer rooms, and I repaired joysticks. Somehow mentally climbed into their pocket, calculated the income and expenses, and I was tempted. So I started thinking about own business. Actually, it's just greed."

The start was extremely unfortunate. There was no money of his own, and the entrepreneur turned to the bank. A loan - 250 thousand rubles at 15% per annum (a Zhiguli car then cost about 9 thousand) - was obtained only for a bribe - 10% immediately went into the pocket of creditors. The business idea was to manufacture plastic products. Suitable machines were found in Odessa, for their supply, the director of the plant, in addition to the cost, requested two more timber machines - also as a bribe. There was no room either. When they finally managed to find and expand a small basement by manually digging out the ground, the SES and the fire inspection did not allow the equipment to be placed there. The machines had to be taken out, and then they were completely stolen. “I tried to come up with something else, but, having no experience and brains in terms of business, financial management, I lost everything. I had only one thought in my head: get out of the skin, and give this money back. In general, there was crazy theft in the bank, but I later realized this, but oh well, ”says the entrepreneur.

The time was difficult, the shelves in the stores were empty, and Ivan Samokhvalov took up trade. I traveled to Moldova, to Western Ukraine. He took boards, televisions and electronics there, and back - polyethylene film and products, mostly sugar. Then the formation of borders was just beginning, sugar was a strategic raw material, and it was very difficult to export it. The businessman says: “What I just didn’t do. In St. Petersburg, for example, he made his way to the management of the Moscow department store or the Elektronika store with a proposal to sell their goods in Kostomuksha and bring money very honestly and conscientiously. They looked at me like I was sick. From the outside it was funny, but I did it. Still, he managed to negotiate and, without a penny of money, stuffed an old, old minibus with goods. He left for his place in the North, made the minimum margin, sold and brought money back - and so on in a circle. “So I slowly got to my feet. And not just returned the entire loan, but learned how to earn money and realized that this process is probably the most interesting for me, more interesting than anything else than spending money. Maybe this is not very correct, but it is so, ”the businessman argues.

Doing business at that time was life-threatening. The trade of Ivan Samokhvalov was gaining momentum, and local bandits drew attention to him. But he did not succumb to blackmail - to give up the business or die. “Eight years ago, there was a real Kushchevka here. The bandits were local, from Belarus or Chelyabinsk - real moral freaks. They very closely merged with the prosecutor's office, the police, and the authorities. They had a monopoly on everything.

And I was offered: “Either you will do what we tell you, or we will kill your children one by one, and you - the last, so that you can see it all,” the entrepreneur reluctantly says. – Now it seems easy, but in fact it was hard and risky. Either the tax office pinches you, is about to put you in jail, then your competitors order, then the bandits end up, your children are slaughtered. I went through all this. The eldest son received a knife in the stomach, I also somehow returned from the other world. They beat me with bats, they put a bullet in my head, then they jumped on me, they broke my bones.

At the risk of his life, the uncompromising businessman nevertheless gradually managed to develop his business. He opened his first grocery store in 1991. Five years later, a pelmeni production appeared, and in 1998, a meat processing workshop, its own freezers and sausage production, a base in the Volgograd region with a honey packaging workshop. In the early 2000s, he built his own shopping center area of ​​5.5 thousand square meters. m, a taxi service is open. But the second significant year for Ivan Samokhvalov's business was precisely 2003, when the idea came up to create the Berries of Karelia company. She became a real find and the center of all further entrepreneurial activity families.

Forced diversification

While the majority of entrepreneurs aspire, if not to Moscow and St. Petersburg, then at least to regional administrative centers, all of Ivan Samokhvalov's projects are based in Kostomuksha. The businessman, of course, made attempts to go beyond the district, but they were unsuccessful. The first reason is staff theft. “I have learned the hard way that if a business in Russia is located somewhere far away from you, then you can confidently assume that it is not yours. In Kostomuksha and neighboring settlements - Medvezhyegorsk, the villages of Muezersky, Rugozero, Segezha - I had about 15 small shops, for which I basically converted apartments.

And they stole terribly everywhere, although people had no other work in these towns, and I thought that any should be for happiness. And it’s very insulting: you are so squirming (then firefighters demand wheels for the Volga for desired signature, then something else), and as a result, those to whom you gave a job, they rob you, ”the businessman complains.

It is now the Samokhvalovs who are actively cooperating with retailers. The products of "Berry of Karelia" can be found in "Perekrestok", "Magnit", "Stockmann", "Azbuka Vkusa", "Land", "Auchan". And in 1999, the entrepreneur’s own stores themselves made up trading network"Slavs" - at that time the largest in Karelia. But due to lack of control, they only brought losses. At the same time, the interregional networks Magnit and Pyaterochka began to make attempts to enter the market retail in northern Karelia. The businessman explains the decision to close his outlets as follows: “Their price level is not much lower. But the arrangement of goods and the plan of the store are thought out much better and more beautiful, more convenient for the buyer. Producers are always half-bent bringing products to them, no one asks for money for six months, if only they take it on the shelves. Networks were able to create such conditions, but small businesses cannot do it. And it immediately became clear that we had to leave, otherwise they would trample. Of course, at that time it was still possible to compete with them, but somehow it never occurred to me. To do this, it was necessary to create a security service, hire security guards, but simply on trust, nothing would have worked out because of total theft.”

The enterprise for the purchase and packaging of honey was closed for the same reason, and Ivan Samokhvalov realized that “you need to develop the business where you live, never climb into other people's territories and not do business where you are not.” But there was also a positive experience - the entrepreneur reasoned that it would be difficult for non-Karelian companies to compete with him in the new berry business: remotely managing purchases based on a large amount of cash is very difficult because of theft.

The second obstacle to business development in Kostomuksha is the isolation of the city and poor transport infrastructure. The distance to Petrozavodsk is about 500 km, to St. Petersburg - 930, the road is quite bad in places. “When I bought sausage in St. Petersburg, the car came here, as a rule, late in the evening or at night. In the morning, the goods had to be received, taken to the shops, weighed, and a price was set. And sausages, for example, have a shelf life of 48 hours. That is, we brought them - and we already have to throw them away. The understanding came that they should be made here,” Ivan Samokhvalov explains the reasons for creating local production. But with closing own stores workshops also had to be abandoned.

The third constraint is limited demand. In scale small town far from all business projects and production can be launched at full capacity. So, there was a clear lack of customers for the taxi service. But at the same time, the Slavyane bakery opened in 2005 with a confectionery shop turned out to be really profitable. Now this enterprise occupies about 60% of the market in the city, supplying various bakery products as in your own network outlets, and in other shops of the city, kindergartens, schools, hospitals, orphanages.

All other areas of activity that have proven their viability (a bakery, shopping and warehouse centers, a design and construction company, a beauty center, a furniture and household goods supermarket) are now united into a holding company, which received the same name "Berries of Karelia". This is the largest of all small enterprises in the city with a serious bid to move into the niche of medium and then large businesses.

The entrepreneur recognizes that, in terms of running a business, doing many things at the same time various directions inefficient. However, it is primarily curiosity and interest that pushes him to create new enterprises. And in the second - the understanding that every free niche he noticed will still be occupied by someone someday: “So why not me? And the previous ideas, in fact, already work without me.

Residents say that Ivan Petrovich every day calls in one of the bakeries for fresh pastries and at the same time checks the quality. It makes sense to him:

“I often go into my bakery and say that the juices that they make there seemed tasteless to me. I always explain the following to my employees: imagine a small shop on Nevsky Prospekt in St. Petersburg. A person came in, bought something and left - almost forever. Because it's very Big city and there are many buyers. There are residents of the surrounding houses, but many more of those who come once. There you can cheat, lie on the labels. It is not necessary, but there is a possibility. Not every person will go to scandal, to prove something in the SES. Most people will endure and not get involved. But in small Kostomuksha you can’t do this - it’s simply criminal. If we dared to deceive the client here, then we must understand that we deceived ourselves. We made bad pies, 100 people bought them - and they won't come again. We will immediately notice this - our business will be shaken. We’ll deceive someone else, cheat - and that’s it, let’s go look for a job. There is no other confectionery shop in the city. So I collect women and start hammering these things into them. From time to time I go there and look, sniff out, look for flaws: what if you can fix something, put some kind of machine, improve something, come up with new products? The chief technologist of the institute graduated and remembers that according to GOST, so many fillings are supposed to be added to pies - 32 grams, or something. I say: “Do not care about these conditions! Put in more." And the technologist almost cries: “Look, let’s not fit so much here, well, understand!”. But I know that if there are more fillings in the pie, it will become tastier. This is how I terrorize them so that it tastes good.”

“Business for me is a constant mathematical calculation, day and night. But without the thought of someone to rob, absorb. I try to always play fair and build my business on the principle of “with the world on a string”. It is clear that there is an added value in any business. It can be made large, or small, but the volume must be large. I have always tried to make a small margin, but to stretch the case for large volumes. Then, with perfect quality, our products will be the best for people.”

Kostomuksha – Petrozavodsk – St. Petersburg

Berries - product High Quality

CEO of the Land premium supermarket chain Ilya Shtrom:

We have been cooperating with Berries of Karelia since January 2013. During this time, the partner has established itself with the most better side- We had no problems with deliveries. On the shelves of our supermarkets there is almost the entire range of "Berry of Karelia": tasty and healthy nectars, frozen mushrooms and berries, high quality fresh cranberries.

IN last years, I don’t know if this is due to the not very stable financial situation of some of our fellow citizens or the profitability of such an occupation, the business of forest products has become widespread.

Thousands of buyers of berries and mushrooms register their “business” and travel around cities and towns, inviting people who want to earn some extra money during the holiday season to pick berries and mushrooms in the forest and rent them out for a certain fee, sometimes, by the way, quite decent.

The fact is that in Europe such products are wildly popular. Blueberries, cranberries and blackberries, blueberries are added to ice cream, expensive mousses, syrups, puddings and other equally tasty things are made. Mushrooms are pickled, canned or simply frozen, and then sold to restaurants and cafes, where visitors have to pay at least fifteen to twenty euros for one small portion of such a delicacy. This kind of frozen products is also popular among ordinary Europeans, who have the opportunity to purchase it frozen in super and hypermarkets.

The current situation is being actively used by agile purveyors, who earn decently on the desire of Europeans to taste the most useful gifts of our rich nature.

At first glance, such a business may seem rather risky, because the berry can simply go bad even before it arrives at its destination, especially in light of the “excellent” work of our customs. But this is only if you do not carefully think through all the stages of such work.

Today it is quite possible to rent refrigeration equipment, which will immediately solve the main problem with the shelf life of berries and mushrooms and minimize the risk of getting into a mess. The fact that the “frost” will be rented will significantly reduce the initial costs of doing business.

As a rule, flights to the Baltic countries and Europe with such goods are carried out once a week. During this time, the hired employees manage to travel around about a hundred villages, where procurement points have already been opened in advance, in which flattering products are being handed over briskly. Every evening, a car arrives at the “point”, which loads fresh products into the refrigeration equipment. There are villages where you can take up to a thousand tons of blueberries and hundreds of tons of chanterelles and porcini mushrooms a day. After all, neither old nor young in the village refuses to earn extra money.

After that, the goods are concentrated in the main warehouse, where they are waiting for their shipment abroad. Each flight brings the owner of such a business, depending on the volume of goods, from three to ten thousand euros. From this money you need to deduct funds for paying for the rent of equipment, warehouses, fare, wages employees and taxes, as a result, there is a good amount left. Often, large buyers negotiate with the local population in order to be able to open procurement points right at their homes. The owner of the household is provided with scales, containers and other items necessary for work. For his work, such a villager receives a reward. It is worth noting that in summer period not only large procurers are engaged in such a business, but also smaller buyers. For example, there are people who negotiate with the local population, who donate flattering products not to procurement centers, but directly to a private person, moreover, a variety of marketing tricks are often used, for example, this same private trader himself takes the goods directly at home from the one who collected.

Such a business is beneficial to everyone, because a person who has worked in the forest for a day and is decently tired does not really want to carry the collected goods somewhere, it is much better if they bring the money directly to his house and pick up the mushrooms and berries themselves.

The so-called small "dealer" does not seek to get into the European market, he literally the next day goes to a large market in a large city center located nearby, and has a good "fat" on the previously purchased goods.

It should be noted that every year there are more and more people who are engaged in buying and reselling flight gifts, and state enterprises. Such a healthy rivalry plays into the hands of people who directly collect flattering products, because everyone knows the main law of the economy, the greater the demand, the higher the price.

Very often, it is the issues of selling their products, including their certification, that become a stumbling block for start-up entrepreneurs. What can be especially annoying for a person who is one step away from realizing his dream - creating a profitable environmentally friendly mushroom production. The Center for Environmental Programs is ready to provide support with the sale of finished products to anyone who wants to realize their dream!

Let's try to list all possible sales channels for mushrooms:

1. Retail- with its stores of various formats comes to mind first. A mushroom grower can offer his products for sale to another entrepreneur who has his own small store. It is also possible to rent a place in the market and sell mushrooms on your own. Large Network shops, most likely they will not let a small manufacturer on their shelves - they are interested in supply volumes from several tons.

Of course, in order to be allowed to trade in food products in our country, you need to draw up the appropriate documentation:

BUT- you need to register as individual entrepreneur or how entity;

B- have on hand legally obtained specifications on your products (they will most likely have to be bought);

IN- issue a certificate of conformity for their products at the Center for State Sanitary and Epidemiological Surveillance;

G-provide quality certificates for each batch of products offered for sale.

2. Wholesale- it is quite possible that your offer will be of interest to a dealer at a wholesale base or the owner of a small network of vegetable stalls. In this case, losing in price, you will save time and effort.

3. Canteens, cafes, restaurants- what used to be called public catering, and now the newfangled word for ferret. Naturally, business owners Catering interested in the freshness and quality of products and of course will be happy to receive your supplies.

4. Selling through friends- you (and possibly your employees) probably have friends who love mushrooms, they have their own friends with the same tastes. By organizing trade "by appointment" and hurrying up with delivery, you will find a large number of consumers of your products.

5. Recycling- The disadvantage of all the above sales channels is the seasonality of demand. As a rule, in Russia there is a huge demand for mushrooms in the winter. Especially during holidays and fasting. In summer, demand is significantly reduced. In order not to experience interruptions in the sale of mushrooms, it is best to be able to offer them to processing industries. After all, mushrooms can be frozen, dried, pickled, salted. They are also used in the preparation various kinds cheeses, pates, dumplings, dumplings and pizzas, after all.

6. And finally, the most convenient option that insures all your risks. You can donate fresh mushrooms to our company. At the same time, you do not need to register as a legal entity or individual entrepreneur, you do not need to buy technical conditions, you do not need to certify your mushrooms, you do not need to issue a quality certificate. There is even no need to buy something from our company. We will simply accept all the mushrooms at a price of up to 120 rubles. for 1 kilogram without any problems.

The first mushrooms appeared on the shelves of the capital's markets a few days ago. To the question: “Where are the chanterelles from?” - the sellers grin: "Local, from the Moscow region." But it turned out that the merchants are cunning. Mushrooms are now mainly brought to the capital from the Vladimir region.

That's where I decided to go. I think I will buy it there, and then resell it in Moscow. I'll try myself in the mushroom business...

"COME EARLY!"

A friend of the mushroom picker Volodya advised me to go stock up on the market in the Vladimir town of Sobinka, which is 150 km from Moscow. Here locals bring goods from the surrounding forests. I leave by car at nine in the morning, but due to traffic jams, I arrive in Sobinka only at noon. Here I am disappointed: there are no mushrooms on the shelves!

Son, you should have come in the evening! - my grandmother, who sells blueberries, takes pity on me. - Mushrooms are picked early in the morning. Buyers come to us for them, with boxes. And they buy in bulk.

Yeah, and give them only small mushrooms, they don’t take large ones so that they don’t rot in a few days, ”a woman from a neighboring point grumbles with displeasure. - And they pay meager money for this - only 100 rubles per kilo of chanterelles!

Women persuade me to buy berries from them. A one and a half liter jar of blueberries is given for only a hundred.

Cheaper - only in the forest! - Granny's berries are passed to me. - And since you really wanted mushrooms, go to Lakinsk.

Lakinsk is a town about the same as Sobinka. Many do not have work here, so the fruit and berry season is expected here, like a vacation in Anapa.

We sold the mushrooms! - throws up his hands a happy local resident Yegor. He has already managed to exchange the earned rubles for vodka.

And like this every day, - looking sideways at Yegor, his wife Marina sighs. - We go to the forest together in the morning, and this one drinks almost all the money ...

WHERE YOU HAVE ASSEMBLED, THERE AND SOLD

Mushrooms were found only on the way back. At the traders on the side of the federal highway Moscow - Nizhny Novgorod. Their prices are biting: a kilogram of chanterelles - three hundred!

Nevertheless, at the forest market (about thirty people trade here) there is a whole line of foreign cars: drivers willingly buy mushrooms and berries.

Why are they so expensive for you? - I ask the sellers, nodding at the chanterelles. - Did you bring them from Kamchatka?

Not from any Kamchatka. - The woman looks at me with condemnation. - And dear ones, because there are few mushrooms now ...

For the sake of the experiment, I buy two bags (each contains about a kilo of mushrooms). 250 rubles per bag.

And if there are chanterelles with grebes mixed? I ask suspiciously.

There are no bugs there! We have been selling here for seven years, no one complained, - the aunt dismissed.

“Well, yes,” I think, “whoever eats toadstools will no longer come to be indignant ...”

MARKET SECRETS

I decide to resell the purchased mushrooms on the same day. Returning to the capital, I head to the covered market - "Butyrsky". There are no places inside the market: they are bought here in advance. I sit down at the exit, next to the grandmothers. They sell berries and vegetables here every day.

Are you being kicked out of here? - I turn to a neighbor sorting through strawberries.

How! she exclaims. - Through day shuhayut.

Are they asking for money?

What can we take from us, old women, - she sighs and draws in: - We buy strawberries, fresh, only from the garden!

And we take mushrooms! - I pick it up and for some reason add: - From the forest.

People look at my good with apprehension.

Why are you selling mushrooms, boy? - the plump lady asks me sternly.

Three hundred! For the package! - I name the price. And I think to myself: I need to somehow weld ...

I saw in the morning, they sold the same number of mushrooms for 200, and you for 300, - the woman mutters. - Baryga!

It's a shame: I myself bought a bag for 250!

Don't worry, my neighbor reassures me. And she looks at my jar of blueberries: - How much do you sell berries?

Berries? For 200. - I am modestly silent about the fact that I bought them for 100.

Granny grabs my one and a half liters of blueberries and pours the berries into glasses. Each - 120 rubles. She got five glasses from my jar. Total - 600 rubles. This is the market economy...

My grandmother's blueberries were sorted out in just half an hour. And she again began sorting through her strawberries, laying out the rotten berries with their whole side up.

If they notice, I’ll say that it’s rained, - the woman says conspiratorially.

In theory, all goods on the market should be checked by sanitary doctors. But no one came up to me for several hours. Either they didn’t notice, or they decided that there was nothing to take from me ...

An obese pensioner next door sells pickles. Transfers them from the pelvis to the jars. One cucumber slips out of his hands and falls on the pavement. Grandmother picks it up and puts it in a jar.

It will sour! - I'm surprised.

They will eat it ... - yawning, the grandmother waves her hand. And advises:

And you won’t sell your mushrooms today. Go to the subway! People from work will go and buy up.

I collect the goods and trudge to the Savelovskaya metro station. I stand like a poor relative, holding mushrooms in my hands.

About 30 minutes later, a man stopped next to me.

Why are you selling mushrooms?

I look at the chanterelles shriveled from the sun. And I hide my eyes from shame:

Take both packages for 300...

Y-yes, I'm not a merchant. Took chanterelles for 500. Sold for 300...

While walking home, I counted the losses: on a trip to Vladimir region spent 700 rubles on petrol, 500 on mushrooms, another 100 on berries. A total of 1300. Only 500 rubles returned from them - 200 for berries, 300 for mushrooms.

But if I bought mushrooms from the natives in bulk, twenty kilograms of commercials at a time, on the cheap, then I would have remained in the black. Judge for yourself: for 20 kilos in Sobinka, I would give two thousand rubles. Plus for gasoline 700 re. Total 2700 rubles of expenses. In the markets of Moscow, a kilogram of fresh forest mushrooms costs 400 rubles. If you manage to sell it, you will get 8000. Taking into account the costs - 5300 rubles of net profit!