“It needs a name.”
“You’re sixteen.”
“What does that have to do with a name?”
“I don't know.”
He looked at the advertisement.
“Carter Planter Parts sounds respectable.”
Malik smiled.
“You like it.”
“I didn’t say that.”
The advertisement produced eleven letters.
Not calls.
Letters.
Farmers wrote casting numbers on notebook paper.
Some included photographs.
One included only:
NEED BEAN PLATE FOR OLD OLIVER. 24 CELLS. APPROX 7-7/8 DIAMETER. HELP.
Malik did.
A second classified ad brought more.
Then a small article appeared in a vintage farm-machinery newsletter after one customer wrote to the editor.
TEENAGER CATALOGS OBSOLETE PLANTER PLATES.
Malik hated the word teenager in the title.
Otis loved it.
“Free advertising.”
“They make me sound twelve.”
“You look twelve.”
Malik was nearly seventeen.
He did not appreciate that.
The article mentioned the index-card system.
After that, calls came from farther away.
Ohio.
Pennsylvania.
Indiana.
Kentucky.
West Virginia.
One from Iowa.
A farmer called looking for a plate for a planter Malik had never heard of.
Malik did not have it.
Instead of ending the call, he wrote down the number.
That changed the business again.
Want list.
If a customer needed something Malik did not own, he recorded it.
Manufacturer.
Number.
Machine.
Crop.
Customer name.
Phone.
Date.
When new-old-stock parts appeared later, he already knew whether someone wanted them.
Supply no longer came first.
Demand could be recorded before inventory existed.
Otis noticed.
“That is smarter.”
“Than what?”
“Buying nine hundred pieces before knowing anybody needed them.”
Malik laughed.
“Are you ever going to stop reminding me?”
“No.”
The first lot had taught Malik something else.
Rarity clustered strangely.
Out of roughly nine hundred plates, more than seven hundred were common or moderately common.
Some sold for five dollars.
Some might never sell.
Perhaps sixty or seventy were genuinely difficult to find and matched machines still working on farms.
Those drove much of the interest.
Malik created a red tab for high-demand scarce numbers.
He did not advertise quantities.
Not to create fake scarcity.
To avoid promising parts twice.
At planting time, a plate could sell in the morning and another customer call that afternoon.
Inventory accuracy mattered.
One April day, three farmers requested the same scarce International plate.
Malik had one.
The first caller bought it.
The second offered double.
Malik refused.
“I already sold it.”
“Hasn’t shipped yet.”
“Still sold.”
“I’ll give you seventy-five.”
“Can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because it belongs to somebody else now.”
Otis overheard.
After the call, he said:
“Good.”
Malik looked at him.
“That all?”
“Good decisions don't need speeches.”
Summer slowed.
Malik worked more shop hours.
Cataloged new acquisitions.
Finished high school coursework.
Denise began worrying about college.
“What are you going to do after graduation?”
Malik looked toward the card files.
“Work.”
“That was not the question.”
“Maybe technical school.”
“Maybe?”
“I like this.”
Denise looked around Bell Repair.
“You can like something and still learn more.”