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It is the stuff of supermarket magnates' dreams. A prime retail location at US$45 a month, interest-free capital, all stocks on credit or consignment and no wage bills. But Nguyen Qui Chi Linh is no dreamer. The mover and shaker behind just such a project, he is a third-year student at Ho Chi Minh City's Open University. His Student Mart has been open just more than two months, and it is heaving with contented customers.

"I don't know how they do it," said a woman mulling over which of a wide range of imported shampoos to buy. "Good choice, good service and low prices."

The store's accountant, Le Thu Hien, said they keep prices low by contenting themselves with low profit margins. "The important thing is that people will buy many many things here," she said.

The shop is owned by 18 students from faculties across the city. Together they earned, begged and borrowed from their families a total of 40 million dong (US$3,600) - most of which they sunk into paint, shelving and lighting for the store.

On the corner of a busy intersection in the heart of a middle-class residential area in the city's central district, the site would normally cost a bomb. Somehow, the students sweet-talked its owner into letting them have it for US$45 a month. The contract, an unusually long five years, provides for a 20 percent to 40 percent rise after the first two years. "Isn't it a steal?" Linh asked proudly.

Apparently, the landlord was upset by the poor employment prospects facing his daughter, also a student. Although she is not involved in the project, he decided to support her enterprising peer.

Indeed, it was Vietnam's grim employment situation that set fire to the project. "So many students are out of work, so we decided to help oursel-ves," said Le Duc Phong. He is un usual among the shareholders in that he has just left college and found a job in a bank. But that doesn't excuse him from checkout duty - he does evening shifts.

The 18 shareholders don't get a regular wage for the 20-odd hours a week they each put in at the shop; they plan to split dividends as soon as they have paid off some of the stock and started to turn a profit. "It's early days," said Hien. "But we hope to be making one or two million dong (US$100 to US$200) a month each by the middle of the year."

To cope with the rush of customers who need their motorbikes parked and to staff the city's only phone order and delivery service, the Student Mart's owners have hired another five collegians at salaries of between 500,000 dong and 800,000 dong a month.

"That is more than our teachers earn," said Linh, grinning with more than a hint of self-satisfaction.

He thinks that the phone service will be a winner in this increasing-ly frenetic city - already it accounts for around 10 percent of business. The students' real coup was to get stock on tick. "Most companies I proposed this to refused," said Linh. But part-time work for a distribution company taught him and other owners some of the tricks of the trade in what consumer goods manufacturers say is one of the most confused markets in the world.

"We know very well that in the Vietnamese market you can't do anything in a straight line. Everything is like this..." Linh makes a snaking movement with his hand. That snaking hand reappears when he is asked about smuggled goods, which are rife on the shelves of most mini-markets.

Accountant Hien said her store's selection of foreign or Vietnamese goods was more than a question of consumers' tastes. Distributors selling Vietnamese goods want their cash upfront, while foreign brands are subsidizing distributors in their scramble for market share.

"So it's funny. We just can't afford to stock Vietnamese products," she said.

If things go well, Linh and his friends plan to open another store later this year. And what are the long-range plans for this student of Southeast Asian Studies? "Oh, I think I am going to be a businessman," he said.

Elizabeth Pisani is an Asia Times correspondent.

Copyright 1996 Asia Times.

(c) 1996 Chamber World Network International Ltd.