novelraw Chapter 194
Chapter 194
Chapter 194 Merchants' Alliance
After the father and son had a bit of a quarrel, Emperor Wei's expression turned serious. He looked at Wei Yu and said, “You don't need to get too involved with court officials’ matters. If you see anything that you can't tolerate, just go directly to Huo Tingyu.”
Wow, his dad didn’t even warn him a little?
Wei Yu scratched his chin, “You trust me that much? Aren’t you afraid I’ll form cliques with the ministers?”
“You?” Emperor Wei didn’t even spare him a glance; with disdain, he directly picked up a memorial to read.
Wei Yu was a bit taken aback by his attitude.
“Hey, no, Dad, don’t be so arrogant. What’s wrong with your son? Someone as smart as me, there probably won’t be a second one born in a thousand years, okay!”
Emperor Wei snorted and threw a sentence at him, “Do you want the throne or not?”
Wei Yu fell silent.
He turned his head casually, took a pen and the memorial, acting as if nothing had happened. “Hmm, the handwriting of this Qingzhou Prefect isn’t bad…” Emperor Wei looked at him with disgust.
Such an unfilial son — whenever there’s business to handle, he just wants to throw it away, and now he talks about forming cliques; doesn’t he know how bad he looks?!
As usual, after approving the memorial, Wei Yu left. But before Wei Yu left, he asked his dad for a birthday gift.
Originally, he wanted time off, but unfortunately, his dad was quicker with words and gave him a manor and five shops instead.
No cash at all.
Wei Yu reasonably suspected that this manor and shops were given to make him earn money for the old man!
—
Jiaozhou, Ziyang County.
Ever since Deng Zhengde received the detailed plan for establishing the Merchants' Alliance from the Wise King, he had been busy with this matter.
He was a business genius to begin with; with the detailed plan as a reference, backing behind him, local officials on his side, and his partners in Pingnan Prefecture, setting up a Merchants' Alliance was simply a piece of cake!
Because Ziyang County was too small, Deng Zhengde did not establish the Merchants' Alliance within the city, but with Guo Yajun’s help, he found a suitable spot outside the city and built a small business district there.
In this business district, ambitious merchants from all over Jiaozhou and Pingnan Prefecture gathered.
They bid for shop locations according to the pre-planned shop designs, then built them by themselves. In just two months, the entire district took shape.
Within this business district, all merchants belonged to the Merchants' Alliance. Everything was priced lower than market price, with good quality, and absolutely no issues with quality, price, or service.
Citizens came to buy things, and occasionally saw promotions like “Buy one get one free,” “Spend five taels, get two hundred wen off,” as well as various membership modes inside shops… all kinds of new tricks kept everyone busy.
Since this was the first time in Ji Commandery such an operation existed, and with members of the Merchants' Alliance promoting it everywhere, many people in Ji Commandery and neighboring areas knew about the Ziyang County Merchants' Alliance.
Previously Ziyang County’s sugar, glass, and soap were already well-known. Once the Merchants' Alliance appeared, the long-waiting Yizhou aristocratic clans could no longer resist and came over.
This time, more than just the Sun and Xie families came; the heads of the four great clans of Yizhou all showed up.
Arriving in Ziyang, they saw the bustling scene about ten kilometers outside the city.
After all, outside Ziyang City wasn’t just the Merchants' Alliance. Several expanding factories and newly built roads, as well as improving greenery, all contributed.
Never before had a place outside the city been developed so well. Roads aside, even the roadside shrubs and trees were deliberately maintained!
If they didn’t plan for long-term operation, why bother grooming flowers and grass by the roadside?
The Yizhou clan members were deeply shocked as they looked around.
Especially Sun Xizhao and Xie Liang.
The last time they came was almost four months ago.
Back then, Ziyang County and its small towns were desolate and poor. Although the people there were energetic, the poverty was still apparent.
But now, it was completely different.
In just four months, the formerly desolate outskirts of the city had been built into a well-organized and bustling… large village?
Calling it a village didn’t seem quite right since the people here were passing citizens, each with some money to spare, and no village could be more prosperous than this one.
At least Sun Xizhao had never heard of another one.
The factories were walled off with guards patrolling along the roads, making it impossible for ordinary people to enter. Even the clans couldn’t see inside; to buy products from the factories, they had to negotiate purchases at the corresponding Merchants' Alliance shops.
The Yizhou clans spent a long time wandering inside the Merchants' Alliance.
They weren’t there to look at goods; after all, they’d seen many fine things before. Most of the openly displayed items in the Merchants' Alliance were not even worthy of the aristocrats' eyes. What they were interested in were the sales methods within the Merchants' Alliance!
The various modern sales gimmicks that had fascinated the arriving sellers now fascinated the Yizhou clans.
No matter how smart, people who had never been exposed to endless new tricks would still be defenseless and get addicted!
At least the heir of the Tian family got trapped by a store’s lottery and stamp collecting gimmick.
It wasn’t because he cared about the grand prize — the Tian heir was simply obsessed with stamp collecting!
Each lottery cost two taels; in order to collect a complete set of twelve flower patterns for the first prize, he spent a whopping 368 taels buying from the store!
The store manager was all smiles.
Although the twelve pattern cards were made of sandalwood with exquisite carvings and worth at most fifty taels for the whole set, spending 368 taels on a bunch of practically useless items just to have this wooden card set was truly a masterclass in ripping off money!
Those involved are prone to being confused, but the onlookers who saw the schemes had nothing but sighs. If just one lottery game could rake in so much cash, who knew how much the other shops earned with their tricks?
If they could learn even a bit, they could also make a huge profit!
Xie Liang and Sun Xizhao smiled wryly behind the scenes.
Even though the Merchants' Alliance was under the Wise King’s name, its real backing was the Imperial Court.
If they tried to fleece the Imperial Court, they’d lose their skin!
Better to honestly talk cooperation.
Because the Merchants' Alliance was too successful, it undermined the clans’ confidence.
Therefore, when negotiating with Deng Zhengde about cooperating to go to Great Liang, the clans were extremely hospitable.
But despite that, business was business.
Adhering to the principle of sustainable development, Deng Zhengde did not bother them too much. After both sides agreed on cooperation terms, the matter of going to Great Liang was settled.
As for whether to join the Merchants' Alliance, the clans thought it better to decide after coming back from Great Liang.