Chapter 157 Business Action How did Tian Ze start his career? He made money from wealthy families by selling alcohol, soap and other products. Although Tianze is not short of food nowadays, he is short of copper coins. In fact, with the current speed of copper mining and copper coin forging under Tian Ze's rule, there should be no shortage of copper coins. After all, many people under Tian Ze's rule have become accustomed to the existence of paper money, and have even become accustomed to not using copper coins, and a huge amount of copper coins have accumulated in the treasury. But it takes money to support paper money, money is needed for new people, and even more money is needed to attract refugees from outside, especially when attracting refugees from the south. Nowadays, in the Central Plains and Guanxi areas, due to Dong Zhuo's misdeeds and the constant disputes among various princes, food is in extreme shortage and the price of food has reached tens of thousands of coins per stone. When Tian Ze went to buy up refugees, he could directly trade them with grain. Not only the wealthy and powerful families, but even the impoverished Cao Cao had traded with Tian Ze. However, because the situation in the south was relatively stable, food was sufficient and the price of food was relatively stable. In many places, the price was only a hundred coins per stone. However, due to the obstruction of war, the chaos of local monetary systems, transportation costs and the control of resources by the princes, very little could be transported to the Central Plains. When Gan Ning traded with those wealthy families and bandits, he could not directly pay off his debts with grain, but had to spend a large amount of copper coins.
If it was just the minor fights of the past, it wouldn't matter, but attracting hundreds of thousands of refugees every month required a terrifying amount of copper coins, which even the copper coins mined by Tian Ze over the years could not afford. Moreover, most of the people under Tian Ze's rule were recruited from the Central Plains in the past year or so. These people are not penniless refugees, many of them are people who own fields and land, but their lives are difficult. Many people are already dissatisfied with being forced to come here. If we force them to use paper money right away, it will definitely arouse public indignation. We must take it slow. It would take a relatively long time for these people to adapt to the existence of paper money. Even among the people who had settled in Liaodong for several years, many still retained the habit of storing copper coins. Facing Tian Ze's gaze, Mi Zhu smiled slightly: "Don't worry, my lord." The world is in chaos, and Tian Ze has already revealed some of his cards, so many businesses no longer have to worry about, such as salt and ready-made clothes. Food, clothing, housing and transportation, anything that involves basic needs, as long as it can be monopolized, it will definitely be a huge profit. And Tian Ze just happens to have this condition. Relying on the method of drying salt, large-scale hemp cultivation and organized clothing factories, it is possible to mass-produce cheap salt and ready-made clothes. In addition, there are luxury goods such as soap, fine wine, sugar, perfume, and even glass has been developed. In the past, I was worried about being targeted by others, especially the money-hungry Emperor Ling, so I didn't dare to sell it to others. Now, I can sell it openly! Especially the wealthy southern families, who made so much money from Tian Ze, except for buying land, just kept the money in warehouses gathering dust, which was such a waste. Tian Ze wants to give them an outlet so that their money can be spent and flow back, so that a virtuous circle can be formed and maintained for a long time. "My lord, will the princes allow this?" Cheng Yu couldn't help but ask. The trade routes between the states in the world have basically been cut off due to the war. The princes are doing their own things and rarely allow merchants from other places to trade freely. Not to mention Tian Ze who is causing trouble everywhere. They are not blind. They can see how strong Tian Ze is, and have been tacitly using their own methods to restrict Tian Ze's development. "They won't allow it." Tian Ze said naturally, "But as long as it is done properly, someone will allow it." Where did Nurhaci get so many ironware and grain in the Ming Dynasty? Many of them were provided by merchants in the Ming Dynasty. As the only vassal in the world who was freed from the control of the aristocratic families, Well...it should be said that there are only two, the other one is Gongsun Zan, but this guy doesn't know how to govern and manage at all. He can only survive in that weird place of Liangzhou, where he meets a group of weird locals. Historically in Youzhou, during his heyday, it seemed that most of Hebei was under his rule, but in fact his foundation was weak. After being defeated several times, he was surrounded by enemies and could only defend that little territory.
Because he didn't control those territories at all, he just conquered them. When the troops were insufficient, those territories would immediately turn against him. Tian Ze sent this guy to Liangzhou, which seemed to have made him successful. The local people all admired the strong, and relying on the White Horse Volunteers, he played the role of religious belief, making the people of Liangzhou surrender one after another. According to this progress, it is estimated that this guy should be able to unify Xiliang within a year, and his rule in Youzhou may be much more stable than his original history. However, the aristocratic families and powerful people did not care about this, because they had already seen that Gongsun Zan was just a pure warrior and could not pose any threat. It's just that this warrior's fighting skills were indeed too strong, and they were unwilling to confront Gongsun Zan head-on, so they chose to keep a low profile and wait for the opportunity. But Tian Ze is different. He is really trying to torture the aristocratic family to death, and there is nothing they can do about it. He was deprived of control over land, knowledge, official positions, and public opinion, and the aristocratic families under his rule had no power to turn things around. Tian Ze chose this path, so he naturally wanted to maximize his own advantages and take advantage of the family's disadvantages. He knew too well the drawbacks and dangers of the family, and also knew how to take advantage of these drawbacks. "The interests of the aristocratic families and the princes are not completely consistent, and there are also fights and conflicts among the aristocratic families. When faced with external threats, they may unite. But when they see the benefits, I'm afraid that may not be the case." Tian Ze said meaningfully. "When it comes to making money, win-win cooperation is the key. Since the princes are wary of us, we won't go over there and let those powerful families come over on their own." "Since Gan Ning is able to attract the powerful families in the south to come here to traffic in human beings, we can also sell the goods directly to these powerful families and let them sell them." "It's nothing more than changing from a seller to a distributor, lowering the selling price. We're going for volume this time." Mi Zhu nodded and said, "My Lord, this is very true. These things are very profitable. If we sell them, we may be able to earn dozens of times the profit." "Even if we cut it in half and give half of the profits to the noble families under the rule of the various princes, it would still be enough to make a fortune." Upon hearing this, Chen Gong hurriedly said, "My Lord, the trade idea is very good and must be implemented as soon as possible." When it comes to making money, no one is more active than him. Just as Cheng Yu is obsessed with expanding the army, he is obsessed with increasing revenue and reducing expenditure. "However, when it comes to business, stability is the most important thing. We still need to set up several fixed trading places. It would be best if they are places that are easy to defend and have convenient transportation, and they can be completely under our control." Mi Zhu suggested. Upon hearing this, Tian Ze came to the map, looked at it for a while, and then casually pointed at a valley connected by rivers near Hanoi on the south side of the Taihang Mountains and a large island at the mouth of the Yellow River and the Yangtze River. "Let's just take these three places. Let Zang Ba and Gan Ning act as soon as possible and arrange for heavy troops to guard them to ensure safety." "promise!" (End of this chapter)