I want to be emperor

Hantian Textile Co., Ltd. wanted to expand the scale of the ready-made garment market. The series of difficulties they encountered were enormous, but they did not give up. To develop a standard size version that covers as many people as possible.

In short, it is to reduce costs as much as possible while expanding potential customer coverage groups.

But is all this useful?

In fact, it is still difficult.

The difficulty in the ready-made garment market is not the cost and size coverage...but a problem of consumption habits and low labor costs of family members.

Under the tradition of men farming and women weaving, women basically do not go out to work. For women in middle-class families, they can only pass the time by being female celebrities when they have nothing to do on weekdays.

As for female relatives of low-income urban families, even if the price of ready-made clothes is cheaper, as long as they are more expensive than fabrics, they would rather buy fabrics and then squeeze time to sew clothes by themselves, saving a copper plate is a copper plate.

As for the farm market... Don't even count on this, it is very difficult to even enter the farm market for fabrics, let alone ready-made garments with higher added value.

For the rural market, cotton yarn is the best-selling product, followed by cotton... Even so, these products face great competition from the cotton produced in rural areas.

They even grow their own cotton... It doesn't matter how cheap your cloth or ready-made clothes are!
Unless your price is so low that farmers feel that it is a loss to grow cotton directly, it is better to grow other crops, which reduces the output of self-grown cotton in rural areas.

Then you have to convince farmers that it is cheaper to buy cloth or ready-made clothing than to buy cotton or raw silk to weave their own... which is obviously unlikely.

The rural market in the Huaxia region is very difficult to operate. Many things that urban families regard as necessities of life do not have a big market in the countryside.

What really have a market are some tools, such as cloth is not easy to buy, but the new hand-made spinning machines and new hand-made looms are very easy to sell...

Whether the female family members of rural families use it for spinning and weaving, or sell it after weaving, they all need new spinning machines and looms!

Therefore, in the rural market, among the products related to the textile industry, these new hand-made spinning machines are the best sellers, followed by the new hand-made looms.

But these products are not available to those big companies, because hand spinning machines and hand looms were promoted for free in the early days, but there are no patents. In other words, machinery factories in many small places can create one or two , Even the small workshops of carpenters and blacksmiths can be built and sold.

In the rural market, besides spinning machines, the various tools that sell well in the rural market are more of three categories: cooking utensils, agricultural tools, and daily hardware tools.

Cooking utensils needless to say, everything can be lacking in a family, but there must be an iron pot, a kitchen knife... And these iron products are typical industrial products, the cost of mass production in large factories, even if it is increased The shipping cost is much cheaper than the hard work of the blacksmiths.

In terms of agricultural tools, hoes, sickles, axes, machetes and other tools used in agricultural production are also a big consumer market.

Then to five catties for daily use, that is, hammers, nails, locks and other messy iron products.

The sales volume of the above three categories in the rural market is huge, and it can even be said that these products are also important products in the machinery industry of the Great Chu Empire.

The above three categories of products are even important terminal consumer products that support the development of the machinery industry of the Great Chu Empire.

Look at the most powerful machinery company in China, Hantian Machinery Company. Besides the machine tool business, what is their other core business?Kitchenware!

Including Han Guo and kitchen knives that are sold all over the world, exported to India, West Asia, North Africa and even Europe!

These two types of products are the cash cow business of Hantian Machinery Company. It seems inconspicuous, and the overall profit rate is not high, but in fact, the revenue and total profit brought by it far exceed the machine tool business.

As for Li's Steel Manufacturing, the largest private enterprise in China, what did they do before they entered the shipbuilding industry after they sold their ordnance business?Or how did you accumulate hundreds of thousands of assets and enter the shipbuilding industry with great fanfare?

They rely on all kinds of agricultural tools, daily hardware products, cooking utensils, etc... Their business type is actually highly overlapped with Hantian Machinery Company.

Even after their shipbuilding industry started, their various tools and iron products business and their core business contributed more than half of their revenue and Lilan.

The three major categories of cooking utensils, agricultural tools, and daily hardware supported most of the machinery industry of the Great Chu Empire, and even supported super-large enterprises such as Hantian Machinery Company and Li's Steel Manufacturing.

And these products rely on the rural market.

Therefore, don’t think that the social status quo of men farming and women weaving in the rural society of the Great Chu Empire will separate the rural society from the development of industrial society. In fact, it is not...

The rural society where men farm and women weave only makes some industrial products have no market, but there is still a market for other products.

It depends on whether you have found the right product direction!
If you buy cheap and easy-to-use farm tools, you can definitely make money...

If you buy cheap and easy-to-use ready-made clothes, you must hit the street...

This is also the reason why Hantian Textile Company has never targeted the ready-made garment market at the rural market... Hantian Textile Company has gone through untold hardships in order to sell the two major products of cloth and cotton yarn in the rural market over the years ...and even that doesn't work well.

The rise of Hantian Textile Co., Ltd. relies on the urban market, not the rural market.

The same is true for ready-to-wear this time. They are targeting the urban market, but even in an urban market that is more receptive to ready-made clothing, it is very difficult to open up the market.

It is still difficult for them to change people's consumption concepts by themselves.

For Hantian Textile Company, it is very difficult to change people's consumption concept, but for some companies, this is not difficult, especially for some companies that are at the forefront of technology.

In Songjiang Mansion, in the headquarters of Luohua Shipyard, a group of people wearing scholarly robes and jade belts, who look like social elites, are sitting in two rows of a rectangular table.

One of the people sitting in the main seat signed his name under the contract with a dipped pen, and then stamped a big company seal, his personal seal, and added his handprint. A stack of contract texts was handed over.

A middle-aged man in the opposite seat took it with a smile on his face, and it was also a process of signing, stamping and pressing fingerprints.

After doing this, more than [-] men from both sides stood up together, all with smiles on their faces.

The middle-aged man in the blue scribe robe who put down his pen spoke first: "President Song, happy cooperation!"

"I'm already looking forward to the appearance of our armed merchant ships with iron ribs and wooden shells in the Indian Ocean, and it's time to startle those barbarians!"

General Manager Song of Luohua Shipyard also smiled: "President Fang, don't worry, we have already started preliminary preparations before the contract is finalized today. Tomorrow we will sign an iron rib material supply contract with Zhenjiang Heavy Machinery Company. In a few months, the first boat will be able to start laying the keel and start building!"

"Moreover, the construction of iron-ribbed wood-hull ships is faster than that of pure wooden ships. After all, there is no need to waste too much time waiting for the wood to arrive. As long as the funds are in place, various iron parts and components can be quickly supplied, and all kinds of wood such as ship boards are available. It is a common material without too many special requirements, and our inventory is also sufficient.”

"In terms of equipment and technology, we have also completed equipment upgrades, especially the steam hoisting machine has been installed properly, and other types of specialized processing equipment have also been properly installed. Before that, we also built a frigate for the navy. The overall The technology is very mature."

"The entire construction period will definitely not exceed one year. Even if it goes well, we will be able to complete the construction of the hull in about nine months, and then start outfitting and sea trials. The final delivery time will definitely not exceed one year!"

Seeing Mr. Song's confident appearance, Fang Liugui, the general manager of Nanyang Trading Company, nodded slightly.

He still trusts the strength of Luohua Shipyard, otherwise, he would not put the future of the Nanyang Trading Company and more than a dozen other armed trading companies, and even exaggeratedly say that it is related to the future situation of the Indian Ocean. A batch of armed merchant ships were handed over to them for construction.

One with a displacement of 1000 tons, two with a displacement of [-] and [-] tons, and six with a displacement of [-] tons. The order for a total of nine iron-ribbed wood-hulled armed merchant ships is also the first domestic order for iron-ribbed wooden-hulled armed merchant ships.

It was jointly funded and constructed by the Nanyang Trading Company and more than a dozen armed trading companies in other trade alliances, with a total value of more than one million Chu yuan.

This kind of strategic order cannot be handed over casually. If the other party does not have sufficient technical strength, it will not be able to complete such a large order.

And Luo Hua Shipyard has such strength!
In fact, apart from Luohua Shipyard, there is no second shipyard that can accept their order for a huge iron-ribbed wooden hull ship.

Because at present, there are only three shipyards in China that have the strength to build iron-ribbed wood-hull ships with more than [-] tons. They are Songjiang Naval Shipyard, Guangzhou Shipyard and Luohua Shipyard.

Even the other son of the navy, the Qingdao Naval Shipyard, currently does not have the technical ability to build large iron-ribbed wood-hulled ships of more than 1000 tons. The technology has always been lagging behind. It was very difficult to build more than [-] tons of wooden warships, that is, third-class battleships. In short, there were often quality problems, delays in construction schedules, etc. It is said that the high-level navy was very dissatisfied with this.

As for the Ministry of Industry, the senior management of Qingdao Naval Shipyard has been adjusted several times in a row. The general office has changed five times, but it is still the same...

It's not that they don't work hard, but that their technology lagged behind at the beginning, and they lacked a large amount of funds to spend money to improve their technology. They can only make money by themselves and gradually improve their technical level. This can barely maintain the fifth largest in the country. With the status of the shipyard, it is actually not easy to barely build third-class battleships.

In the past, Lishi Shipyard, the third largest shipyard in China, was a step behind in following up the technology of iron-ribbed wood-hull ships because of the heavy investment in the machine tool industry. New technologies have been approved and technology upgrades have begun, but this will take time.

It is conservatively estimated that it will take more than half a year.

Looking at the domestic shipbuilding industry, there are only Songjiang Naval Shipyard and Guangzhou Shipyard that can build thousands of tons of large-scale iron-rib wood-hulled armed merchant ships, or a weakened version of the firepower, and warships that carry more cargo. Money, the Luo Hua Shipyard that was forcibly built.

The production capacity of iron-ribbed wood-hulled ships of Songjiang Naval Shipyard and Guangzhou Shipyard... are now contracted by the Navy.

The navy has now completely stopped the construction of pure wooden warships, and has completely changed to iron-ribbed wood-hulled ships, even transport ships... The navy has a lot of orders, and the order for third-class battleships alone is more than a dozen , the number of orders for cruisers and frigates adds up to hundreds...

The navy not only needs to continue to expand the size of the navy, but also needs to build a batch of new warships to replace the warships in early service.

The quality of the warships built and served by the Navy in the early days was not very good. Many of them have reached the end of their service career after serving for more than ten years and are in urgent need of replacement... It’s not that these early warships are really unusable, but that the maintenance in the later period of service is too much. It is troublesome and costly... Not to mention the large amount of money needed for overhaul at every turn, and it will seriously squeeze the attendance rate of the battleship.

Warships also have operating costs. A warship worth [-] Chu yuan does not mean that it can float on the sea every day to perform tasks. In terms of the frequent use of the ocean-going duty of the Great Chu Empire Navy, basically After three years of service, at least half a year needs to be maintained on the berth.

This is still normal maintenance and service. If the overhaul in the middle and late stages is added, the maintenance time in the middle and late stages will be more.

The more time for maintenance, the less time for on-duty, relatively speaking, the cost of use is increased.

Therefore, when measuring the cost of a warship, the early procurement cost is only a part of it, followed by the personnel cost of the crew and the maintenance cost of the ship.

This is why the Navy often uses the concepts of life-cycle cost, monthly and annual service cost.

Calculate all the costs, and then you calculate the cost of serving for one month, so that you can better measure the real cost of using the warship.

It's not that you spend a dozen or two 10,000+ to buy a battleship, and then you don't need money...

Considering the cost of use, many warships built in the early days of the Great Chu Empire can still be used, but because the early shipbuilding technology is not good, the maintenance cost in the middle and late stages is high, and it takes a lot of time. In terms of cost, it is no longer as good as directly building a new ship. Iron-rib wood-hulled warships.

This is why the Navy placed a large number of orders after the iron-ribbed wood-hulled warships came out, and even squeezed the production capacity of the Songjiang Naval Shipyard and the Guangzhou Shipyard.

Because the navy has a large number of old warships that are expensive to use and are waiting to be replaced... According to the navy's plan, there are at least fifty Daye-class frigates that need to be replaced!

This is still a normal replacement... and the navy is still expanding the size of the navy.

The navy still hasn't forgotten the plan of a hundred battleships... they feel that the dozens of battleships today are not enough, and they are all thinking of expanding the number of battleships to more than a hundred, and then adding four to five hundred cruisers and frigates for matching operations.

With such a huge shipbuilding plan, not only the production capacity of the two government-run shipyards has been squeezed out, but even the production capacity of the Luohua Shipyard has been squeezed out a lot.

Luo Hua Shipyard has received orders for a total of more than [-] frigates and cruisers. In January, it even received an order for a third-class battleship from the Navy.

This is the first time their company has set foot in the field of battleships.

You have to say, when they have received so many orders for naval warships, why can they still receive orders from the United Trade Alliance? Naturally, it is because the trading company has money and the price they give is high...

Luohua Shipyard is a serious private enterprise, and many of its shareholders are armed trading companies, and they are just rushing to make money.

Although the navy has a lot of warship orders and the total price is high, to be honest, the price given by the navy is not high... If the price is too high, the navy would rather wait for the production capacity to come up.

It is also because of this that the production capacity of Luohua Shipyard's ribbed wooden hull ships is not fully reserved for the navy, but for those rich and powerful armed trading companies...

Make money, not shabby.

Whoever gives the most money, they will build ships for whoever, regardless of whether you are a navy, an armed trading company, or any other shipping company.

After all, they spent 30 million Chu Yuan in real gold and platinum at the beginning, and only then did they solve the technical problems of lifting the ribbed wooden hull ship. After expanding the production capacity, they built many dry docks, recruited a large number of workers and technical engineers, etc. These all cost money.

With so much money invested, why not take advantage of the fact that the two government-run shipyards have no production capacity to face the market because of the political tasks of naval warships, and other shipyards have not yet formed production capacity?
Therefore, for Luohua Shipyard, they would rather postpone the order of naval warships, and give priority to completing the order of armed merchant ships of the Trade Federation.

They heard the wind, saying that the Nanyang Trading Company and a large number of other armed trading companies are expected to formally merge and then establish a super-large armed trading company. Go big.

There will never be fewer orders for armed merchant ships.

And Luo Hua Shipyard's guess is good. Under the bridge of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, the Ministry of Industry, the Army and the Navy, and the previous trading company alliance model has achieved great success, so the Chu Empire's Dozens of armed trading companies have entered into actual merger negotiations.

According to the high-level plan of the empire, dozens of armed trading companies with armed trading licenses will be merged into two trading companies.

One is the Western Trading Company, which is an armed trading company that specializes in India, West Asia, and Africa.

One is the Toyo Trading Company, which is an armed trading company preparing to face the Americas.

These two companies will be established under the model of official holding and private capital participation in dividends, and will be listed in the future to absorb more funds. At the same time, it is also to give private capital an opportunity to participate in it and obtain dividends from Lilan.

Since then, in the Great Chu Empire, only these two armed trading companies that are completely under official control and operation can legally hold overseas armed licenses.

They can recruit and organize mercenaries, and conduct military operations overseas legally and freely.

To put it bluntly, these two companies will become the pioneers of the Great Chu Empire's overseas colonization in the future...

The reason why overseas colonization is carried out by armed trading companies, rather than in the official administrative mode at the beginning, is mainly because of the huge cost of overseas colonization, and overseas colonization by means of colonial taxation alone will cause losses to the point where there are no pants left.

Even if the empire’s official family has a big business, they can’t afford the government-led overseas colonization... Among other things, just sending tens of thousands to overseas operations, the money spent will go to sea... just relying on the tax revenue of the colonies The subsidy can't be recovered after 100 years, unless the army directly grabs it...

How to carry out overseas colonization when the official colonization cost is huge?

The method of the high-level empire is to subsidize by monopolizing commercial interests.

For example, the trade in the Indian region in the future will be handed over to the Western Trading Company. Even in order to ensure the benefits of the Western Trading Company, the Great Chu Empire will block the Strait of Malacca and prohibit other ships of the empire and other countries from entering the Strait of Malacca. Between Southeast Asia and India.

Monopolizing trade will generate a huge amount of Lilan, which can be used to attract immigrants, establish colonial strongholds, maintain colonial rule, and fight various messy kingdom natives.

Lilan, who monopolizes trade, launches overseas colonization.

This is the idea of ​​the top leaders of the Great Chu Empire!
It is precisely because of this idea that it eventually led to the merger of dozens of armed trading companies... This is actually not the voluntary choice of each armed trading company. For example, the Liu family, one of the major shareholders of Luohua Shipyard, and the Liu family Liuhe Trading Company is doing well, why should it merge with your Nanyang Trading Company?

But... He can't do anything if he doesn't want to... Anyway, after this year, the authorities will revoke your overseas military license. If you don't have a military license by then, you can only become an ordinary trading company or simply a shipping company.

Either obediently merge with Nanyang Trading Company, and then occupy a certain share in the new company, and get a dividend every year or something.

Although the Liu family has 1 reluctances in their hearts, they also know that they must not make trouble with the imperial officials. The high-level officials of the empire have made it clear that they want to integrate the armed trading company and monopolize the armed trade. If you resist, be careful of family ruin...

Of course, although the Armed Trading Company was lost, the Liu family also gained a lot of shares and follow-up dividends. In short, the money will not be small.

In this regard, the top management of the empire is still very generous.

Under such an overall situation, in April 19, the Dachu Dibao officially published the news that 36 armed trading companies merged to form Western Trading Company, and 27 armed trading companies merged to form Dongyang Trading Company.

And it is planned that these two companies will be listed on the stock exchange in a few months!

As soon as the news came out, ordinary people may not feel it deeply, but those who are well-informed or have a keen sense of political smell can predict that the empire is going to launch a large-scale overseas colonization operation!