Warring States Survival Guide

Chapter 11 Selling, selling, selling

"Tucang" is a bit like a pawnshop in China, providing loan services with collateral. It also buys and sells various luxury goods, buying at low prices and selling at high prices. Usually there is a temple behind it.

Well, the money lending business in Japan is basically done by monks, and they also have armed forces and a large number of monk soldiers. They can ensure that if the other party cheats and does not pay back the money, their property will be confiscated. Their strength is usually stronger than that of the local powerful families. Sometimes they can even beat up the daimyo and force him to pay back the money.

There were no customers in the store. When Yuanye and his three companions entered the room, the shopkeeper looked at him with a rather venomous look, then stood up and came over to greet him. He pushed aside the waiter who came to greet them and said enthusiastically, "Sir, please come in, please come in quickly!"

After saying this, he told the waiter to greet Tao Liulang and Jing Qilang and pour them some water.

He had experience and knew that decent people like Yuanye, who were clean-handed, probably had good things in their hands, so they had to negotiate in private, otherwise these people would feel embarrassed to mortgage their ancestral items.

He invited Yuanye to sit on the earthen seat, poured him some tea, and then asked enthusiastically, "What is your name, sir? Do you want to borrow money (it's not nice to mention money directly) or pick out some utensils that suit your taste?"

"Nohara, I'm short of money, so I'm selling things." Nohara looked around the elegant earthen seat with ink paintings hanging on the walls, slowed down his speech, and used simple words.

"So it's Lord Nohara." The head of the group thought about it and didn't remember if there was a family named Nohara nearby. But it didn't matter. Since it wasn't a loan, there was no need to ask about it. He asked with great interest, "Then could you please open my eyes?"

Yuanye took out two hard plastic bottles from his backpack, which were the plastic bottles previously used to hold purified water and sports drinks. He tore off the wrapping paper and scraped off the production date on the bottle caps, preparing to sell them for money, making it look like a scam.

There was nothing he could do about it. The medicines in the first aid kit could very well save lives, so he didn't plan to sell them unless it was absolutely necessary. Electric batons, flare guns, power banks, mobile phones, flashlights, etc. couldn't be sold. Biscuits, Snickers bars, seat cushions, and quick-drying clothes probably wouldn't sell for a good price, and in the end, only these two bottles seemed like they could make some money.

This is similar to the Western colonists selling glass beads in Africa and America, except that they had no choice but to do so, which is also more conscientious, because at least plastic was definitely a rare commodity at that time.

The head of the Bantou was in charge of a "earth storehouse" here, so he was naturally well-informed, but this was the first time he had seen a plastic bottle. He held it carefully in his hand, looked at it over and over for a long time before asking Yuanye: "I am sorry to make you laugh at my poor eyesight, but may I ask, what is this..."

"Southern Barbarian Teaware." Yuanye began to promote the glass beads. "They should be rare in Japan. It's not an exaggeration to say that they are unique."

"The shape... is very ordinary." The head of the team did not comment on his self-praise. He squinted his eyes and looked at the bottle again and again, and then weighed it and asked, "I wonder how much you are going to sell it for, sir?"

"How much are you willing to pay?"

The head of the army thought for a moment, then smiled and asked tentatively, "How about one guan of coins?" This offer was too high a price to even reach Yuanye's expectations. He bargained patiently, "This is a rare treasure that is hard to come by. It will cost at least fifty guan of coins."

The other party was rude, so he was even more rude and asked for a huge amount of money.

The first famous Japanese tea ceremony utensil, the "Nine-Nine-Hand Eggplant", was sold for only ninety-nine kan when it was first sold. It is an antique that has been passed down in an orderly manner. It was a favorite of several generations of generals in the Ashikaga family. It is extremely famous and has a very high status in the tea ceremony. Two broken plastic bottles should not be worth half of it even if they are novel. But after all, this is an industrial product from four or five hundred years later, and it is high-temperature resistant food-grade plastic. It should be able to sell for the price of five or six pack horses, right?
The head of the army looked like he was smiling, and he didn't say anything to his counter-offer. He just put down the bottle, stood up and went to the backyard through the side door. In a blink of an eye, he brought back a brocade box, opened it carefully, and lifted up the Ming Dynasty brocade inside, revealing a light green translucent long-necked glass kettle and three glass cups of the same color. His face was still full of enthusiasm, and he smiled and said, "If Lord Nohara likes similar tea utensils, this set of southern barbarian 'goose neck drink' is priced at 5 guanwen. I can keep it for you. When you have enough money, come and get it. What do you think?"

The businessman didn't say anything bad, but his meaning was clear. They were not country bumpkins. They had seen many transparent bottles and never asked for such a high price. Do you think we are idiots? Spending a lot of money for something we have never seen before?
These days, barbaric goods from the south are pouring in like crazy. In places like Jie-cho, new products that have never been seen before appear every few months. Anything that has never been seen before is treated as a treasure, and they are like fools trying to buy it. They would have gone bankrupt long ago.

Therefore, fifty strings of cash is absolutely impossible!
Yuanye had expected this and did not get angry out of shame.

Stained glass windows began to become popular in Europe in 1330 AD, and transparent glass was everywhere in the th century. Even the Ming Dynasty imported a lot of it, so he did have some historical knowledge.

Therefore, if he had traveled back to before 1300 AD, he would have dared to sell these two broken bottles for a thousand taels of gold. But now it is around 1550, and Magellan was hacked to death in the Philippines decades ago. It is already the Age of Exploration, and there is competition in glass products. His base price is fifteen strings of cash. Anyway, as long as it can allow him and his silly son to smoothly pass through the initial period when they were penniless and had no food or clothing, it will be enough.

He picked up the "Goose Neck Drink" and looked at it, then smiled at the leader and said, "It's very finely made, it's really good, but glass products are not hard to find, but it's rare to find a Nanman bottle that's this light and this transparent."

After that, he put away the plastic bottle and prepared to leave, looking at the other party as if he had no experience. He shook his head and said, "Forget it if we can't come to an agreement. See you next time, Mr. Bantou."

"Master Nohara, why are you in such a hurry? Please have a cup of tea first."

The leader was not calm anymore. Although the shapes of the two bottles were not good - the popular style in Japan now was "light, rogue and bizarre", including tea utensils. The more twisted and weird the style, the better. Anyway, it had to be twisted with the style of traditional Confucian ritual vessels. It had to be different and distinctive, weird, with incomprehensible patterns, mysterious and crazy, and a little Cthulhu-like. Therefore, southern barbarian objects were very popular in Japan at that time.

Although the two bottles were too rigid in shape, not in line with the current fashion trend and hard to attract the eye, their material was excellent. They were as transparent as glass but almost weightless in the hand and slightly soft when squeezed. They were considered quite rare items. At least he had never seen or heard of them in places like Kai-cho where southern barbarian items gathered and transited.

Originally, he wanted to take out the "Goose Neck Drink" to provoke the other party. If the other party was a little thin-skinned and childish, he might give up the pricing power to him out of shame, and he could get a great bargain. He could buy it for three or five kan, and then send it back to Sakaimachi or Kyoto, and invite a celebrity to show off at a tea party. By hyping it up, he could easily sell it for dozens of kan and make a lot of money.

But the other party is obviously experienced in life, has a thick skin and a strong will. He is not a prodigal son who does not know the hardships of life. He is not easy to influence, so we have to negotiate the price slowly.

If we try to get it within 15 strings of cash, we should be able to make a lot of money. Anyway, we can't let our competitors make this money!
(End of this chapter)