Chapter 50 Sponsors.h.i.+p 1
As soon as Jake went home he found his mother who was in the kitchen preening dinner, he stayed in the kitchen for a while looking and his mother had not noticed him because he was concentrating on the kitchen, she was struggling harder after seeing that Jake was getting better at his cooking.
In fact, Jake was not really improving, he was just slowly cooking the way he did in his past life, after all, Jake cooked better than some restaurant chefs if they were just ordinary food without much sophistication, but for Eva, he was improving fast.
Jake thought Eva was just proud and was being compet.i.tive, so he wanted to wait a while and teach her the things he knew or pay a cooking course for his mother, but what he had not yet realized was that his mother had a dream of having a restaurant of her own, although she did not expect that dream to come true was still a dream.
"Son you already arrived, if you were there, I should have said something, you almost scared me."
"I saw that you were concentrating and did not want to disturb you, I"m sorry."
"Not all right, so how was the day at your friend"s house?"
"It was okay, I talked to his grandfather a bit, he was a really nice person and he told me something, I"ll tell you more about it at dinner time."
"Okay then, go take a shower and change clothes and then we"ll talk over dinner."
So Jake went to his bathroom, this news about the sponsors.h.i.+p Jake had to talk to his mother calmly, she should not think it was just about making a donation, because if it was so she would not accept, he had to explain that it was an exchange and that Jake could help the company with its image and its performances.
So after putting on the new outfit Jake came down the dining room and went to eat with his mother, the table was with several different things and Eva seemed to have been struggling at that dinner.
"So Jake, what did you expect to tell me until dinner?"
Eva knew her son well too, she knew it should be something important, or he would have said it all at the kitchen door, but she knew Jake was mature and would not cause problems, so she was not worried.
"Mom, what happened was I talked to Joseph"s grandfather, his name is Matthew and he"s a really nice person, he heard that my school team had won the regional champions.h.i.+p and I was the captain and the MVP and that we could also win the state and said that a friend of a son of a friend of his was interested in me. "
Jake mixed Matthew"s words with the reality he knew and made the words a bit ambiguous to get Eva"s attention from the point, so when he spoke on the patronage, his mother would be relieved and forget the importance of the situation, this was a technique of negotiation that Jake learned to use in his past life.
"What do you mean, she"s interested in you?"
As Jake hoped Eve fell into her bait and s.h.i.+fted her attention from the main subject.
"She has a company that makes sportswear for young people, they must have shoes too, so she was interested in sponsoring me to promote her brand."
"Sponsors.h.i.+p do you mean she"s going to give you money?"
"It"s almost like that, it"s not her that will give me money, but her company, so I could just talk about her company in some interviews, or play in the state with some sports article that her company does, or could even make a commercial for television or a magazine wearing and talking about your brand."
"So you mean this is not a charity and that her company is going to win something with you, too?"
"Exactly that, in addition, she may be investing in my future as a basketball player, if after a few years I get into college basketball or even in the NBA, even though I still do not wear the clothes of her brand, her company could declare that I wore while I was younger, they can earn a lot from it. "
So Jake convinced Eva to tell him all the possibilities of sponsors.h.i.+p, as the company was from an acquaintance of his friend"s grandfather, they may not want Jake to do anything, but he himself knew what he said was true as he saw it happen several times.
And he had the confidence to enter the NBA in the future if they did not use that opportunity who would lose it was them, but it was not his business.
Of course Jake also thought that if the brand was really good, and they had a future it could help them in a future crisis, and could even be a partner of the company, but that was for the future, after all, Jake even needed to sponsor them now for not having more money, the more help the company with money.
So a few days later Jake received a call from the company that Joseph"s grandfather spoke of, so he decided to go to that first date alone, after having negotiated everything correctly, he could call his mother just to sign the contract.
Soon a car appeared in front of Jake"s house, and soon he saw that it was the company car so he went in and went to the restaurant that he would meet with the company representative.
As soon as he entered the restaurant he went to the waiter for this to take him to the representative"s table, the waiter took him to a table which is in a separate place, it was a good place to talk business.
As soon as he got close to the table he saw a beautiful woman who had gorgeous long black hair and a face that resembled the actress from the movie Ghost he saw with his mother at the cinema the other day, she was a little smaller than Jake"s mother and not it seemed to be the serious type.
"h.e.l.lo, you must be Jake Matthew told me the other day, I thought your mother would come with you."
"Hi, I"m Jake, my mom is working today and as the matter today I am and we"re not going to sign any contracts today, I thought I could figure it out."
"You"re right, Matthew even said that you were more mature than your age, my name is Clara, and I am the company"s representative in this negotiation."
Jake realized that this woman seemed to be hiding something, but she could not figure out what it was, yet he did not think it would cause a problem so he did not care.
"So Matthew told me about you and I heard that you were the captain of your team and had been the regional champions.h.i.+p champion and also the MVP, so my company was looking for a young man to be the face of our company in America and so we thought you might be suitable, I wanted before I decided on this to ask a few questions for you. "
Jake was relieved that she seemed to take him seriously and get right into business, and it seemed to be more or less what he expected.
"Sure, you can ask whatever you want."
"So I would like you to be honest with me, I do not speak what we say to anyone today, how far do you think your team can go in this season and what do you think of your team?"
"I believe we can win the state champions.h.i.+p and qualify for the national champions.h.i.+p, plus I think we can not go very far to the national champions.h.i.+p, about my team, some of them have skills to play the state champions.h.i.+p and others less than that, n.o.body but me has the ability for the national champions.h.i.+p. "
Jake said the truth was what he had already thought before starting the regional champions.h.i.+p, after all, it was impossible that other teams that have won their respective state champions.h.i.+ps have flawed players like Luke, unless they have a player of the level of Jake, what can be possible plus is bad anyway.
Clara was a little surprised at Jake"s honesty, many young people were very attached to their colleagues and often lied or were hypocritical and did not want to speak ill of others to pretend to be cool, but Jake spoke without problems as if talking about another person.
"And you have the thought of going to play in another school after you finish that champions.h.i.+p this year?"
"I have, I wanted to play in a team that had the ability to give me the national champions.h.i.+p trophy, and also I would have to leave my school anyway after more than a year if a private school offered me a purse I could transfer there and play the national champions.h.i.+p on a good team and stay there for high school too, I would just have to talk to my friend Joseph before. "
Now Clara was more surprised because it seemed that Jake had already thought about all this for some time, it was good to do business with someone determined, things went faster.