Volume 2 Chapter 1 Industry Business conference
On the fifth day after New Years, Xu Yi received a special invitation.
This invitation came from the City Lord’s Manor. The contents was to invite Xu Yi to represent the Frestech Chamber of Commerce in partic.i.p.ating in the New Years exchange banquet at the City Lord’s Manor.
It was different from the normal banquet invitations Xu Yi received from the City Lord’s Manor before. This time the invitation was personally signed by the City Lord Count Sean Samo.
Xu Yi could avoid the banquet invitations from before, but since this was an invitation the Lord City Lord was personally sending, it was hard for him to easily avoid them like before.
Moreover, the key point of this invitation was that at this New Years exchange banquet, other than representatives from Banta City companies, there were also merchants from Karma City that was closest to Banta City.
This made Xu Yi a bit surprised.
It was only the fifth day after New Years, why were the Karma City merchants suddenly running over to Banta City?
“Actually this is an old tradition.” The Amrit Chamber of Commerce’s chairman Moon Cruise had a cup of wine in his hand as he explained to Xu Yi with a smile, “Every New Years, Karma City’s City Lord Count Anaris would bring the Karma City merchants to visit our Banta City. Then a few days later, the Lord City Lord would pick some Banta City company representatives to take a trip to Karma City. Chairman Xu, you have only joined the business circle last year, so it isn’t strange that you don’t know about this custom. But your Frestech Chamber of Commerce was just established last year and already has already been invited by the Lord City Lord to this banquet, it really is shocking.”
Xu Yi looked at him, “What? You don’t think our Frestech Chamber of Commerce is qualified?”
“How could that be!” Chairman Cruise called out with an exaggerated expression, “Chairman Xu, although your Frestech Chamber of Commerce hasn’t been established for long, is there anyone in Banta City that still dares to question your qualifications? Then again, we are close partners, so no matter who I think is unqualified here, I wouldn’t think of you, don’t you think so?”
Xu Yi laughed, “I’m just joking, chairman Cruise doesn’t need to be this nervous.”
Chairman Cruise said that the Amrit Chamber of Commerce and the Frestech Chamber of Commerce were close partners and although it was a bit exaggerated, it wasn’t that exaggerated.
Since the Amrit Chamber of Commerce obtained cement from the Frestech Chamber of Commerce and they grasped the various methods of using the cement, the quality of the Amrit Chamber of Commerce’s buildings had soared.
In just a short two months, the Amrit Chamber of Commerce had received quite a bit of praise. Their construction orders had increased after the New Years and it had raised by 30% all of a sudden compared to last year.
And this increase of 30% wasn’t including the construction orders the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had made with the Amrit Chamber of Commerce.
On the third day after New Years, Xu Yi had specially found chairman Cruise. Other than wishing him a happy New Years, his more important goal was to mention the new large scale construction products the Frestech Chamber of Commerce needed.
Other than constructing another new factory on Viscount Leslie’s land for the household magic machine workshop to use, there were two other large projects that surprised chairman Cruise.
One of them was building new houses for the Norma and Angola Tribe and to build houses for the new tribe. The other was solving the water problem of the Night Song Tribe, changing that river in the Falling Rain Forest filled with silt.
Xu Yi didn’t tell chairman Cruise why he wanted to do these two projects, but chairman Cruise wasn’t that interested in Xu Yi’s goal. Other than raising some doubts on whether Xu Yi had Count Sean’s approval on changing this river, he was mostly focused on the price of these two projects.
Xu Yi had very high requirements to the quality of these two projects, requesting the Amrit Chamber of Commerce to use their best manpower and materials. This meant that the Amrit Chamber of Commerce would receive the most profits from these two projects.
According to Xu Yi’s initial plan, chairman Cruise could easily calculate that the total price of these two projects could surpa.s.s three hundred thousand gold coins!
And the lowest profit the Amrit Chamber of Commerce could get was a large profit of over fifty thousand gold coins.
Although the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had high profits, they had been established for too short, so it was impossible for them to take out three hundred thousand gold coins at once. So Xu Yi proposed to settle this debt with the Amrit Chamber of Commerce using cement, which was greatly welcomed by chairman Cruise.
The construction projects under the Amrit Chamber of Commerce almost couldn’t leave cement now.
Therefore, chairman Cruise had requested several times to Xu Yi on increasing the length of the monopoly right on cement the Amrit Chamber of Commerce had, but it was firmly rejected by Xu Yi.
But no matter what, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce and the Amrit Chamber of Commerce could be considered close.
Actually when Xu Yi said “some people doubted the Frestech Chamber of Commerce didn’t have the qualification to partic.i.p.ate”, he was completely joking.
The ones at the banquet were all merchants from Banta City and just in half a year of development, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce was known by all the companies in Banta City. Everyone was very clear on the powerful potential the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had.
And after the auction of the two mines from last time, no one doubted the power of the Frestech Chamber of Commerce anymore.
Being able to s.n.a.t.c.h an iron mine from the Falcao Chamber of Commerce and borrowing funds from the Chimera Chamber of Commerce, no matter what point it was, it was enough to make the other companies hold the Frestech Chamber of Commerce in high respects.
There were even quite a few people who guessed that there was a large backer behind Xu Yi.
And based on speculation from Xu Yi’s relationship with Viscount Leslie, his backer was very likely the Stagg Family which was one of the strongest families in the Lampuri Kingdom.
Of course, no one questioned it, but that didn’t mean everyone accepted it.
There were some who were like chairman Cruise and were very friendly with Xu Yi, but there were also people who showed hostility that wasn’t strong, but was very clear.
This was of course referring to chairman Fuller Morgan of the Falcao Chamber of Commerce.
Because an iron mine had been taken by the Frestech Chamber of Commerce, Fuller Morgan had been reprimanded by the important members of the Jole Family, almost losing his position as the chairman because of this. So Fuller Morgan being full of hate for Xu Yi wasn’t strange.
Normally speaking, when the other side fully displayed their hostility, people wouldn’t willingly approach them, but Xu Yi was the exception.
After he found Fuller Morgan in the crowd, he walked over with a smile.
“Chairman Morgan, happy New Years.” Xu Yi raised his cup in a toast to chairman Morgan.
Although chairman Morgan was very unhappy, he had the good demeanor of a large merchant. After clinking gla.s.ses with Xu Yi, he said with an ugly smile, “Happy New Years.”
Xu Yi finished his cup of wine and said after some praise, “Chairman Morgan, I’ve been busy these days and haven’t had a chance to talk to you. Now that we have a chance to meet, I want to ask you, the mining magic machines I mentioned last time, have you considered it?”
Chairman Morgan was stunned. He remembered the auction and that Xu Yi had mentioned this matter with him, but Xu Yi had said that it was just a simple concept and chairman Morgan had been in a very bad mood, so he didn’t seriously listen and had forgotten about it.
Because there had been many things he had been busy with in terms of the mine, chairman Morgan had thrown this to the back of his mind.
Hearing Xu Yi mention this again, chairman Morgan thought about before discreetly answering, “I have considered it, but chairman Xu, although I believe in your Frestech Chamber of Commerce’s ability, is there any meaning in not seeing the thing and just believing in empty words?”
“Oh? This means that chairman Morgan is interested?” Xu Yi said with a smile, “It’s actually very easy to see the thing. Our company has just invented a small Magic Drill not long ago that can increase the efficiency of mining. If chairman Morgan has the time, will you come and see it?”
“Small Magic Drill? This name sounds not bad……” Chairman Morgan was a large merchant in the end, he wasn’t easily influenced by his emotions. After hearing that Xu Yi didn’t seem to be joking, he considered it before saying with a nod, “Alright, chairman Xu can have someone send the thing over to let me study. If it is easy to use, we can discuss other matters.”
Seeing chairman Morgan agree, Xu Yi didn’t care about the fact that he deliberately acted reserved, agreeing with a smile.
Not long after, Count Sean suddenly walked out from the back of the banquet hall. Beside him was a middle aged man with small stature, but was firmly built, with clear eyes.
It was very clear that this middle aged man was Karma City’s City Lord Count Anaris.
And following behind the two City Lords were the merchants that had come from the far Karma City.
Xu Yi looked over them and found several acquaintances. They were all merchants who had come to Banta City to order large amounts of magic machines from the Frestech Chamber of Commerce.
The two City Lords gave a speech on the stage, speaking of the main purpose of this banquet. It was to give the merchants of the two cities a chance to interact, hoping that everyone would seize this chance to create many new business deals to help develop the two cities.
It should be said that this exchange was very meaningful.
With the limited technology level of the Sines Continent, there weren’t many methods of communication. If the merchants wanted to do business, most of the time they relied on face to face interaction.
Now that the City Lords of the two cities took the initiative to host this kind of banquet, it gave the merchants of the two cities a very good chance.
Of course, the premise was that Count Sean and Count Anaris had a good relationship, allowing them to host this kind of banquet.
When the two counts announced that the banquet was starting, everyone began talking to each other. The merchants of the two cities went to find friends they were familiar with and they began chatting in small groups of twos and threes.
When Xu Yi wanted to find some Karma City merchants he was familiar with to talk to, he suddenly noticed Count Sean beckoning to him.