Zheng Cai's fleet departed from Penghu at the end of September, and because it was already blowing a lot of north winds, the fleet was headwind, and it was expected to reach Chifengwei in Shandong by the end of October. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

While Zheng Cai was sailing on the road with a huge fleet of six hundred ships, Li Xiao was now paying attention to another matter.

That's the pace of cigarette production.

Since April, 450,000 acres of land have been leased in Wuding Prefecture and other places, and captives have been used for cigarette cultivation, and all tobacco fields have been harvested and dried.

The yield of tobacco fields is about the same as Li Xiao expected, on average, the output of flue-cured tobacco per mu of tobacco fields is only 100 catties. Then the total output of 450,000 mu of tobacco fields is 45 million catties.

In fact, there is a reason for this yield, that is, most of those lands are abandoned land, fertility is lost, and there is no chemical fertilizer application in ancient times, so there is a shortage of roots. The captives who were forced to work were not motivated enough to produce, so they could reach a yield of 100 catties per mu, which was not a mistake.

The dried tobacco leaves are then sent to a cigarette factory built at the foot of Chifengweizhong Squaodog Mountain, where workers pick out the defective tobacco leaves, then chop them into shredded tobacco, and then customize thin, flammable yellow paper from commercial paper mills and roll them by hand.

These cigarettes and cigars are all equipped with simple filters. The material of the filter is soaked in cotton acetic acid and degreased, then dried and shaped, and then cut into 2-3 cm lengths, wrapped in paper rolls with tobacco leaves, and then made into filter cigarettes in the Ming Dynasty.

Since yellow paper and cotton can be purchased on the market, Li Xiao does not plan to produce these two things by himself, so everyone can make money and save management and labor costs.

In modern China, generally speaking, one kilogram of tobacco leaves can produce four ordinary cigarettes in 12 packs. Or 2 long cigars.

And Li Xiao now, because he can't use cigarette machines to produce cigarettes like modern cigarette factories, all of them are hand-packaged and produced by manpower, and the means are crude and simple, and in order to ensure quality, Li Xiao removes some low-quality tobacco leaves, plus the loss of transportation and storage, so that it is estimated that one kilogram of tobacco leaves may only produce 2 ordinary cigarettes or a lengthened cigar.

Of course, the cigarettes produced by Li Xiao under such simple conditions in the late Ming Dynasty are much worse than the cigarettes produced by the current cigarette factory, both in terms of taste and smoking effect.

After all, all kinds of flavors, mixtures, additives, as well as special flammable and odorless paper produced by modern Chinese cigarettes, as well as tin foil for packaging cigarettes to prevent moisture absorption, were all produced by Li Xiao in the Ming Dynasty.

As a joke, if Li Xiao had produced cigarettes in such a humble production environment in the Ming Dynasty, the cigarettes he produced could meet modern standards. The director of the cigarette factory, the cigarette engineer, the workshop technician, etc., in modern China, can go and kill themselves by covering their faces, hehe.

It's just that in the late Ming Dynasty, when there were only shoddy mountain smoke and hookahs, Li Xiao was able to produce this kind of filter cigarettes, which was already an epoch-making product, which was enough to shock the people of the Ming Dynasty. Although it cannot be compared with modern cigarettes, it is a rare high-end enjoyment compared with those crude mountain smoke and hookah in the Ming Dynasty.

This is the gap between the times.

Now the total output of tobacco leaves in 450,000 acres of tobacco fields is 45 million catties, excluding defective tobacco leaves, as well as various transportation losses, the number of tobacco leaves that can be used for actual production is about 40 million catties, that is, 20 million kilograms, then, theoretically, the total output of 450,000 mu of tobacco fields in a year can produce a total of 40 million cigarettes or 20 million cigars.

Li Xiao's cigarette factory, the scale is very large, covers an extremely wide area, by the former Department of Commerce official Hu Zhongwen as the factory director, there are more than 10,000 workers, of which female workers account for the vast majority, most of them are the family members of the Red Phoenix Guards and the workers of the factory, after all, rolling cigarettes is a meticulous work, female workers do such a thing, much more suitable than male workers, the entire cigarette factory, only a small number of transport workers for men.

Hu Zhongwen reported to Li Xiao that after an actual inspection in the factory, it was found that a female worker could roll 13 cigarettes at hand and 10 cigarettes at hand during a four-hour working day, with an average speed of 11 ordinary cigarettes per person per day. To produce 40 million cigarettes, an average of 10.9 cigarettes need to be rolled per day over the course of a year, which is just right to match the speed of the workers.

In this way, at this rate, it is just right to ensure that the workers can work all year round.

Li Xiao gave this cigarette a well-known name.

Zhonghua brand cigarettes.

This famous cigarette brand in later generations was used by Li Xiao in a grand manner in the era hundreds of years ago, but there was no sense of disobedience at all.

Li Xiao has reason to believe that in this era, the Zhonghua brand filter cigarettes and cigars he made should be the first brand leading the world's cigarette trend.

In a rolling workshop, Li Xiao watched the whole process of rolling cigarettes with great interest.

Li Xiao saw that on a long table, there were six female workers on it, one female worker at each end, and four female workers in the middle sitting side by side opposite each other.

The female worker at the front of the end sorted and weighed the tobacco evenly, and made a small piece of 2 cm long cylindrical cotton, and a small piece of yellow paper, all of which were sorted and coded, and then handed to the four female workers sitting in the middle.

At this time, the four female workers in the middle, after receiving the production materials handed over by the female workers above, saw that they first quickly spread out a small piece of yellow paper on the table, and then quickly grabbed a small piece of tobacco that had been classified and coded, placed it on the upper end of the yellow paper, and then loosely rolled into a cigarette about one centimeter wide, and then immediately stuffed the trimmed cylindrical cotton in the gap at the lower end, and then wrapped the whole root tightly, and tightened the edge of the cigarette with rice glue. Then use small scissors to cut off the tobacco and cotton heads exposed at both ends to make the appearance more beautiful.

After this step is completed, the four female workers will roll the cigarettes respectively to the bottom of the female worker, who will roll the cigarettes, in the specifications of 20 per box, wrapped in thick yellow paper into a rectangle, and then stuffed into a cardboard box with the name of the Chinese brand, affixed a seal, a pack of cigarettes is made.

When the twelve packs of cigarettes were available, the female worker wrapped the twelve packs of cigarettes, together with a small piece of flint and velvet, in a long strip of thick yellow paper printed with the Chinese character, and then wrapped them with glue and seals, and a whole cigarette was made.

Li Xiao Next, he looked at the production process of the cigar workshop, which was basically similar to that of cigarettes. It's just that the cigars are larger, and each pack is twenty. It's also a pack of twelve cigars, all in one.

Finally, the male workers in the packaging workshop packed 50 cigarettes into a box of specifications, nailed them into a thin wooden box, affixed them with seals, and put them in the warehouse for storage.

Li Xiao lit a filter cigarette, lit a fire with flint, took a deep breath, and tasted it well, what the taste of the cigarette he had worked so hard to make.

Li Xiao felt that the taste of this self-made filter cigarette was much more punchy than that of modern cigarettes, not mellow enough, and the fishy smell and tar smell of the tobacco leaves were also relatively heavy, but compared with the shoddy choking mountain smoke and hookah that Li Xiao had tasted in this era, the taste was much better.

After tasting the taste of cigarettes, Li Xiao was even more confident, and he believed that as long as this batch of cigarettes entered the market, it would be deeply loved by the majority of smokers in the Ming Dynasty.

Li Xiao wanted to immediately develop the type of luxury cigarettes, specifically for the wealthy, to develop high-end cigarettes, this kind of cigarettes, will select the best tobacco leaves, carefully roasted, in addition to the gift of flint velvet, another gift of finely carved pipes, and with luxurious and gorgeous wooden box packaging, so that the price can be greatly increased.

It's just that because cigarettes are now in production, Li Xiao doesn't plan to become a fat man in one step. He plans to wait for a few months, after the cigarette market is cultivated and expanded, and then produce high-end cigarettes, which should be more effective.

Seeing that in the entire huge cigarette factory, all kinds of people, materials, and finished products are in good order, chaotic but not chaotic, showing the situation of preliminary assembly line operation, Li Xiao is very satisfied.

He greatly praised Hu Wenzhong, the director of the cigarette factory, so that Hu Wenzhong was flattered, and immediately expressed to Li Xiao that he would manage the cigarette factory more well, so that the output and quality of cigarettes could be fully guaranteed.

After listening to Hu Zhongwen's statement, Li Xiao was very happy and encouraged him a few more words, and then, Li Xiao began to consider the pricing of cigarettes.

As for the price of this cigarette, according to the data of the Dutch East India Company, the factory price of an ordinary cigarette is 2 yuan and 5 cents silver.

It is said that after these Indonesian cigarettes were sold to the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, France and other places, the price of an ordinary cigarette could be 1 pound, which was exchanged for the price of silver in the Ming Dynasty, which was 2 to 3 taels of silver!

This is simply a huge profit from drug trafficking!

It's just that Li Xiao took into account the living standards of most people in the Ming Dynasty, and in order to cultivate and lead the market, he planned to greatly reduce the ex-factory price of the Dutch, and sell it at a wholesale price of 1 yuan and 5 cents of silver for an ordinary cigarette and 3 yuan silver for an ordinary cigar.

At this price, Li Xiao believes, it should still be very attractive for the ordinary smoker market.

It can be simply calculated that if all the 40 million cigarettes are sold, the total sales will reach 6 million taels!

That's a staggering amount of sales, and the cost of producing cigarettes is nothing compared to its staggering sales amounts.

According to the report of relevant personnel, Li Xiao roughly calculated that the total cigarette production cost mainly includes the following aspects.

1. The land rent of 450,000 mu is 255,000 taels.

2. The cost of food and accommodation for the 45,000 captives, salaries for supervisors, cattle, farm tools, tobacco seeds, etc., is about 600,000 taels a year.

3. The cost of dealing with local officials is about 20,000 taels.

4. The cost of building a cigarette factory and tables, chairs and tools is about 50,000 taels.

5. The salary of the workers in the cigarette factory is 72,000 taels a year, and the food expenses are about 80,000 taels.

6. Rolling cigarette paper, filtered cotton, thick yellow paper, packaging boxes, wooden boxes with nails, and matching flint velvet and other materials, according to the available information, these additional costs of a cigarette can be evenly apportioned to 0.2 cents of silver. Based on 40 million pieces, it is about 800,000 taels.

In this way, it can be calculated that the total cost of producing these 40 million pieces is about 1.8 million taels in total.

In this way, if Li Xiaoruo sells all these cigarettes, the net profit can reach 4.2 million taels, and the profit is really amazing.

And now, the only question is how long it will take for the Ming Dynasty market to accept such a product. At this point, Li Xiao still has no bottom in his heart.

Only five days after the official production of the Squa Dog Mountain Cigarette Factory, Shen Zongxiang, the deputy chief soldier of Dongjiang Town, with his deputy general Wang Tingrui, led a fleet of ships to Chifengwei to purchase merchant goods.

Li Xiao immediately lost no time in recommending to him the newly made Zhonghua brand cigarettes from the cigarette factory.

"Brother Shen, Vice General Wang, you see, this is a new type of Chinese brand cigarette developed by our army, this kind of thin and short is called a cigarette. This kind of thick and long is called a cigar。。。。。 ”

Li Xiao used a mysterious tone to introduce his cigarette products to the two.

Shen Zongxiang and Wang Tingrui, when they saw such a novelty, their eyes were round.

After carefully watching and playing with the cigarette in their hands, the two lit a fire with flint and took a puff carefully.

Soon, the faces of the two gradually showed joy, and they squinted slightly in intoxication, immersed in the pleasure of swallowing clouds and spitting mist.

After smoking a cigarette, Shen Zhixiang flicked the cigarette butt in a chic posture, and then said to Li Xiao with a smile on his face: "Li Dudu, your Chinese brand cigarettes are really quite good!" Brother, I'll order 200,000 first, how about it, brother is interesting enough, Li Dudu has to give me a preferential price? ”

After Shen Zhixiang finished speaking, he looked at Li Xiao with an earnest face, and Wang Tingrui on the side also looked expectant.

Seeing his eagerness, Li Xiao suddenly had the idea of quoting him a high price to try the water, so he smiled and said: "Brother Shen, brother can spend a lot of money to make this cigarette, and this price is rare and cheap." ”

"Let's talk about the real price, our brothers don't come to the vain." Shen Zhixiang waved his hand, quite unimpressed by Li Xiao's words.

"Well, cigarettes are 3 cents each, and cigars are 6 cents each."

Li Xiao quoted the price to Shen Zhixiang at double the price, and Shen Zhixiang immediately screamed as if he had been scalded by boiling water.

"Oh my God! Li Dudu, your cigarettes are good, and the quantity is real, but the price is ruthless, not very real, our brother, how can it be discounted? Shen Zhixiang said to Li Xiao in a pitiful tone.

Li Xiao laughed, he sighed and said: "Let's go, who let Brother Shen be an old friend of Li, brother, I will also quote a reserve price, each cigarette and cigar are discounted by seven, a cigarette is 2 yuan silver, and a cigar is 4 yuan silver, how about it, our brother is real enough, right?" ”

"Good! Chong Li Dudu's refreshment, deal! I bought 120,000 cigarettes and 80,000 cigars! If it sells quickly, we will buy it again next time. Shen Zhixiang clapped his hands and laughed, and immediately agreed to Li Xiao's offer.

After receiving the payment of 56,000 taels of silver for cigarettes, Li Xiao was overjoyed.

With Shen Zhixiang's first batch of orders, Li Xiao's cigarette sales got off to a good start.

Now, Li Xiao can be sure that if Shen Zhixiang can accept this, the price of a cigarette for 2 yuan of silver and a cigar for 4 yuan of silver, then in other places in the Ming Dynasty, it can be sold wholesale at the same price, so that it can be more profitable than the price Li Xiao originally envisioned.

If you can really sell all 40 million cigarettes at the price of 2 yuan silver, it will be a sales amount of 8 million, and after removing the cost, it will be a net profit of 6.2 million!

This is quite an astonishing profiteering, and its profit is comparable to that of Li Xiaojun's silk and steel industries.

It is no wonder that in later generations, the state will firmly grasp the tobacco industry in its own hands, make it the focus of state profits and taxes, and carry out monopoly operations.

With this huge income, Li Xiao will be like a tiger.

Li Xiao knew that Shen Zhixiang was gone, except for a small amount of sales to the soldiers and people in Dongjiang Town, the bulk of the sales should be from Liaoxi and the Qing Dynasty. According to Li Xiao's estimate, Shen Zhixiang, a black-hearted trader, is very likely to increase Li Xiao's wholesale price by more than two or three times, and the profit is even more amazing.

However, even if he is allowed to occupy the sales territory of Dongjiang, Liaoxi and the Qing Dynasty, the cigarettes produced by Li Xiao, as well as the domestic market of the entire Ming Dynasty, as well as the Mongolian tribes outside the Guan, and even North Korea in the east, should have a certain share of sales. And Li Xiao believes that Zheng Zhilong in the south, as long as he has tasted the cigarettes he produces, will definitely buy them vigorously, and then sell them to Nanyang and Japan at a higher price.

Maybe one day, I can sell Chinese brand cigarettes to Europe and the Americas, and to the whole world。。。。。。

。

Appendix: (Brief answer to the questions of the Sengoku Qiangfeng brothers)

According to the information of my subordinates, a rough reply.

The iron mold cast cannon was invented by the Qing man Gong Zhenfeng during the Opium War, and it can be regarded as the world's leading technology for the Chinese.

During the Opium War, Gong Zhenlin, a county in Jiaxing County, Zhejiang, was transferred to the Ningbo military camp by his boss and ordered to make artillery. Because of his urgency, he invented the iron mold casting method to quickly produce artillery against the British army.

The specific method is to first make artillery from wax, and then turn the sand several times to make an iron mold. When casting the gun, first brush the inside of each petal of the iron mold with two layers of slurry. The first layer of slurry is made of fine rice husk ash and fine sand mud; The second layer of slurry is made of fine kiln coal and water. Then, the two petals are combined, tightened with iron hoops, baked, and continuously continued, and finally the molten metal is cast. After pouring enough molten liquid and cooling and molding, the iron mold is immediately peeled off according to the order of the mold flaps, and the gun body is gradually exposed like peeling off the bamboo shoot shell.

Compared with the clay mold casting gun, the advantages of the iron mold casting cannon are: the process is simple and easy, saving the mold raw materials, not limited by climatic conditions, shortening the manufacturing cycle, reducing the production cost, no moisture problem, especially to solve the problem of honeycomb (bubbles), improve the quality of artillery casting, and greatly reduce the rejection rate of the casting gun.

It's just that there is a reason why I didn't immediately ask the craftsmen to adopt this method in the article.

First of all, Li Xiao did not understand the details of this technique, such as the composition of the slurry and the method of turning the sand of the iron mold, so he could not point out the direction to the craftsmen with only verbal guidance.

Then, from the 16th century to the first half of the 19th century, the whole world was still using the technology of clay mold casting cannons, and this group of craftsmen from the Dengzhou Firearms Battalion chose the usual clay mold cannons, which was a normal thing, and it was much easier than groping for iron mold casting cannons with only an empty concept out of thin air.

In the end, the iron mold casting cannon, in the future, will be slowly explored and put into practice, but it still needs time and practice, and it cannot be realized overnight. (To be continued.) )