Chapter 191: Commodities
After several years of getting along, the wealthy and wealthy families in Shandong have gradually felt Chen Xian's pulse.
They found that in addition to being very persistent in confiscating land, Chen Xian would not forcibly seize other properties of the rich and powerful, of course, if you dare to resist, then the exception.
Chen Xian even treated ordinary merchants very well, although the commercial tax was heavy, and did not tolerate tax evasion, the methods of tax inspection were varied, and a special tax inspection cavalry team was also set up, but it was very preferential to the merchants who had paid taxes, not only gave certain privileges, but also spared no effort to protect the merchants who paid taxes and trade routes.
Chen Xian even allowed a private army organization known as mercenaries to flourish in the territory, and he even allowed mercenaries to be equipped with armor, spears, halberds, strong bows and crossbows, and even firearms, except for a certain limit on the size of mercenaries.
After some temptation, some clever merchants have funded the establishment of mercenary organizations under their control.
In fact, Chen Xian is not unrestricted for mercenaries, he stipulates that the garrison of mercenaries must be in cities above the county seat, or in the wilderness, and they are not allowed to be stationed in castles, plus the number of mercenaries, such mercenaries basically do not pose much threat to Chen Xian's rule.
Under Chen Xian's suppression and support, the landlords in his ruling area almost disappeared, and commerce gradually prospered, and some wealthy families with connections in Henan, North China, Huaibei and other places organized caravans and mercenaries to sell cheap and high-quality handicraft products produced by Chen Xian's factories to these places, and weapons and armor that were strictly controlled in other places were openly supplied here by Chen Xian.
Among these merchants, the most comfortable are the maritime merchants of Michigan.
With Chen Xian's support, these maritime merchants can arm their sailors and merchant ships openly, and they can buy any weapons and equipment in Chen Xian's arsenal, even including cannons, but the local ships in Mizhou cannot be installed with too large cannons, because they can't withstand the recoil, they can only load some flying sand cannons.
Chen Xian's tolerance for private armed forces at sea is even higher than that of mercenaries on land.
This is because armed forces at sea pose a much smaller threat to the regime than armed forces on land.
With Chen Xian's support for maritime merchants, and his vigorous renovation of the port along the coast of Jiaozhou Bay, as well as the construction of Qingdao Port, the superior conditions attracted many maritime merchants along the Bohai Sea and Goryeo to use Jiaozhou Bay as their transit point.
Michigan's maritime merchants also grew rapidly with Chen Xian's support.
These favored merchant classes became more and more supportive of Chen Xian's rule, and their relationship with him became very close.
The original landlord and powerful class, either resigned to their fate and transformed into the merchant class, joined the vested interest group, and those who hesitated a little have been ruthlessly cleaned up by Chen Xian, so over the years, although Chen Xian's killing has been heavy, he has not encountered many vendettas.
For the southward movement of the merchant fleet this time, Chen Xian put a lot of thought into it.
To tell the truth, as the most developed handicraft region in the world, the market of the Southern Song Dynasty is not easy to open, because it produces the best goods in the world, there are the most exquisite porcelain, the most luxurious silk, and the best quality tea......
It seems that going with money is the best choice, but Chen Xian doesn't want to do this because he is also short of money.
It's not appropriate to carry weapons and armor either.
According to the information that Chen Xian has found out over the years, compared with the turmoil in the north, the internal political situation in the Southern Song Dynasty was relatively stable, and most of the struggles between the landlords and the powerful were concentrated in the officialdom and court, and the local landlords and heroes were not strong in their willingness to arm themselves.
What's more, the handicraft industry in the Southern Song Dynasty was developed, and they did not lack weapons and armor.
Selling firearms and gunpowder? Chen Xian was a little hesitant, the handicraft technology in the Southern Song Dynasty was more developed than that of the Jin Kingdom, and the imitation of gunpowder firearms should be very fast.
He wasn't afraid that the Song people had learned gunpowder and firearms technology, anyway, they had already been learned by the Jin Kingdom, and it was estimated that it would be a matter of time before the Mongols learned it, and there was no need to guard against the weakest Song State.
Chen Xian's concern was that Song Guo quickly learned how to make gunpowder and firearms, making the business a one-shot deal.
Moreover, large quantities of gunpowder and firearms can only be sold to the Song court, Chen Xian has little confidence in the imperial court of this era, and it is difficult for you to make them face up to fair trade before the other party recognizes your strength.
In the end, Chen Xian rejected gunpowder and firearms as the main trading items, but he planned to make a batch of finely made revolver muskets and sell them as luxury goods in the Song Kingdom.
Soap should have a market in the Song Kingdom, but Chen Xian has always sold it as a luxury item, and it cannot be used as a bulk commodity.
Thinking about it, the only commodities that Chen Xian can hold in his hands are all kinds of cheap and high-quality iron tools.
In the past two years, in order to increase the competitiveness of foreign trade products, Chen Xian mobilized manpower and took time to personally lead the team to test the production method of tinplate.
The so-called tinplate is tinplate, this material has a strong anti-rust ability, and it can greatly extend the service life of iron tools produced by replacing ordinary iron sheets.
An ordinary tin basin or kettle may rust and leak in a year or two, but similar items made of tinned tin can even be used for five or six years.
Tinplate has a long history of production, around the 14th century, when it appeared in Bohemia, which means that its production process is not complicated.
The original tinplate was tinplated by dipping the pickled iron plate in a tin solution.
Chen Xian spent more than half a month to basically determine the production process of tinplate.
Anti-rust iron utensils made of tinplate, especially iron kettles, iron basins, iron buckets, and other utensils that often come into contact with water, have been popular in the local area since they appeared.
This time, Chen Xian made tinplate iron tools the main commodity of the trading fleet.
In addition to tinplate products, Chen Xian also prepared high-quality iron pots, scissors, various daily knives and other cheap and high-quality steel products, assisted by water conservancy forging hammers, Chen Xian's factory to produce similar products, the cost of production of similar products, is much lower than that of ordinary blacksmith shops.
In addition to these existing goods in Chen Xian's hands, Chen Xian also developed an expensive luxury for the Song people.
That's glass.
Glass manufacturing technology is a must in the crossing, and the Internet writer's mobile phone also has a more detailed glass firing technology.
Chen Xian, who was insecure in the past, was only interested in military technology, and making money was only incidental, to tell the truth, although Chen Xian has been developing industry and commerce all these years, more than half of his financial income was actually looted through war!
Therefore, Chen Xian has never needed to come up with glass manufacturing technology.
However, when he built a qualified sailing ship and planned to develop maritime trade, the high-quality trade product of glass could no longer be let go.
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