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Chapter 1451 Unorthodox Methods
Knowing the enormous gap, besides envy and jealousy, a strong desire to catch up arose spontaneously. However, those large-scale transoceanic trade deals not only required capital, but also sufficient knowledge and connections. Learning from scratch was not impossible, but it would be too time-consuming, and at my age, I was afraid I wouldn't have enough time.

Not only is it too late for them, but the next generation is in dire straits as well. Their sons and nephews only attended private school for a few days at most when they were young, and by the time Emperor Jingyang promoted modern education, they were long past school age. Their grandchildren, on the other hand, were born at a better time, but unfortunately, they are too young to take charge of the family business in the short term.

Waiting until the grandchildren grow up? That would be absolutely too late. Even without anyone to teach him, Jia Yihui understood the principle that times change.

If I hadn't defied all opposition and gone bankrupt to seize the opportunity to build an arsenal, I wouldn't be able to find such a good business now, even with all the money in my pocket. There are always more people wanting to make money than opportunities to do so; if you miss this wave, it's hard to say when the next one will come.

Therefore, we absolutely cannot wait; we must seize this golden opportunity and work tirelessly to develop our business. We must first expand our family business to lay a solid foundation for our grandchildren, so that they can potentially reach even greater heights when they grow up.

However, investing in traditional industries requires too much capital and accumulates too slowly. They lack the conditions for engaging in ocean trade and don't have the courage to risk everything to establish plantations overseas. So how can they develop rapidly?

This is where the advantage of connections comes in! The more people you know, the more opportunities you can uncover. For example, during a trip to Ningbo to purchase Japanese sulfur, a long-time client brought along two wealthy local businessmen. Over drinks, they began discussing business strategies.

One of the businessmen, surnamed Wang, became even more enthusiastic after learning that the Jia family owned an arsenal in Lanzhou Prefecture. After the banquet, he insisted on hosting a night trip to the most famous pleasure boat in the area.

The next morning, he mysteriously revealed the whole story, intending to show Jia Yihui a way to make big money. Two words: smuggling! Four words: arms smuggling!

The Ming Dynasty had many special products, ranging from traditional porcelain, silk, and tea to later cocoa powder, whale oil, clocks, glass, machinery, and cotton and wool textiles. In addition, there were emerging products in recent years such as rubber, mint, fertilizer, dyes, fuel oil, and medicines, each of which was unique and enjoyed strong prices and sales overseas.

However, these conventional products were spotted by discerning large merchants as soon as they were launched. After they had been operating for a period of time and sorted out all the links, it was difficult for outsiders to get involved. They could only join in and earn some hard-earned money, and they certainly couldn't get a piece of the big pie.

If you want to eat big pieces of fatty meat, you have to go to the Royal Academy’s annual auction to buy patent rights. You have to start from building a factory for a new product, mass production, opening up sales channels and accumulating big customers, and take it one step at a time.

The period can last from a year and a half to three to five years, during which you may not make any money or even lose money. Only after you have sorted out all these steps can you enter the harvest period.

However, this kind of investment is beyond the reach of ordinary people, and even large businessmen of one or two households cannot undertake it. Depending on the scale and output value, it requires the cooperation of several or even a dozen large businessmen to make it possible.

So you can't just look at the glamour of others making money; you also have to consider the anxiety they felt when they invested. It's really built with hard-earned money, and a slight misstep could result in losing everything.

Although Jia Yihui's family had made a considerable amount of money from the arsenal over the years and had also invested in several mines, oil fields, and processing plants, they were still far from being able to engage in large-scale overseas trade. As for joint investment, that was even more unreliable. They simply couldn't find like-minded people in their hometown, and they weren't familiar with outsiders, so they wouldn't dare entrust their lives and fortunes to them.

What to do? Master Wang said, we have to take an unconventional approach! If ordinary goods won't work, then let's find something unusual. What kind of goods are unusual? The simplest and most common are things the court forbids from being bought and sold freely, such as firearms.

According to the new Ming Dynasty law, civilians were not allowed to possess military firearms, specifically rifled firearms. Furthermore, military organizations such as garrison troops or local militias were strictly prohibited. Public security was the responsibility of local governments and agencies under the Imperial Guard, while military tasks, such as bandit suppression, were undertaken by the garrisons of various military commands.

However, where there's a will, there's a way. The military camps and local militias were abolished, and the garrison troops, salt workers, and mine workers were also banned, but some people still couldn't resist fighting. These people dared not openly defy the laws of the Ming Dynasty, but secretly they had a strong demand for weapons, especially firearms.

As the Ming army rose to prominence with its firearms and artillery, winning battle after battle and becoming an invincible force in the era, details such as tactics and logistics were ignored, while the weapons used became objects of fascination.

Wealthy merchants travel frequently and have many valuables at home, so it's understandable that they would hire several bodyguards to watch over their homes. However, a bodyguard carrying a knife certainly doesn't inspire the same sense of security as one carrying a musket, and even the masters and officials themselves would like to carry one on their belt when they travel far away.

In addition, there is a type of industry called "fighting," which is a semi-legal business. It involves providing guard and bodyguard services to employers on the basis of being hired, while also participating in many illegal fights.

They used to use knives, spears, and clubs as weapons, but with the popularization of firearms in the army, these weapons, which did not rely much on physical strength or require long-term training, were easy to carry, use, and were extremely powerful, gradually became the first choice for the members of the fighting group.

However, traditional smoothbore guns are cumbersome to use, not very accurate, and quite large. Compared to military firearms, they are clearly inferior.

Obtaining a standard-issue musket was extremely difficult and dangerous. If reported or discovered by the authorities, the Imperial Guards or even the army would quickly appear. If the evidence was conclusive, not only would the owner be sentenced to hard labor, but the seller would face even harsher punishment.

Therefore, most of the firearms used by civilians were made privately by blacksmiths with some skills. In addition to being of poor quality, inconvenient to use, and having very unstable power, they were usually also ugly and not accepted by high-end people.

In reality, the true market for military firearms was overseas, compared to the Ming Dynasty's mainland. There, without the strict laws, the Imperial Guards, and government oversight, as long as the goods were available and of good quality, people were willing to pay high prices to buy them. What they were used for was no longer the merchants' concern.

The market was established, but the supply of goods became a major problem. Although privately manufactured muskets were also called muskets, they didn't fetch a good price, and various countries had their own craftsmen who could make guns, so there was no need for them to spend a lot of money to buy them. What they wanted to buy were the muskets used by the Ming army!

(End of this chapter)