Li Xing stood in the Tianjin City Hall, watching the busy carpenters tearing off the window paper from the doors and windows, using tools to dig grooves where the paper had originally been, and installing the transparent flat glass.
Li Xing stood next to a craftsman and watched the craftsman operate, and suddenly asked: "Why are you so skilled?"
The craftsman laughed and said, "I'll tell you back to the Second General. All the Duke's mansions have been installed with this kind of glass. Installing glass windows for the Tianjin City Hall is my second time doing this job, so I'm naturally very comfortable with it."
Li Xing saw that the carpenter was smiling happily, and he also laughed without a smile. But Li Xing was annoyed that the carpenter looked "very knowledgable", and he suddenly stopped his smile before it fully appeared.
He tightened his facial muscles and immediately put on a serious black face.
The carpenter was frightened by Li Xing's grimace. Why did he think these two generals were so evil?
However, there are rumors that the Second General Li Xing has always been domineering and dares to do anything. It is not common for him to make a weird face in front of the craftsmen. If he gets angry, the Second General might kick him out. The carpenter did not dare to talk to Li Xingduo anymore and raised his head.
Once he was buried, he just took the time to install his glass windows.
Li Xing was a little proud of having frightened the carpenter who pretended to be an expert. He stood up, stretched out, and sat in front of the counter of the tax bureau with his legs crossed. He held his chin up and looked at the pieces of glass that had been installed in the window, and was silent.
Li Xing sat for a while and was about to go back to the governor's office to handle official documents when he saw Jiang Chong, the leader of the enemy division, walking into the city hall carrying a bag of files.
Li Xing often hung out with Jiang Chong. When he saw Jiang Chong, he was happy and quickly recruited Jiang Chong.
"Jiang Chong, your elder brother's glass window."
When Jiang Chong saw the second general greeting him, he quickly walked up and saluted Li Xing, and then carefully looked at the glass windows installed by the craftsmen.
When the carpenter installing glass saw another group leader who had never seen a glass window, he raised his head and looked at Jiang Chong expectantly.
Jiang Chong looked at the glass window, touched it with his hand, shook his head and sighed: "Jiang Chong has never heard of such a wonderful thing. I never thought that a luxury object like glass can be used as a window."
"With such glass, wouldn't it be able to transmit light for illumination and block sand and dust? No matter whether it is windy or rainy outside, this glass can block the debris outside the window? It can block the wind and rain and still transmit light.
Come in and let the light inside the house suddenly light up. Even if there is sand and rocks outside, the house can still get sunlight."
Jiang Chong took a breath and said: "Exquisite! It's really exquisite!"
Li Xing laughed loudly after listening to Jiang Chong's words. He understood this kind of glass window panel before Jiang Chong, which made him feel very accomplished. After patting Jiang Chong on the shoulder, Li Xing put on an expression of "Don't make a fuss".
, which is very useful in my heart.
But the carpenter didn't know how to live or die. He actually laughed along with Li Xing, as if he was also proud of his "well-informed" carpenter.
Li Xing found that the carpenter was also laughing with him, and it seemed that he, the dignified governor of Tianjin, had the same knowledge as a carpenter. He felt as if he had eaten a fly. He was very embarrassed and had to slowly stop smiling.
Jiang Chong looked at Li Xing and asked curiously: "How much does this glass window cost?"
The ignorant carpenter wanted to show off his knowledge, so he rushed to answer: "Three coins per square meter!"
Li Xing's face turned darker.
If Li Zhi hadn't repeatedly taught Li Xing to love the people as his own son, Li Xing would have kicked out the carpenter long ago.
Jiang Chong thought for a while and asked: "If the Duke of Guo sells this glass window so cheaply, won't it affect the sales of the original glass wine vessels? If Xiao Zui bought this flat glass with ulterior motives, it would become soft.
Wouldn’t it be possible to make very cheap wine vessels by making them into wine vessels?”
Hearing Jiang Chong's words, the carpenter was dumbfounded. He was barely literate. Although he had seen glass windows earlier than Li Xing, who knew why Li Zhi gave up the glass wine set industry and sold glass so cheaply?
The carpenter didn't understand such a complicated problem. He touched his head and looked at Li Xing.
Li Xing smiled and thought to himself, finally there is something you, a carpenter, don’t understand?
"Jiang Chong, let me tell you, this is where my eldest brother is so clever."
"A pair of glass wine vessels sells for thirty taels of silver. Only very wealthy families will buy this kind of luxury goods, and the sales volume is limited. Even if the eldest brother sells the wine vessels to Korea and Japan, he will only earn hundreds of thousands of taels a year. These incomes
Compared to my elder brother’s expenses in various places, it is nothing to mention.”
Li Xing shook his official robe, looked at the carpenter, and said:
"But glass windows are different. Nowadays, most people in Tianjin and Shandong are wealthy. Who doesn't have tens of taels of savings? I went to Shandong some time ago and saw that the poorest farmers had knocked down their adobe houses and started to build bricks and tiles.
House. Since these farmers have money to build houses made of bricks and tiles, they can afford brother’s glass windows.”
"Based on one person per room and two square meters of windows in each room, each person would have to spend six cents on windows. Shandong and Tianjin have a population of 13 million, plus Liaodong's 1,000 people.
Four million people, each spending six pieces of silver to buy a window, this is"
Li Xing did the math and said, "This is a big deal of 8.4 million taels of silver!"
"This is just a business within the eldest brother's territory. If the benefits of glass windows are understood by people from other provinces, and wealthy households from North Zhili, Shanxi and even Jiangnan come to buy them, it will be a business worth tens of millions of taels."
"This kind of business cannot be compared with glass wine vessels. For this kind of business, you can give up hundreds of thousands of taels of glass wine vessels."
After hearing Li Xing's analysis, Jiang Chong and the surrounding carpenters looked as if they had seen the light of day. They finally understood why Jin Guogong sold the glass so cheaply.
Jiang Chong humbly raised his hands and said: "Listening to the second general's words is worth ten years of reading!"
Li Xing turned around and looked at the carpenter beside him.
The carpenter knew what he was doing, and he raised his hand to Li Xing and said, "The second general is really well-informed! Compared with ordinary people, they are really ignorant!"
Li Xing became happy and finally found the airs of a dignified governor. He patted Jiang Chong on the shoulder and laughed.
Seeing that it was almost time, Li Xing said goodbye to Jiang Chong and went back to the Yamen.
The carpenters continued to be busy, and it didn't take long for the glass windows of the city hall to be installed. The glass windows introduced sunlight into the hall from the window, making the originally dark and gloomy city hall very bright.
Where had those Tianjin people who came in to do business seen such a bright indoor environment? Everyone looked at the transparent glass and were dumbfounded. Many people stood by the glass window and poked their heads, wanting to touch the completely transparent glass, but they did not dare to touch it.
A "guide" specially set up in the city hall lost no time and walked up to introduce to the people that this was Jin Guogong's new product "glass window".
The key point is to let the people know that this glass window only costs three cents per side, and the price is absolutely cheap.
So the demand for a large number of glass windows immediately appeared. Many people who had finished their work went straight to the glass window shop in Tianjin Acropolis as soon as they walked out of the city hall.
