Ding Yun had no choice. Her original land and manpower were very limited, and the State of Zhou itself was sparsely populated. The largest landowners and slave owners remaining were her son, King Jing of Zhou.
Ding Yun did not want to take land and people from her son.
She couldn't possibly seize land from commoners.
For now, her development was inseparable from land and population. Until Luoyang could become a financial and trade center that attracted a large population, she could only make her own son suffer a little.
Besides, Ding Yun wasn't taking it for free!
She was paying for it!
Once the entire Luoyang developed into a commercial and trade center, and merchants brought various goods to sell here before buying things to take back and sell, Ding Yun would no longer need to "plunder" her son's land and slaves.
Firstly, she could outsource industries that required a lot of land and directly purchase the corresponding products. Secondly, with the development of commerce, as long as Ding Yun showed a desire for more labor, there would naturally be people to sell labor.
This would form a relatively balanced supply and demand relationship.
It couldn't be done now, mainly because Luoyang hadn't developed yet. She had no place to buy things. No one specifically transported large quantities of slaves to sell, and ordinary citizens were unwilling to accept employment.
Because the current situation was that large nobles mostly used slaves for labor, and when Ding Yun spoke of employment, ordinary citizens didn't believe her. They were even worried that she would turn them into slaves through employment. Such ingrained notions couldn't be changed overnight, so she could only use slaves for now.
Compared to ordinary citizens, slaves were easier to satisfy. As long as they had food and shelter, they would be loyal.
As Ding Yun successfully acquired a certain amount of land and slaves from her son, she immediately began to expand production and increase the number of people guarding her property.
This was another way of cultivating her own private army.
Without sufficient armed forces, Ding Yun could not feel at ease. After all, if she hadn't been wary of those nobles and made thorough preparations, her workshops and workers would have faced a great crisis.
Even though the workshops didn't have any secret recipes.
But if something really happened, wouldn't it be very troublesome?
Afterward, there was a long period of development for Ding Yun and the dissemination and fermentation of refined salt, soap, and other goods.
Except for a small number of more reserved nobles who simply purchased some for their own use, the remaining majority of nobles and merchants purchased products in large quantities from Ding Yun's four shops and then transported them out to sell. Among these, refined salt and other seasonings, as well as soap and other daily chemical products, had the highest sales. Next were writing brushes, ink, paper, and inkstones, as well as glass products. The worst-selling item was toilet paper.
People seemed rather ashamed to mention this item.
Coupled with factors such as low prices and high transportation costs, the poor sales were also reasonable.
However, even with poor sales, it wasn't that they couldn't sell any. Some were still sold, and these goods, transported by merchants controlled by various nobles and merchants, rapidly spread outwards from Luoyang as the center, and from the State of Zhou as the center, to other neighboring countries.
And quickly caused a rush to buy.
It could be said that wherever the goods were sold, they caused a wave of discussion. Then, some nobles simply bought the goods to enjoy, while others deeply investigated the source of the goods and sent their subordinates to personally go to the capital of the State of Zhou, Luoyang, to purchase them and join the ranks of selling these goods.
When the news spread to all the states, and the goods were sold to all the states, caravans heading to Luoyang for procurement were already arriving one after another.
Most importantly, Ding Yun was constantly introducing new products, which further attracted more merchants. Those merchants naturally wouldn't want to come empty-handed. After all, since they were already here, wouldn't it be a waste not to bring something back? Thus, a new commercial, financial, and trade center was slowly taking shape.
As long as Ding Yun could maintain the unique characteristic of "having what others don't, and excelling where others have," Luoyang would undoubtedly become more and more prosperous, developing to the fullest utilization of land, expanding the city to its maximum, and using the resources of the surrounding countries to support this city and make it grow stronger.
Of course, this was just a future goal. For now, Luoyang was only just starting to gain some popularity and assets. Da Feng Novel Network.
Ding Yun had only just revealed her need for labor.
And her need for grain and various other supplies.
The real large-scale development would have to wait until those merchants brought enough labor and grain, otherwise, there wouldn't even be enough manpower to repair the royal palace, let alone repair the entire Luoyang city, or even expand it. In short, she couldn't rush it; it was a long and arduous journey.
...
State of Qi, Capital HD.
Since merchants had transported refined salt back to the State of Qi for sale, the court of the State of Qi began to debate this issue. They debated whether the refining process for refined salt could be imitated, and where the State of Zhou actually obtained this refined salt.
Should they stop supplying ordinary salt to the State of Zhou from now on, and should they appropriately lower the price of green salt?
The salt industry was too important to the State of Qi. The annual revenue from salt accounted for over 30% of Qi's total income. If this portion of income were lost, all aspects of the State of Qi would be affected, and their disaster relief capabilities would be weakened.
Therefore, the debate ended with...
The State of Qi decided to adopt a three-pronged approach.
First, they ordered people to research how to imitate refined salt. Second, they dispatched personnel to the State of Zhou to investigate the situation and, most importantly, to obtain the secret recipe for refined salt. Third, they decided to lower the price of green salt.
There was no other way. In the past, green salt was mainly sold as a high-quality salt to the nobles of various countries, so its price was naturally not too low. But with the advent of refined salt, everyone started buying refined salt. Any noble who could afford to buy refined salt was basically unwilling to buy their green salt anymore.
At most, they would buy a little for brushing their teeth and cleaning their mouths.
If the price wasn't lowered, the remaining stock of green salt in the country would likely be left unsold. Whether they would continue to produce green salt in the future would depend on how many people bought it. If too few people bought it and the profit was too low, it would be better to cut the entire production line and only sell coarse salt.
At least coarse salt could follow the path of small profits and quick turnover.
Of course, the attitudes of other major salt-producing countries were basically similar to those of the State of Qi. They paid more attention to the refined salt sold by Ding Yun and constantly dispatched personnel to Luoyang, the capital of the State of Zhou, to try to investigate and figure out the secret recipe for refined salt.
As for the secret recipes for other items, they were secondary, and it would be fine if they could be obtained, but it wouldn't matter if they couldn't, because salt was truly too important. In any of the vassal states, edible salt was a strategic material.
There was no ruler with some ability.
Who could ignore the importance of edible salt?
Finally, Ding Yun was annoyed by them, so she simply held an auction and auctioned off the secret recipe for purifying ordinary coarse salt into refined salt. Then, she imposed purchase limits on the edible salt sold in her shops, allowing only citizens of the State of Zhou to purchase it, with a limit of one jin per household per month. She simply stopped competing for this profit, and her workshop finally had some peace.
She had, in a way, exchanged refined salt for a period of peaceful development.