When Simon stepped into his apartment and hugged his new girlfriend the stress of the last few months seemed nonexistent. Today he just planned to cook with Sarah and spent an enjoyable evening at home.
When he first returned to New York he truly believed he would just work and fight for Atari and his other businesses in the next few decades. But in the last few months he learned that he still needed to include proper rest into his life.
Letting his subordinates manage his companies and take charge of the logistic and supply chain problems relieved him of a heavy burden and he could just use his mind on the creative and strategic tasks.
Furthermore, strengthening his bond with Sarah truly relieved him of some mental stress. The young girl was nowhere near a spoiled New Yorker princess like she could have been, but sincerely cared for him, he could feel it every day.
Just laying his head down on her thighs and cuddling together on the sofa in front of the large glass windows and looking into the night sky of New York was such a wholesome feeling for him.
"Sarah, would you like to visit Europe in the next few weeks? I just had a few meetings at Red Bull and Atari in the last week and everything is taken care of for now."
The young lady of the Harisson family was quite surprised by this suggestion, as she knew her boyfriend was extremely serious about his work and companies. Him suggesting going on a longer vacation right after his companies started to succeed was rather odd to her.
"Are you sure Simon? I don't want you to just take a vacation for me. If you need to stay in New York, I will gladly accompany you. Don't worry about me."
Even though Simon was quite touched by her considerations he still insisted.
"It's not just taking a vacation. I have a goal in Italy I would like to achieve, and taking a vacation will just help fill up my creative energy. If I can come up with new ideas after the vacation my managers and our families would gladly send us on the flight to Italy themselves."
When Sarah realized she could go on vacation in Italy for a few weeks and really enjoy the Mediterranean sun with her lover and not hamper his career for it she got truly enthusiastic and started planning her vacation goals. Simon gave some suggestions from time to time as he was already quite familiar with Italy due to his art courses and his visits of famous Italian museums.
The next day Simon communicated his plans with his management team and his family, and both were completely fine with his ideas.
Caroline insisted he would stay for another week and give some more feedback and ideas for the further development of Red Bull, which he of course did. After describing his intentions for the acquisitions of the Chicago Bulls and the future marketing campaign using the Red Bull of Chicago as a brand to further increase the hype around the Red Bull beverage Caroline invested some capable assistants into looking into the Chicago Bulls.
After some initial results she was not that hyped anymore. The team was founded on January 16, 1966, and played its first game during the 1966–67 NBA season. In their first season, the Bulls played their home games at the International Amphitheatre, before moving to Chicago Stadium.
Fan interest was diminishing after four seasons, with one game in the 1967–68 season having an official attendance of 891 and some games being played in Kansas City.
In summary, the current Chicago Bulls seemed nothing like a team worth supporting for Red Bull. But Simon insisted and described the current situation with Atari and the Los Angeles Lakers. If you truly want to be accepted by the sports entertainment circle you need to build up achievements by yourself and not just smash money to join it, because nobody likes people that simply trade money with achievements, especially in sports.
After finally convincing his sister of the plan for the future, Simon and Sarah booked a private flight to Italy on January 27th 1971. Their destination was a city famous for it's food in the northern part of Italy, Bologna.
Bologna was further known for it's art. The first contemporary art fair in Italy would be launched in Bologna in 1974, at the end of what can be called the first wave of fairs.
Bolognas biggest landmarks (figuratively and literally) are the towers Torre Asinelli and Torre Garisenda. These towers built by two rich medieval merchant families fulfilled defence, living and prestige purposes, and are among the very few still standing today of erstwhile around 150 such towers.
At night, Bologna's rich bar and restaurant culture is especially popular among the city's student population. Streets like Via Zamboni, Via del Pratello, Via delle Moline or Via Mascarella host a great number of pubs and bars, that attract big crowds and make for a lively late night atmosphere in and around them.
Of course, Simon didn't just visit Bologna to enjoy great food and the art atmosphere of Bologna and Italy in the early 1970s.
He had another goal to achieve. He wanted to complete an acquisition. A certain company, known for the luxurious designs in the future. A company worth roughly 11 billion US dollars in 2023 and famous around the world.
He knew this company would be sold in 1973 for a price of roughly 1,3 million dollars and enjoy a decade of losses and grief, before officially rising to greatness in the 1990s.
The company Simon was looking for was the famous automobile company Lamborghini.
In the early 70's this company was far from what it would become in the future under the leadership of the German car giant Audi.
For Simon this was an opportunity to invest in the manufacturing industry and the automobile industry. He knew how influential this industry would become in the next few decades and further change into the electric automobile industry of the future, but he certainly would not step into the big pitfall of the American manufacturing industry with its large labor unions.
The only automobile industry worth investing in would be Germany and Japan in the next few decades, but both of those countries protect their automobile industry from the influence of outside forces.