Chapter 28: Ch 19 It doesn't SHIT!Chapter Text
White Harbor, despite being known as the smallest among the five cities to the people of Westeros, remained the most significant settlement north of the Neck. However, unlike King's Landing, the frigid climate of the North ensured that the city never had to contend with unpleasant odors no matter how much its population increased.
The city of White Harbor was situated on the River White Knife's eastern coastline where it meets the Bite. It is a clean and well-ordered City, with wide straight cobbled streets that make it easy to walk around. The houses are built of whitewashed stone, with steeply-pitched roofs of dark grey slate.
Located on the central street, just a stone's throw away from the famous Fishfoot fountain of Harbor, was a modest two-story building. Although the building's owner, an elderly merchant, had recently passed away, he was able to fulfill his wife's final wish by arranging the marriage of his daughter, Danny, to Rogar, the son of his dear friend Sam, who was also a merchant from Wintertown.
The two-story building boasted a store on the ground floor, similar to the nearby buildings, while the upstairs area served as a living space. Danny was primarily responsible for managing the store, which mainly sold various types of food supplies suitable for long voyages. Given its strategic location in the biggest port in the North, the store was thriving and enjoyed a steady flow of customers.
Following the death of Danny's father, she and her husband Rogar resided in the building alone until a few weeks ago, when Roger's father, Sam, arrived from Wintertown to work and moved in with them.
The morning was still young, and the street lay deserted as Danny worked away in the kitchen, preparing breakfast. She glanced up when she heard footsteps and spotted her father-in-law emerging, dressed in his work clothes.
"Good morning, Danny," Sam greeted her with a warm smile, "Has Rogar already left?"
"Yes, he departed in a hurry since his ship is leaving for King's Landing tomorrow," Danny replied, returning to kneading the dough. She looked up again as Sam approached the door. "Where are you headed, Father? Breakfast is almost ready."
"I'm already running late, and there's a shipment due to arrive today," Sam explained apologetically. "Don't worry about wasting any food; I'll be back for lunch." Without waiting for a response, he closed the door behind him and hastened off to his destination.
As Sam scurried along the path, jostling through the throngs of early risers heading to their jobs, he found himself reminiscing about the day his fortunes had taken a turn for the better. It was a vivid memory, etched into his mind like a clear blue sky. At that time, he had been a little concerned about his younger daughter Becca, who was unruly and showed no interest in learning.
When Becca expressed a desire to learn from Jon, Lord Stark's son, he readily agreed and even paid a handsome fee to Jon, who was still a young boy at the time. His primary motivation, Of course, had been to establish a connection with his liege lord, Lord Stark, at that time as any true Northener would attest to the value of any connection to the Starks, no matter how tenuous.
But little had Sam known that this decision would become one of the best ones of his life and would ultimately pay immense dividends in the future.
Jon Snow had managed to create an exceptional invention, the Starkhorse, which served as an excellent alternative to horses in large cities while being much cheaper. Although it could not replace horses used by armies, knights, Lords, and the like, it was an ideal option for smallfolks who needed to travel within the city or move small items quickly.
When Jon offered him the opportunity to oversee the day-to-day operations of his Starkhorse business, he readily accepted the offer, recognizing the immense profit potential it presented. He had only been in town for two months since arriving from Wintertown, and he had already been sold out of stock five times. Fortunately, Jon always anticipated the demand and sent more stock than before.
At this moment, a new batch of freshly made Starkhorses was on its way to White Knife from Winterfell, and he needed to be there to ensure that everything went smoothly. He couldn't afford any mishaps, and he was determined to make the most of this opportunity.
As he made his way towards his destination, he spotted a commotion in the middle of a four-way street. As he approached, the clamor emanating from the crowd quickly revealed what was happening.
"Step right up! Witness the wonder of the North! Behold the Starkhorse!" a young teenager hollered enthusiastically, beckoning all onlookers to gather around.
Despite it having been over two months since these promotions began, the sight of people flocking to see the Starkhorse remained awe-inspiring. After all, such novelties were a rarity in the North.
The teenage promoter was putting on quite the performance, leaping and shouting dramatically in an attempt to convince the crowd of the benefits of purchasing a Starkhorse. The assembled crowd was entranced, listening with bated breath.
Abruptly, a middle-aged man muscled his way to the front of the crowd and shouted a question towards the young promoter. "Why the F*ck should I buy this...this...thing instead of a normal horse? At least a horse can walk on its own," he grumbled
"Good question!" the teen beamed, "Tell me then, Old Man, Does a horse need to eat,"
"Oh course it does," The man retorted, "What kind of horse doesn't need that,"
"Well, This one doesn't need any kind of feed at all," The teen waved his hand over the Starkhorse standing perched on a pedestal, "Now, tell me can a horse die? Can it fall sick? Can it easily get injured? Can it easily break a leg?"
"Y-Yes,"
"Ah, but this one cannot," the teen exclaimed triumphantly. "So you can purchase it without hesitation. And you want to know the cherry on top..." The teen said dramatically to the crowd, "It doesn't Shit! So no more waking up in the morning early to clean new shit every day," the crowd supplied the teen's enthusiasm with raucous cheers.
"So tell me, People of The North," The teen yelled as soon as the clamor had died down, "Is a horse better or a Starkhorse,"
"STARKHORSE!" The crowd chanted excitedly.
"And, as an added bonus, a Starkhorse is FIVE times less expensive than a horse," the teen pivoted to face the middle-aged man. "So, are you now ready to make a purchase?"
The man hesitated for a few moments before he said, "Ah! F*ck it! I'll buy one then," he announced, making his way toward the back of the teenage promoter. There, rows of Starkhorses were on display, with a man seated at a table taking payments and distributing Starkhorses.
Observing the man making a purchase, a dozen other hesitant individuals were tempted, and soon followed suit, clamoring to acquire their very own Starkhorses.
After observing the commotion for a few more moments, Sam decided to move away from the crowd and continue on his journey. He had seen this kind of marketing ploy more times than he could count and knew that it was all staged. In fact, he knew that it was a marketing idea sent by Jon himself. But there was no denying that it was working wonders for the sales of Starkhorses.
The person who had posed the question was actually a worker under their employ, so there was little to no cost involved in the promotion. The concept was simply brilliant and played on the psychology of people, boosting sales by more than three times.
Every few days when the sales hit a plateau in an area, they would move to another part of town and start anew, with a different worker, asking similar questions, maybe they will change the order now and then to keep things interesting.
Jon had estimated that it would take approximately two years to reach most of the city's population that could afford a Starkhorse. However, with the way demand was increasing day by day, Sam was confident that they would meet the city's demand a lot sooner than anticipated.
After which they would start looking for markets in other cities in Westeros and maybe even in Essos. But at the moment they were not letting even a single Starkhorse move out of the city as much as they could, even though a lot of merchants had come to them with great offers after seeing the potential it had.
But Jon didn't want to move out of North before they completed White Harbor's demand completely and another thing was that every new batch of Starkhorse had one or two improvements that made it better. So he wanted to make sure that they were safe and perfect during what he called a "Trial Run" since if any problem arose in the North it could be solved easily with the Stark name which would be hard to do somewhere else.
Of all the sales that happened, Sam knew that the Manderlys took about 20% of the profit. And this generous amount was due to Lord Stark being the one who was negotiating on behalf of Jon, for if he himself had done it, things would have gone a lot differently. Because he understood that for the likes of Lord Manderly, doing a favor to their liege lord was a lot more valuable to them than anything he could earn from this.
And the Manderlys provide many things in return for their cut of profit things like protection, a warehouse to store their products, and the like. While all the people working had been hired by Sam on Jon's behalf the warehouses on the other hand a place to dock, as well as ships that ferry their product from Winterfell to Whiteharbour, were provided by the Manderlys.
Sam arrived at the inner port where the eastern shore of the river White Knife ended, to find three ships filled to the brim with a new shipment of Starkhorses. They had been transported straight out of the Factory on the bank of the other end of White Knife near Winterfell.
He hastened to the pier, relieved to find the unloading process already underway. As he had anticipated, the number of Starkhorses was greater than the last shipment.
At the start when the sales took off and the stock in Whiteharbor started to empty a lot faster than Sam anticipated, he was a bit worried that the supply would not be able to keep up with the demand.
But it seemed that Jon had taken that into account too because slowly but surely he was upping the pace at which he produced Starkhorse and Sam even heard that Jon was already planning a new factory just beside the old one.
Sam diligently worked from morning till noon, overseeing the stocktaking and ensuring the workers weren't slacking off and that no one was trying to do anything sneaky. The process was completed without any hiccups, and the new stock was safely deposited in the Warehouse. Sam's stomach growled with hunger as he hurriedly made his way back home.
He relished his meal heartily, savoring the satisfaction of eating well after a few hours of hard work. As he finished his lunch and got ready to head back to work, a teenage boy suddenly appeared, sprinting towards him at full speed. Sam halted in his tracks, recognizing the boy.
"Mr Sam," the teen panted, coming to a stop in front of him, "The first mate is calling for you urgently,"
"Why? What's happened?" Sam asked with a hint of concern in his voice as he hurried towards the outer port, where his son's ship was likely still docked.
"I don't know," replied the teen, his pace quickening to keep up with Sam's.
As they arrived at the bustling port, the noise of ships unloading and loading goods filled their ears. Pushing their way through the throng of people, they finally reached their destination ship, where Rogar was impatiently waiting for his father.
"Rogar," Sam said, "What happened? Your aide said that it was urgent?"
"Father, do you remember when you told me to keep an eye out for anyone selling ships?" Rogar asked, a smile spreading across his face.
"Yes, I do," Sam said with anticipation, "Why? Did you find a good deal?"
"Yes, I did," Rogar nodded happily, "Do you remember Ron, the wealthy merchant from King's Landing?"
"Yes, the one who used to trade in fruits and olives,"
"His fleet was struck by a severe storm," Rogar explained with animated gestures. "He lost a significant amount of cargo and a few ships. As a result, he needs to sell three ships he can't afford to keep right now to raise cash."
"Really," Sam said, his excitement building.
"Yes, I think he will be willing to sell them at a huge loss if you were able to pay him upfront," Rogar said before he asked worriedly, "Would you be able to procure that kind of gold in time,"
"Oh Don't worry about that," Sam waved his son's worries away with a smile, "I have been waiting for an opportunity like this for a long time. Before that, Did you see the condition of those ships? Are they in good condition?"
This was another crucial task Jon had asked him to do, he wanted him to acquire affordable ships and assemble a fleet of at least five fully crewed vessels with trustworthy sailors over the next two years. So that when they eventually started shipping to other cities, they didn't have to look for other merchants and could have a Shipping company of their own.
"Yes, I looked through all three ships closely before calling for you," Rogar nodded seriously, "All three were barely damaged in the storm and would be good as new after a few repairs,"
As they walked towards the merchant's home to negotiate the ship's price, they discussed a few more things. However, Sam noticed a frown on his son's face and asked, "Is something bothering you, son?"
Rogar hesitated before replying, "It's nothing serious. It's just that I have a couple of friends who used to work as crew members on those ships. Now that the ships are being sold, they'll be out of work. They have families to support, and I'm worried about them."
Rogar sighed and shook his head. "They're good northerners, and they'll have a hard time finding work. They'll probably have to start from scratch somewhere else and be paid far less than what they were earning before."
Sam's face lit up with realization. "Why didn't you tell me earlier? That's not a problem at all. In fact, it's good news. I was worried about the time it would take to hire a completely new crew for the ships, but now we can just hire them."
"Are you sure about that?" Rogar asked.
"Absolutely," Sam replied confidently. "We can hire as many of the previous crew members as want to stay on board. It's a win-win situation."
He was excited at getting one pleasing news after another and knew that when Frost arrived next week with Jon's letter he would be writing a good long reply filled with the good news that would be sure to get his spirits high.