With the establishment of the Citizens' Committee, Liang Yao sounded the clarion call to fight back against Brannan and officially launched a counterattack.
Its restaurants, grocery stores, tool repairs, laundry and other businesses all moved into San Francisco at almost the same time.
At the same time, Liang Yao also published a message about the grand opening sale in the California Daily. All goods in all shops opened by Liang Yao in San Francisco will be sold at a 50% discount, and the promotion will last for a week.
This is undoubtedly great news for the vast number of gold prospectors in California.
Almost all gold mining companies and groups sent people to the new store in San Francisco early to purchase supplies. For a time, the four stores and more than a dozen stalls opened by Liang Yao in San Francis were surrounded by gold miners.
Cai Mingsheng had to temporarily vacate the guesthouse to serve as a temporary counter to sell gold panning tools.
Previously, Liang Yao did not sell gold mining tools in San Francisco in order to temporarily avoid Brannan's attention. Therefore, there were no counters or shops selling gold mining tools in San Francis, and he could only temporarily requisition the guesthouse.
Gold mining tools are Brannan's core business, and Liang Yao's intention to get involved in the sales of gold mining tools is also very obvious. He wants to squeeze out Brannan's big cake. In order to grab this piece of cake, Liang Yao took out all the gold mining tools that he had stored in the past four months and even used for himself.
Under Liang Yao's impact, Brannan's businesses in San Francisco, except for the brothel and casino, were almost deserted.
The reason why brothels and casinos were not affected was because Liang Yao did not have these two industries under his name.
The gold diggers were not stupid either. For the same product, Liang Yao's pricing was originally slightly lower than Brannan's. Now the price was cut in half during the grand opening sale, which was extremely tempting to them.
Gold diggers would rather wait in line all day at Liang Yao's shops and stalls than buy shops in Brannan's empty shops.
It had only been three days since Liang Yao's aggressive march into San Francisco, but Brannan's store owners were already getting restless and began to complain to Brannan, asking him to step in to save the situation.
Brannan, who was once high-spirited, began to look a little haggard. At the age of thirty, several of his hairs turned white overnight. This was the first time since he became the richest man in California that he felt confused and helpless.
Liang Yao hit him hard and caught him off guard.
"Get out! Get out! You annoying bastards! Useless guys! I need to be alone for a while!"
Brannan had hired gunmen to drive the noisy shopkeepers out of the manor. He was in a state of confusion and needed to calm down.
Brannan covered his face with his hands and rubbed his sore eyes.
The fact that his market share in San Francisco was taken away by Liang Yao was secondary. This was not the most difficult thing for him to accept right now.
Instead, Liang Yao actually bought the land from those early immigrants before him.
Brannan owes much of his success to his unique vision, always being one step ahead of others in spotting business opportunities. This is the first time since the gold rush that someone has spotted a huge business opportunity before him.
Brannan regretted very much that he had not taken this potential competitor seriously earlier and nipped him in the bud. However, Liang Yao was already grown strong now and it was too late to think about it.
After calming down, Brannan analyzed the strengths and weaknesses of himself and his opponent.
There is no doubt that Brannan's biggest advantage is that he has more financial resources than Liang Yao.
Liang Yao purchased a large amount of land. Although Brannan didn't know how much Liang Yao paid for these lands, he was sure that Liang Yao's cash flow must be very tight now.
Maintaining existing industries, rebuilding Sacramento, and seizing the San Francisco market would all require huge cash flows.
Liang Yao, aren't you going to start a price war with me to seize my market?
Okay, I'll fight with you! Let's see who will have the last laugh. Brannan was determined to fight to the death. As long as he won this business competition, he could force Liang Yao to surrender. Then, he would be able to take the coveted land in Liang Yao's hands.
While you are engaging in a price war with me, you are also building a commercial street in San Francisco. Liang Yao, Liang Yao, you are such an annoying guy, you are so conceited that you don't even know your own weight.
"Third brother, Brannan has also lowered the price!"
Deng Wenshun rode his horse as fast as he could from San Francisco back to Sacramento, informed Liang Yao of the news, and handed him a list of the latest commodity prices.
Liang Yao looked at Brannan's pricing. Each item was slightly lower than his selling price. It was obvious that Brannan's price cut was a response to his entry into the San Francisco market.
"Brannan finally took the bait."
Liang Yao was neither annoyed nor angry when he heard the news, but rather felt somewhat happy.
He was afraid that Brannan would not accept the offer!
Now that Brannan had fallen into the trap, the next thing would be much easier. He would just have to start a price war with Brannan and drain Brannan's wealth bit by bit.
Of course, this would be a move of killing one thousand enemies and losing eight hundred of his own men, and he would also have to suffer huge economic losses.
"The horseshoes are almost worn out. Go to my house and get a good horse. Take this letter to San Francisco and give it to Uncle Cai. Tell him to do it according to the instructions. If there are similar things in the future, there is no need to report back to Sacramento. If he lowers the price, we will follow suit. Remember, our price must always be lower than Brannan's."
Liang Yao put away the pen, blew on the wet ink on the letter, then put it into an envelope and handed it to Deng Wenshun.
Jones could now understand a little Chinese. After learning that Liang Yao was going to engage in a price war with Brannan, he stepped forward to persuade him.
"Boss, I have to remind you that our funds are very tight right now. Although you have borrowed 5,300 ounces of gold from Sutter and Boston Company, we only have 7,200 ounces of gold in stock right now.
Our daily expenses are staggering. The construction of San Francisco Commercial Street requires 367 ounces of gold in labor costs and 215 ounces of gold in building materials costs every day. Maintaining the operation of existing industries requires 530 ounces of gold every day.
As for the salary of your guards, you need to pay 45 ounces of gold every day. Of course, the salary of the guards is paid monthly, so you don't have to worry about it this month.
However, we need to pay one cent interest every month for the loan from Mr. Sutter and the Boston Company, which is also a considerable amount.
The current pricing of our products is just enough to cover our costs. If you insist on lowering the price, we will inevitably bear losses. In a week, we will face the risk of a broken capital chain, and you will most likely go bankrupt at that time.
Maybe the situation is not so bad, you still have land, which is a considerable fortune."
"Okay, okay, give me the report."
Liang Yao impatiently interrupted Sven who was showing off his knowledge. He held his pipe in his mouth and checked the data on the report.
In order to fight the business war with Brannan, all of its businesses except the laundry will be in a loss-making state and will not make any profit.
The laundry room can contribute 45 ounces of gold revenue every day. The mine currently produces about 200 ounces of gold per day. This relatively stable income is only enough to cover the cost of building materials.
Jones was right. If he continued like this, his funding chain would be broken in a week.
As for the land Jones mentioned, he would never sell it. He would keep it even if he went bankrupt. Even if it came to the last resort, he would not touch it.
"Brannan's financial resources are far stronger than yours. It is not difficult for Brannan to survive a week. If you want to engage in a price war with Brannan, I hope you can think twice before doing so." Jones reminded.