The Rise of the European Emperor

In fact, what Marin thought was a bit simple. Although it is said that the total sales of wine in Europe every year is as high as tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of gold coins. However, the most important sales, or poor quality wine.

Marin uses glycerin to remove the astringency of the wine, which improves the taste and increases the price. But the problem is, it's useless for you to get so many mid-to-high-end wines with good taste. Because the spending power of ordinary people is there, if you make too much good wine, it will be difficult to sell.

Probably only some people, who belong to the kind of little nobles, rich people and middle-level priests who can’t afford high-end wines but can afford mid-range wines, pay attention to taste, and don’t like astringent taste, will favor this glycerin-improved taste Mid-range wines.

Therefore, the consumers of this glycerin wine with improved taste are limited, and it is impossible to say that you can sell as many barrels as you want. Because, most people can't afford...

Of course, because the wine consumer group in Europe is too large. Even if only some people are willing to consume glycerin wine, it is still a huge market. but,. The sales will not reach tens of millions, probably in the millions. And this number, for Marin, is also a huge profit. However, Marin didn't know it right now, but happily organized the purchase of inferior French wines, and then processed them into mid-range wines in order to reap huge profits. Marin will not realize the problem until there are too many mid-range wines that are unsalable.

Of course, Marin didn't lose. After all, the cost of bad wine is too low, and glycerin is also a free by-product of soap production, which costs nothing. Later, Marin digested the unsalable mid-range wine at a preferential price within the Beihai State Church...

The Church of the North Sea State is a very special existence. Relying on the close relationship with the Pope, Marin annexed the Bishop of Münster, the Bishop of Bremen and the Bishop of Osnabrück, and took away most of the church. land. Ordinarily, the Beihai State Church should be poor.

However, in order to appease the church, Marin provided them with a large amount of fertilizer, which increased the output of the church's land from about 100 pounds per mu to 400 pounds per mu, and the income was nearly four times that of the previous one. Therefore, although the land has decreased, the church has become more prosperous. Don't underestimate the increase in yield per mu. In addition to increasing output, it does not increase manpower, and the benefits are huge. The reason is very simple. In the past, the yield per mu was 100 pounds, but half of it was used to feed the serfs and meet various expenses. The real amount that went to the church was only about 50 pounds. And if the yield per mu is 400 pounds, a full 300 pounds or more will go to the church, which is more than six times the previous amount. Of course, because fertilizers also have costs, the income per mu is about five times that of before. But it's also amazing. Therefore, even if there is less land, the church will benefit a lot, even more than before. Therefore, church members in Beihai State are generally richer. The consumption power of mid-range wine is also relatively strong.

It's just that Marin overlooked a problem-in this era, Europeans drink wine as water, not as luxury consumption.

Therefore, the nobles and the middle and high-level people in the church will drink medium and high-end wines for a long time in order to keep the style. However, it is difficult for the low-level priests to drink expensive wine for a long time.

Take the mid-range wine as an example, it is 20 shillings per gallon, which is 240 pence (Finney), and the price is 60 times that of the low-end wine. Divided into mugs per pint, that's eight mugs. The average price of a large glass is as high as 30 pfennigs, which is almost 15 days' income of ordinary people!

What is this concept? It is equivalent to people in later generations who spend 1,500 yuan to buy a large glass of red wine! How can ordinary people afford to drink this shit? Even if you can afford to drink, it means that you are willing to drink a cup only after many days. If you drink it every day... even ordinary small bosses can't bear it...

So, 20 shillings a gallon of mid-range wine is a watershed. Only nobles and middle-level priests can afford it, and many poor nobles and middle-level priests in poor parishes can't afford it either.

It's 6 shillings per gallon for low-to-middle quality wine, which is very popular among low-level nobles and priests.

This kind of wine is about 18 times the price of the lowest grade wine. The average pint costs 9 pfennigs, or 4.5 times the average person's wages.

Although this price is expensive, the nobles and priests gritted their teeth and accepted it. The main reason is that no matter how low the grade is, it will not match their status. Think about it, how shameless would a nobleman or a noble priest drink the same sour and inferior wine as a mud leg?

Of course, there are cheaper ones. Lower middle class wines. This kind of wine is the worst among mid-range wines, with a relatively strong astringency. But in low-grade wine, it is considered the best. This wine costs 2 shillings a gallon, or 3 pfennies a quart.

This price is equivalent to a day's salary of an ordinary apprentice or mercenary. Ordinary people are reluctant to drink it, but poor nobles and poor priests are willing to drink it. First of all, their economic situation is much better than ordinary people, and they can still afford to drink. This kind of people is almost equivalent to the middle class with an annual salary of 200,000 yuan, and their income is about five or six times that of ordinary people. It is still possible to spend a fraction of the income to buy this kind of wine.

The most important thing is that no matter how low-grade the wine is, it not only tastes extremely bitter and astringent, but also embarrassing. What the hell, in the ancient class society, consumption was also divided into classes. Wine below 2 shillings per gallon belongs to the "untouchable" class. If you drink that kind of wine, you will be despised by people of the same class.

The ancient European nobles paid special attention to the division of ranks and grades. Why did they desperately squeeze the serfs? Isn't it to maintain a decent expense?

Generally speaking, the annual expenditure of a knight family (a fief knight with a fief) is several hundred gold coins. Take wine as an example, even if you drink 3 pfennig per pint of wine. Generally, adult aristocrats drink 2 pints of middle and lower-grade wine every day, and 2 pints are 6 pfennigs, which is equivalent to one-tenth of a gold coin. Calculated as 3 adults, the whole family spends at least 110 gold coins on wine every year. This is still the worst grade. If you change it to the previous grade of 6 shillings per gallon, it will be 330 gold coins per year. If you change it to 20 shillings per gallon, it will cost thousands of gold coins!

This is only part of the cost. The nobles usually need to spend a lot of money to purchase expensive spices, luxurious clothes, spend a lot of money to raise horses, purchase and maintain weapons and armor... Therefore, a noble family spends thousands of gold coins a year. Not surprisingly. Only the down-and-out poor nobles would keep their annual expenses below 1,000 gold coins. For the sake of face, the general nobles also borrowed money to maintain a decent consumption. The most "outstanding" representative is probably Ulrich, Duke of Württemberg. This old man owed a huge sum of 1 million gold coins because of excessive consumption or even abnormal consumption. You know, the annual fiscal revenue of the Kingdom of France is only 1.2 million gold coins. Can you imagine an aristocrat owed a huge debt of 5/6 of the annual fiscal revenue of the most powerful country in Western Europe? According to the standards of later generations, France's fiscal revenue exceeds one trillion euros, five sixths, which is equivalent to hundreds of billions of euros! Old horses and old kings are far from having so much money, but Duke Ulrich dares to owe so much!

Of course, that's not how it works out. After all, this era is an agricultural era, and there is no industry with high output value. In addition, there is no general taxation in Europe. Only relying on the income of the royal family and commercial tax, everyone's income is not high. It was not until the late 17th century that Europe began to learn from the East and implement a general taxation system. Then, tax revenues in European countries skyrocketed, which also gave countries the capital to feed hundreds of thousands of troops and launch an all-out war.

...

To be honest, adding glycerin to wine mainly removes astringency, then makes the taste smoother, and adds a little sweetness. For the aroma in wine, glycerin does not play much role. Therefore, Marin can use glycerin to turn a bad wine into a mediocre wine, but he cannot turn a bad wine into a top wine. If you want to obtain high-end wine, you have to use mid-range wine with aroma but astringency, adding glycerin to neutralize the astringency but retain the aroma.

In later generations, according to EU standards, wine is not allowed to add glycerin. Of course, we are talking about fine wines. For the inferior wines produced in Huaxia in later generations, that is, a bottle of more than ten yuan, most of them were added.

But adding glycerin is also particular. Edible glycerin should be used instead of industrial glycerin. Industrial glycerin is chemically synthesized. For example, propylene produced by petroleum cracking is used as raw material to synthesize glycerin by chlorination. But the problem is that the glycerol produced by this synthetic method is not suitable for mixing into food because of the many chemical raw materials and toxic substances.

Edible glycerin is extracted by reacting animal fat with caustic soda. As long as you put less caustic soda and more animal fat, it is safe. Most of the chemically synthesized glycerin cannot be used as food glycerin.

In fact, later generations of high-end red wine itself contains glycerin. However, it is glycerin, which is naturally produced in the winemaking process, which is very precious and greatly improves the quality of wine. According to the standards of later generations, the glycerin content of dry red wine is about 1 to 10 grams per liter. The reason why high-end wine tastes good is actually because of the high glycerin content, which directly neutralizes the bitterness in the tannins. Therefore, the two most high-end wines have basically no bitterness, and the difference is only in aroma.

Marin uses glycerin to neutralize the bitterness of low-quality wines. Because of the lack of aroma, it must be mid-range wines. But people in this era are not very demanding. If you can drink wine without bitterness, it is considered high-end. So, there is still a certain market.

But as I said before, because of the poor economic level in Europe in this era, most people were poor. Therefore, the sales of high-end wines are limited, as are mid-range wines. Only nobles and priests in the middle and lower classes, as well as some businessmen, could afford to drink mid-range wines.

Therefore, even if Marin has mastered the skill of neutralizing the astringency of wine, there is no way for everyone to afford mid-range wine that is not cheap. Similarly, there is no way to let the great nobles and church leaders drink mid-range wines with insufficient aroma.

In the end, the share that Marin can win is a part of the mid-range wine market... After all, the wine market is also controlled by people, and they are not easy people. It is not so easy to snatch food from their mouths. So, it's not that simple, it's not that you can become the king if you have the technology. Just like the flintlock gun in France, it was suppressed by the matchlock gun for decades at the beginning, and it was finally widely accepted after it was carried forward by the Swedes...

If Marin wants to compete for the mid-range wine market, he will inevitably have to go through a fight to grab some share. And some shares may not be able to grab it...

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