Tsou custom house
Started in 475BK, the famous Tsou Custom House brand is now spread through Asirania, and beyond.
Originally started as an outlet in Old Tsou City, to sell seized merchandize(for non-payment of taxes, bankruptcy, criminal proceeds, etc.), during a typhoon affecting most of the islands nations of Asirania, which left many homeless for an extended period, then-Cat Princess Laramir Tsimori, made the unprecedented then move, to keep the stores open, and to dedicate their proceeds for the duration of the emergency, to those homeless. When the stores were shuttered, at the end of the emergency 180 000 Tsou Dawn(now eighty-million Kagomine Sum, accounting for inflation) had been gathered and given to caritative initiatives across the continent, from Yamagand, Kagomine, Abendeen and even northernmost Goguryeo.
The store was shuttered, but not forgotten, and 16 months later, reopened, dedicated this time to caritative initiatives inside Tsou. This led to much popularity for Princess Tsimori who ascended the throne to near-unanimous acclaim a few months later.
For decades thereafter, other countries affected by the disaster would see the odd blip in tourism. Those who had received aid from the store would make a pilgrimage, seeking to understand those who aided them, and to reconnect, even in the most cursory manner, with those that had changed their lives for the better. Sometimes sparing the victim homelessness, famine, or debtor's court.
The most popular item then was a small type of cat statue, designed in honor of the cat princess' favourite cat: Niko.
Noticing this, Princess Tsimori, now in her fities, and crafty, sought to help her balance of payments. Noticing both the tourism, and the goodwill generated by the stores, she opened a single store, in her embassy in Megamisama, calling it 'the Tsou Custom House', it offered 'duty-free' goods at cut-rate prices and was so wildly successful, other stores joined in in New Tsou City, Abendeen, Yamagand, Lavali City, Garay, Sook Zenith and Mint, then-capital of the Primarchate of Goguryeo.
Tsou custom house products are now a sizeable part of Tsou's balance of payments, and a multi-digit share of Tsou's GDP. Over time, they've spread over all the other continents, and indeed, few city below a hundred thousand inhabitants does't boast at least one shop bearing the logo, or have a few commerces sharing a space, one of which has the logo.
In the thirteen centuries since, Tsou Customs House products included not only Tsou products, but also Gogur, Moniqan, Kagomine, Abend, Yamagand, Laidanese and Pinay merchandise, often exporting it as far as the Handi's prefectures, the Saami Things, and New Etruscan and New Lollandese territories.
The original shop, however, still stands, and is poised to celebrate a thirteenth century by 825AK. Visitors to Old Tsou City still abound, despite the smell of fish, and the small, cramped ex-castle still peddles cat statues shaped after Niko, dried goldfish treats for the cat-and-otter-owners in the crowd, and serviceable linen black clothes for the minimalist.
"Oh, my."
"I'm sorry?"
"That Tsou Custom House, across the street, really? Across from the Mei Palace?"
"It's the second oldest, older than the palace, by nearly five centuries."
"Just how old is this palace?"
"780 years, give or take."
"And the shop?"
"1290. I am too young to remember the twelve-century party, but I hear it was quite the thing."
"What, that thing is 12 centuries?"
"It is Kagomine granite battlements, not betting against it reaching twenty."
"But it's so tiny!"
"It's only a decade or so younger than the one in Old Tsou City. "
"Amazing! That was the very first, and the most memorable."
"This one is the site of the Megamisama city riots."
"What happened?"
"When war was declared betwen Tsou and Kagomei, some of the poor classes rioted to keep access to cheap goods. Obviously, the Tsou could not supply those while we were at war with them, but a piece of the population thought the war an excuse to jack up prices, and rioted. Then-Meihomei had to nationalize the store and freeze prices just to get everyone to return to work."
"Strictly, you never even returned the store to Tsou ownership, though." There it is, this wasn't a social call, Amarat thought.
"We've allowed a share of the profits to be returned to Tsou ownership."
"But not the entire profit."
Amarat started sweating and swore in his own mind. That was three-hundred million sums, of pure profit, he knew, and those profits had done more to keep the cold war with Tsou going than actual warship shots fired. "It is impolitic in Kagomei to mention those."
"I'm sorry, but I can hardly ignore them, when they'd move Tsou's ranking from #15 to #14 on the Gubba-12."
"Their lack would probably prevent Kagomei from entering that august body, surely, you can hardly expect them for free?"
"Well it was our idea, I'm sure we can make a case for the intellectual property."
"I insist we buy the name off you then, for use inside Kagomei, if not for the intellectual property, it's hardly useful."
"Hmm, I do not have instructions on that."
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