Norwod Company

The Norwod Company, established in 230 BU in Wyeh, is the biggest transit company on Dain and holds vast majority of rights to transport sefia throughout the continent.

History

Before the Norwod Company was established, it was part of the Widel Mining Company. The Widel mines were famous as the sole source of sefia on the Dain market before the existence of Zea was discovered. In 234 BU, Karo Norwod married into the family of Henrich Menes, the owner of the mine and the local lord. Norwod, entrepreneur and chief of a sefia purifying workshop himself, did not agree with his father in law’s policy of restricting the sefia trade to Wyeh. Only small quantities trickled through the mountain passes to Erres, which Karo saw as a huge, missed opportunity. He slowly advanced in ranks to the person responsible for planning trade routes. The first caravans were a fiasco. The first sefia products were seen abroad as a small improvement over their mundane equivalents, and not worth their price. When Menes discovered that his son in law sent shipments to Erres and failed, he decided to cut his losses. While he would still allow Norwod to buy purified ore and merchandise, he would have to back off from local trade and try his luck in Erres.
Norwod and his fledgling company had trouble staying afloat, until the discovery of sefia being a universal additive was made. Suddenly, the Erres market was full of people attempting to mix in the magical substance into metal, mortar, and medicine. Instead of tools, Norwod focused on trading in pure ore, quickly building a network of contacts with trading hubs and nobles. For the next 200 years, this network would prove to be the basis of accumulating Norwod fortune. While the Norwods were able to outbuy most competitors and retained good trading relationship with the Wedel mines and surrounding purification plants, the Sadantes Coup and coming of the Unification War put a strain on sefia trade. In 22 BU, all sefia transit between countries was effectively stopped and while smuggling small amounts was not impossible, it was barely profitable. It wasn’t until 2 AU when the situation normalized, but by then, the Norwod Company branched out significantly and thrived on transporting any cargo necessary.

Present day

Nowadays, the company is still in the family, led by Palo and Atilda Norwods. Their wagons transport everything, from fruit and crops to stone and livestock. In the light of discovery of Zea, the Norwod Company started investing in sea travel and transit by building a fleet of ships. Too focused on the Dain land travel, they lost the sea race against smaller competitors, who sailed to the new lands to bring back unseen wonders of Zea almost a full decade before them.

Type

Guild, Merchant