Zhang Yang quickly shared this good news with Meng Fan, and Meng Fan immediately expressed his willingness to go. The matter was quickly passed on through intermediaries and put on the agenda.
Three days later, Meng Fan said goodbye to his friends at the company over a farewell dinner, and set off alone to Hubei to begin his journey of learning competitive fishing.
With Meng Fan temporarily leaving the team, Zhang Yang's other team members also had their work scheduled.
After a brief communication by Zhang Yang, Han Qiang was brought over to partner with Zhang Yang, and the live streams continued as usual.
However, with past experiences in mind, the focus of both streaming accounts underwent a distinct change.
The priority for increasing the fan base was placed further back, while the main focus was on nurturing loyal fans and managing private traffic through WeChat groups and QQ groups.
Due to the adjustment in live streaming strategies, the effect of the live streams subtly changed; the growth in fan numbers slowed down, but the quantity of committed fans rapidly increased.
In less than half a month, they managed to establish seven or eight QQ groups, each with two thousand members. Zhang Yang even specially filmed and recorded some practical teaching materials for these anglers to share and learn from within the group files, sparking a surge in enthusiasm among everyone.
Besides running private traffic groups, the bait promoters proposed by Wang Yan were also quickly put on the agenda.
After several rounds of calculations and comprehensive considerations, Zhang Yang decided to allocate 8% of the profits from revenue to the promoters, causing the bait products from Famous Fishing Tackle Company to explode like a viral wave among micro-businesses.
Time flew by, months passed, and as the weather transitioned from summer to autumn in September, signaling the prime months for the fishing tackle industry.
In the recent months, the overall appearance of Famous Fishing Tackle Company underwent noticeable changes, and both sales performance and the development of offline agents, as well as product distribution, made significant progress, effectively stepping up to another level.
Just as Zhang Yang and Han Qiang were preparing for the new day's reservoir fishing live stream, some explosive news arrived from Wang Yan.
In a neighboring city, Fengcheng, a car fishing competition was about to take place! The grand prize winner would get a Great Wall brand Haval H6 off-road vehicle!
"Boss? The first prize is a car! How about we take everyone to give it a try? What if we're lucky and win?"
Wang Yan eagerly shared the news he had found in the fan's WeChat group with Zhang Yang.
"Car competition? Fengcheng?" Zhang Yang keenly picked up on the keywords and asked curiously.
"Yes! The registration fee is 1080 per person! Registration includes a complimentary 398-value souvenir! A formal event co-organized by the local fishing association! The location is the fishing base within Dragon and Phoenix Manor!"
"Wow, let's go! Are there any spots left? Ask everyone who can go, sign them up, the company will cover the costs!" Zhang Yang showed immediate interest.
These car competitions could become routine in future black pond and cannon field circles, like at Jinghai Garden, where a single competition might give away dozens of pickup trucks.
But back in 2015, it was still a novel event. For a registration fee under a thousand yuan, participating in an event where the prize was a small off-road vehicle valued at a hundred thousand yuan was something no angler who had decent skills would want to miss.
"Alright, I'll contact them right away!"
Seeing Zhang Yang's interest, Wang Yan immediately took out his phone to make the calls.
Thanks to being informed early by fans, and after some inquiries, there were still quite a few slots available. Wang Yan and Zhang Yang decided to sign up five people without hesitation.
Zhang Yang, Wang Yan, Han Qiang, Zhou Chu, and even Zhao Bingguang all signed up.
Since the start of the year, most of these team members had been busy with their own affairs most of the time, and this would be the first time the entire team would go fishing together after registering, sparking great excitement.
Especially Wang Yan, who hadn't even set off yet but had already posted the news of the team's registration and plans for an offline meetup in the fan group, never missing a chance to engage loyal fans.
That afternoon, right after lunch, everyone gathered at Zhang Yang's store without even taking a nap.
The five big men sat around the tea table, waiting for Zhang Yang and Zhao Bingguang, the two leaders, to strategize.
Zhang Yang carefully studied the announced registration rules and said, "Since we've decided to go, let's make preparations early!
The competition time stated in the rules is the day after tomorrow, and my personal opinion is we should set off early to collect information on-site, and gather tomorrow morning to set off, first going to understand the competition venue and fish situation as much as possible! What do you think?"
"Leaving early is not a problem. The question is, what tactics and fishing methods should we use? From the rules, I see there's a wide variety of fish released, and in large quantities!
Especially the rules, there's even a double points system, which definitely needs thorough examination and study!" Wang Yan said, holding a cigarette in his mouth and frowning as he read the competition rules.
"Boss, what does this double points system mean? I don't quite understand it!" Han Qiang asked.
Zhang Yang explained, "The double points system is where the total weight ranking and the individual big fish ranking scores are added together for sorting!
This means you need to rank high in total fish weight and also try to catch big fish to rank in the single-tail fish category!
For this sort of competition leaning towards leisure, the rules are fairly logical; if it were purely counting small crucian carp, casual anglers wouldn't stand much of a chance!"
"What about bait? What should we use? Do we need to prepare specifically? The rules say hand-thrown baiting is allowed, and it's also permitted to fish with live bait! What's our approach?" Han Qiang asked again.
"Bring all necessary items along and decide after seeing the venue! These are minor things that can be decided on-site, but pre-competition preparations, especially for line groups and leaders, do need some readying! Since everyone's here, there's no need to go home, let's just collectively prepare hooks and lines this afternoon as pre-competition preparation!" Zhang Yang proposed.
"Uh, so Boss, aren't you going to help everyone out? You're a fishing tackle shop owner, after all, worst-case scenario, we'd even pay you a hook tying fee!" Wang Yan slyly said, with a mischievous look.
Zhang Yang shrugged: "Tie your own, no way! As more fish gets caught, people are getting lazier!
With the thickness of your face like a city wall curve, asking me to tie your hook, if we hook onto a big one that cuts the line and escapes, you could blackmail me for half a month's lunch!"
"Hahahahaha!" Everyone burst into laughter.
...
The news of Fengcheng hosting a car competition spread swiftly in the fishing community, and the total of one hundred twenty spots were swiftly filled in less than a day's time after opening registration.
Many anglers who learned of the information late regretted missing out, while numerous three to five-person small groups centered around familiar anglers or fishing tackle shops headed towards Fengcheng.
Early the next morning, a five-person team gathered in the company parking lot, all equipped with full set platform fishing gear, traveling in Zhang Yang's van and a Transit van borrowed by Zhao Bingguang, with the two vehicles departing from the company to hit the highway heading north towards Fengcheng, which was two hundred kilometers away.
After five full hours of driving, Zhang Yang and his group successfully exited the highway and arrived in Fengcheng.
Dragon and Phoenix Manor was a renowned medium-sized resort in the local area, situated in the suburbs of Fengcheng, about thirty kilometers from the highway exit.
Zhang Yang and his team quickly resolved lunch at a service area and then directly headed to the destination after exiting the highway.
Along with Zhang Yang's team, several vehicles with W City license plates also got off the highway, and Old Ma's group all participated in this car fishing event.
However, their convoy didn't stop for a meal at the service area; instead, they met up with friends waiting for them at the highway exit, quickly heading towards the city to the pre-arranged hotel.
"Teacher Ma, the meal has been arranged, let's eat first, once everyone is full, we'll go check out the venue! With you personally attending, winning the car in this competition is practically assured!" The angler responsible for hosting graciously lit a cigarette for Old Ma.
Ma Yuhua symbolically covered the lighter with one hand and calmly said, "Alright, let's eat first and then go see the venue! Do any local anglers have information on Dragon and Phoenix Manor? Tell me about it, it's been a few years since I've been here, last time I came with Xiao Wu and the others for a competition!"
"The person responsible for stocking the fish is acquainted with my brother, we'll talk it over at the meal!"
"Alright, let's follow as you're hosting, let's eat first!"
The group boarded the vehicles, and the convoy proceeded grandiosely towards the city.