Basketball boy, starting to shine from the slam dunk

Zhuang Yu's face turned red. "Uncle Zhou, although I know you are telling the truth, it is totally unrelated for a basketball player like me to be involved in a movie."

Zhou Zhiming smiled and said, "What does this matter?"

"Yes, I haven't studied acting."

“But you’ve acted in it.”

"Ah? What have I played?"

"Filming commercials is filming, and filming movies is filming, what's the difference? Aren't they both just moving around and speaking lines in front of the camera?"

"Uh......"

Zhuang Yu was speechless, scratched his head and smiled: "If you say so, I really have to give it a try, maybe I can become an actor or something."

Ha ha......

They both laughed.

It was just a joke and the topic soon returned to business.

The second thing Zhou Zhiming did during his visit was to discuss with Zhuang Yu about the work arrangements during the off-season, including meeting with representatives of some brands and discussing signings in person. In addition, the newly signed endorsement contracts required filming of commercials and promotional posters.

Some endorsement contracts that have been signed previously also require reshooting of commercials, etc.

There are also some commercial activities.

It would take a lot of time to add up all these bits and pieces. Zhou Zhiming gave Zhuang Yu a rough estimate and said that it would be good if they could be done in half a month.

The two of them first selected the endorsement contracts and picked out some suitable ones. Zhou Zhiming would make the schedule and Zhuang Yu would meet with these companies one by one.

In addition, there are the arrangements for the next trip.

Whether it is shooting commercials or anything else, it is impossible to complete it all in Los Angeles, especially shooting commercials, which requires going to some specific places to shoot.

Therefore, it is impossible for Zhuang Yu to stay in Los Angeles forever. In order to allocate time more reasonably, he must plan his next itinerary.

After talking about these two things, Zhou Zhiming talked about another thing.

"Once these endorsement contracts are signed, there will be a lot of extra money in your account. How do you plan to use it?" Zhou Zhiming asked.

Yes, how should I spend it?

Zhuang Yu couldn't help but feel a headache. He never thought that one day he would have a headache because he had too much money in his account and couldn't spend it.

What a happy trouble.

Zhuang Yu said: "It is definitely not okay to just leave the money in a bank account and let it gather dust, but how should I invest it? To be honest, I don't know what to do. I talked to Brother Ming last year and he gave me some advice, but I really don't have any experience in things like investment."

Zhou Zhiming smiled and said, "How can you not have experience? Didn't you invest in the Sharks? You also opened an investment company with Yao Ming. In addition, you cooperated with Anta and invested in your own exclusive brand. These are all very successful investments, not to mention the Sharks. The Zhiyu series of brands have achieved extremely amazing results in the past year. I heard that it has developed very quickly and has a rapid momentum."

Zhuang Yu also laughed.

These two investments were indeed successful.

With the restructuring of CBA and the establishment of CBA Company, the league has been further commercialized, and the commercial value of each CBA team has been improved to varying degrees.

In the past two years, the Sharks Club's performance in the CBA league has improved significantly and is getting better and better.

This further increased the market value of the Sharks Club.

Of course, Zhuang Yu has no plans to sell the Sharks Club now.

In fact, he has no intention of selling the Sharks in the short term.

After all, although the performance of the Sharks Club has been improving since he took over, it has not yet won the CBA championship.

Zhuang Yu felt that even if he wanted to sell the Sharks Club, he would have to wait until the Sharks Club won at least one CBA championship trophy.

As for Zhuang Yu’s investment in the Yu series of brands, it can be said to be very successful.

The brand announced its independence from Anta last year and officially became a sports brand similar to AJ.

Many people were skeptical at the beginning. After all, AJ is AJ. It has become a business myth and it is not something you can copy just because you want to.

However, such doubts have gradually dissipated over the past year.

The Yu series brand is deeply bound to Zhuang Yu.

In other words, the better the performance of Zhuang Yu, the higher the popularity of the Fish series brand will be. The more fans Zhuang Yu has, the larger the customer base of the Fish series brand will be...

With Zhuang Yu's outstanding performance this season, the Yu series brand is also in rapid development. In the playoffs, the Lakers made it all the way to the finals, which provided a strong publicity for the Yu series brand.

In the end, Zhuang Yu led the Lakers to win the championship, became completely famous, and also completed an evolution of the Yu series brand.

Both sales performance and commercial value have been greatly improved.

Zhou Zhiming continued, “I thought since we have the success of the Yu series brand, why not expand it?”

Zhuang Yu became interested: "How to expand?"

Zhou Zhiming had already prepared a plan: "Of course, you can't do sporting goods because you have a contract with Anta. But you can do other things, such as food, home furnishings, chain restaurants, etc...."

"Didn't Yao Ming open a Yao Restaurant in Houston?"

"You can also open a restaurant named after yourself, and if the business is good, you can develop it into a chain store. You can open it in Los Angeles, in other cities, or even in China. It's not a big problem."

This gave Zhuang Yu some inspiration.

Indeed, due to the contractual relationship with Anta, I cannot engage in the sports goods business, but my commercial value is there. Instead of endorsing others and letting them use my commercial value to make profits, it is better for me to do it myself.

Start my own company, create my own brand... Can't I just be my own spokesperson?

Of course, that doesn’t mean you can do everything.

Some companies have signed endorsement contracts with Zhuang Yu. Due to the restrictions of the agreement, Zhuang Yu cannot work in these industries. Even if he does, he cannot promote his own brand.

For example, if Zhuang Yu signed an endorsement agreement with Anta, then Zhuang Yu cannot make sports products himself. Even if he does, he cannot use his own name, let alone endorse himself.

Under such circumstances, it would not make much sense for Zhuang Yu to continue working in these industries.

Fortunately, Zhuang Yu signed contracts with almost all large companies, and there are many industries that Zhuang Yu cannot enter just because he wants to.

For example, Huawei mobile phones, TCL TVs, BMW cars, Coca-Cola, mobile communications... These companies have signed contracts with Zhuang Yu. Even if they have not signed contracts with him, he cannot get involved because they are already the leading companies in the industry and are among the best.

Moreover, the market is already fixed, and many industries are still asset-intensive, so even if Zhuang Yu wanted to do it, he couldn't.

For example, Huawei and BMW, can Zhuang Yu start a communications company or a car company himself?

Those all cost a lot of money, easily hundreds of billions or even trillions of dollars, and there are also very high technical barriers. The little money he threw in wouldn't even make a splash.

But there are always some industries where this is possible.

For example, the catering industry that Zhou Zhiming just mentioned.

According to Zhuang Yu, many domestic celebrities are involved in the catering industry.

For example, Huang Lei who can cook, Huang Xiaozhu who plays the domineering boss, Zeng Xiaoxian who is a good man...all of them are involved in the catering industry, and some of them have already established chain businesses.

In fact, celebrities’ involvement in the catering industry can be regarded as their own star effect, another way to realize their commercial value.

There are still some limitations on the ways in which celebrities can realize their commercial value based on their own fame, namely by making movies and TV shows, singing, shooting commercials, and participating in some commercial performances.

In fact, all of these get money from investors, advertisers, and event organizers, and the investors, advertisers, and organizers then make money from fans.

This means that there is an extra middleman who makes a profit from the price difference, which of course makes celebrities unhappy, so they want to find a way to cash in directly.

Some people invest in their own movies, some set up their own management companies, some open their own record companies, and some run restaurants, directly making a name for themselves and attracting fans to shop in their stores...

Doesn't this eliminate the middlemen?

Now Zhuang Yu's commercial value is also realized through various commercial endorsements. He can learn from those domestic stars...

"Yes, I can learn from those celebrities. I don't have experience, but they do."

Zhuang Yu slapped his thigh.

Then can I also invest in making movies, or...

Once this line of thought came to mind, everything suddenly became clear.

Not only can you learn from those celebrities, you can also learn from Ming Ge and Kobe. They all have a lot of successful investment experience. They understand what you don’t understand.

Just follow them.

"Uncle Zhou." Zhuang Yu chuckled, "You say, anyway, I don't know how to invest, so instead of trying my luck on my own, I might as well give the money to someone who knows how to invest."

Zhou Zhiming's eyes lit up: "This is also a solution, if there is a good investment manager..."

Zhuang Yu interrupted, "I can't trust those investment managers."

"Who can be trusted then?"

"Kobe."

"Uh, you mean you want to give the money to Kobe and let Kobe help you invest it?"

"correct."

Hearing this, Zhou Zhiming thought for a moment and said, "This is indeed a good idea. Kobe's investment vision is still very impressive. And now that he has retired, he can focus all his energy on business, and he will definitely do better than before. And he is much richer than you, and you two can trust him given your relationship."

Zhuang Yu smiled and said, "That's it."

Of course, he didn't mean to just throw the money to Kobe and act like a hands-off boss, letting Kobe work for him for free. That was impossible.

No matter how good the relationship is, there is no reason to do this.

Zhuang Yu's idea is to set up an investment company with Kobe, and then he will be Kobe's partner. They should settle accounts clearly as brothers and do business as business. He will get the returns according to how much money he invests and how much contribution he makes.

Of course, if there is a loss, everyone loses together.

Moreover, Zhuang Yu did not plan to put all his money into this. Other investments could still be carried out simultaneously, such as running a chain restaurant.