Real Man-Chapter 822
Not long after, an announcement was posted on the Zalando website.
As expected, Zalando blocked the route of purchasing through Reverb’s reviews with a lame excuse.
This caused the ‘Buy Now’ button on Reverb to be disabled.
Moreover, they changed the price and product information API to a closed system, making the services such as ‘Price Comparison’ unavailable on Reverb.
From Reverb’s perspective, their service channels were completely cut off.
It seemed petty, but they couldn’t complain about how they managed their own site.
It was the limit of Reverb, which only acted as a hub.
Yoo-hyun had anticipated this problem and prepared for it.
The next day, inside the Zalando executive office.
Rubin Ritter, the bearded representative with an impressive chin, frowned at Robert Gentz, the co-representative.
“What? Chanel said they won’t supply us with their products?”
“They’ve been trying to draw a line with us for a long time. They’re using Reverb as an excuse to focus on their own online shop. The problem is that other luxury fashion brands are also showing signs of leaving.”
“Damn, this is messed up.”
Rubin Ritter scratched his short hair.
One of the secrets that allowed Zalando to push Amazon out of Europe was the sale of luxury clothing.
‘Of all things, Chanel had to side with Reverb.’
They even linked their online shop with Reverb.
What if they left?
Other luxury stores would follow suit like dominoes, and the reputation that Zalando had built up over the years could collapse overnight.
Determined, Rubin Ritter picked up his phone.
The other party was Hugo Freyrik, the strategic director of Mersson AB, who ordered all this.
Christina Mersson, who received Hugo Freyrik’s report, spoke sharply.
“Why? Why is Chanel siding with that insignificant Asian man?”
“Vice President Laura Parker has a close relationship with Steve Han.”
“Even so! That doesn’t make sense!”
This was something that was not in the scenario at all.
What annoyed her more was Yoo-hyun’s attitude.
Why didn’t he back down and confront them?
It would have been easy if he just bowed his head like the others.
She was furious, and Hugo Freyrik, who had led Mersson AB’s strategy for over 20 years, calmed her down.
“He seems to be a tougher opponent than you think. It might be a good idea to back off at this point.”
“No. I’m not going to do that. Please take further action right away.”
“Underst…ood.”
He couldn’t disobey the order of the new president, no matter how unreasonable it was.
Hugo Freyrik nodded his head, hiding his anxiety.
The complacent ones and the ones who prepared for everything.
The difference between these two made the confrontation between Mersson AB and Reverb a stalemate.
Yoo-hyun didn’t just settle for defense, but tried to use the enemy’s attack to his advantage.
He immediately countered the expected move by using the media, and it was part of that.
The opponent’s absurdity was exposed, and Reverb enjoyed the publicity effect.
That wasn’t all.
Yoo-hyun launched a cloud computing service called WithC, and quickly absorbed the customers who were disappointed with Kinetic.
He took care of the profit as well.
As this repeated, Mersson AB’s reputation worsened, and Reverb’s position grew bigger and bigger.
Eventually, Christina Mersson, who had been hard-line, gave up.
Perez Vago, who received the successful result, laughed out loud.
“Haha! Thanks to Mr. Steve’s strategy, we’ve grown a lot. We got a lot of publicity because we competed with such big companies.”
“It’s thanks to Mr. Perez for using the media well.”
“Hey, don’t say that for such a small thing. I have that much of a network. It’s not like I enjoy parties for nothing.”
“You’re amazing.”
Perez Vago clapped his hands, looking at Yoo-hyun who was playing along.
“Oh, wow! There’s more good news.”
“What is it?”
“It’s about Christina. She’s been getting a lot of backlash for being unreasonable.”
“Backlash?”
“Yes. Look at this.”
Swish.
Yoo-hyun looked at the phone that Perez Vago handed him.
On the YouTube video on the screen, there was a scene of Jeong Da-hye being bitten by a dog, and Christina Mersson demanding an apology with force.
Someone who filmed the situation at the time must have uploaded it.
The provocative video of a celebrity had a lot of views.
Yoo-hyun tilted his head in wonder.
“Why is this?”
“Look at the comments. The public opinion is no joke. They say Christina can’t leave the house because of this.”
“But that’s already been settled.”
“That was then. The public opinion is bad, so follow-up articles are coming out. If the criticism boils like this, she’ll have to euthanize her pet. Well, it’s her own fault.”
“…”
Perez Vago seemed to be relieved, but Yoo-hyun wasn’t entirely happy.
He felt sorry for her.
‘She seemed to love her pet very much…’
He could tell by the fact that she, who had such a strong pride, bowed her head.
He had received an apology for that incident, whether it was sincere or not.
He didn’t want to bring it up and make her suffer personal attacks.
“Hmm.”
Yoo-hyun, who was reading the hateful comments, fell into a moment of thought.
A few days later.
A photo was posted on Yoo-hyun’s Instagram.
In it, there was Yoo-hyun’s face smiling with a black large dog.
-Weekend, with the awesome Alex. #friend #alex #pet #mersson
It was a post after a long time, but Yoo-hyun had a lot of followers.
Many people pressed the ‘Like’ button, and among them was Christina Mersson.
‘I thought she hated me.’
Yoo-hyun chuckled, recalling that day.
Yoo-hyun acted on his feelings rather than being uncomfortable.
He visited her mansion, knowing that Christina Mersson wouldn’t welcome him.
It was as expected.
She, who had been hiding from the public opinion, refused to see Yoo-hyun who came suddenly.
She heard from the maid that he came for Alex, but the door of the mansion didn’t open.
She seemed to think that accepting his kindness was a blow to her pride.
Even when the door opened after a long time, he couldn’t meet her.
It didn’t matter.
Guided by the butler, Yoo-hyun tried to befriend Alex.
He felt someone watching him from somewhere when he played with Alex for a while, but she never showed herself.
She, who had been like that, left a trace on his SNS.
Was it because of that?
People reacted hotly to the reconciliation mode of Yoo-hyun and Christina Merson.
Thanks to this photo taken in the garden of the Merson family mansion, the negative public opinion subsided in an instant.
From Yoo-hyun’s point of view, he had wrapped things up well before leaving Europe.
He had no reason to leave any grudge with Merson AB.
‘It would be hard to be friends with her…’
But it was a good thing to do.
He nodded his head with satisfaction.
Ring. Ring.
When he answered the ringing phone, a familiar voice rang out.
Christina Merson asked bluntly.
-Why did you protect Alex? Was it pity?
“No. I agreed to be educated, remember? I was just curious.”
-Then why did you bother to come and spend time with him, and post that picture on Instagram?
He didn’t like the way the pet owner treated the pet, not the pet itself.
He didn’t like the way Christina Merson handled the incident, but he had no reason to hate her as a person.
“The picture came out well, didn’t it? Alex and I seem to have gotten pretty close.”
As Yoo-hyun answered with a good-natured tone, he heard her breathing over the phone.
She broke the silence after a moment.
-Thank you.
“You’re welcome. I had fun too.”
-I… No. Anyway, thank you.
Click.
Christina Merson hung up the phone hastily and put her hand on her forehead.
“Why can’t I speak?”
She had a lot of things to ask and say, but she couldn’t say them.
Her head was blank as if it was the first time she had received such a favor.
She suddenly thought.
‘If I had apologized first, could I have been friends with him?’
Even if not, she wanted to return what she had received.
In her own way.
The result was delivered to Yoo-hyun soon after.
He was shocked when he first heard the news.
Why all of a sudden?
He later found out that Christina Merson had a hand in it, and everything made sense.
It was her own way of trying to repay him somehow.
The internal reaction of Zalando was also favorable, and he heard that the matter was progressing rapidly.
‘How did it get resolved like this?’
He never imagined that she would make such a decision with her personality.
It wasn’t what he had wished for, but he felt amazed to see that a small good deed came back as a reward.
Thanks to that, ReviBer made a foothold to expand throughout Europe.
He got a much better result than he had expected.
Yoo-hyun picked up his phone and called Christina Merson.
He wanted to treat her as a connection, not a grudge.
Things went well with Zalando, and ReviBer was in a better situation.
The ReviBer European branch, which had grown steadily, was now stable enough to run on its own with Perez Bago at the center.
Everything was going well.
But why…
Ding. Ding.
In front of Yoo-hyun, who was sitting blankly in the coffee shop, a doll with a paper on its head swayed.
“Yoo-hyun, why are you so spaced out?”
“Just. I’m feeling complicated and subtle thinking about this.”
Jeong Da-hye, who held the doll he had picked for her on their evening date, asked.
“Is it because you became friends with Christina out of the blue?”
“No. Not that.”
“Then what?”
“What if the one who attacked us wasn’t Zalando or Kinetic, but Amazon?”
Amazon was the world’s largest online shopping mall and the world’s largest cloud service company at the same time.
They had the data of countless companies in their hands.
What if they had refused ReviBer’s review?
It would never have been resolved as smoothly as it was now.
It could have been fatal to the entire ReviBer business.
Jeong Da-hye shuddered and hugged her arm.
“It’s scary just to think about it.”
“But I keep thinking that something like that could happen in the future.”
“You don’t think someone will force you like this time, do you?”
“Probably not. But what if ReviBer grows big enough to threaten them? Will they just sit still then?”
Son Jung Eui had already warned him of the potential threat of ReviBer.
-ReviBer is bound to be a link between the existing giant companies in terms of business structure. They will leave you alone for now because you are helpful to them, but when your influence grows, you will be attacked from all sides.
Yoo-hyun thought that time was still far away.
But looking back on this, he kept thinking that it wasn’t.
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