18 January 1993, Hogsmeade
"Well, it's far above and beyond any other broom on the market. I guarantee you won't find any broom that's anywhere as fast or as manoeuvrable anywhere in the world," the man stated.
Harry snorted, "We both know that's not true, is it? Racing brooms are a lot faster and very manoeuvrable. The French and the Italians have that market cornered and I don't think that anything you can do that would stop that."
"Yes, but those brooms are hideously expensive. There's barely any wood in them at all. It's all practically made up of alchemically treated metals which costs a fortune. A single mediocre racing broom is even more expensive than an entire Quidditch team's state of the art brooms ten times over. And they even wouldn't work well in Quidditch; while racing brooms have impressive top speeds, they don't have the acceleration that Quidditch players need. If you think about it, Quidditch players don't really maintain high speeds, they just need to be manoeuvrable and be able to accelerate very quickly."
The Potter scion smiled, "Well said. Now when you're talking to a potential investor, please make sure that you're very objective with every fact. You're claiming that this will be the best Quidditch broom in the market. The question now, is why?"
The man shrugged, "It's the efficiency of it that's impressive. Do you know how racing brooms work, Mr. Potter?"
"I have an idea. The enchantments on the brooms act more like buffers that channel a user's magic like a wand to work the magic. It's why Quidditch players get exhausted while flying."
The broom maker nodded, "Yeah. The problem with Quidditch is that games could last very long, so the ICW department of sports and games made sure that brooms wouldn't really magically exhaust a player to unconsciousness or death. All Quidditch brooms have a certain charm designed by the association that limits the input of magic. Without that charm, it's more than easy to get a broom to move faster than the speed of sound. You just needed a rider with very large magical reserves or with enough control to not waste any magic, and the enchantment would work. Other broom manufacturers have been tinkering with the shape of the brooms, certain anti-turbulence charms, playing around with air resistance charms, stabilization charms and things like that. They even resorted to muggle means, like using actual aerodynamic features, to make sure that as much of the magic allowed was used to power the acceleration and manoeuvrability enchantments. What I did, was discover a way to make sure the magic is used more efficiently anyway, so I could leave more than enough of it to power the stability and steering mechanisms to make the flight as smooth and as responsive as possible while leaving room for a sizeable increase in acceleration and with my custom variable air resistance charm, a much higher top speed. That's what makes my broom the best one on the market, Mr. Potter."
The man took a deep breath in the end and Harry suppressed the urge to smile. He hated to admit it, but he was impressed by Terrence Smythe. The broom maker was obviously very passionate about the subject, but it was nice to see someone using a different way of going about a problem. He was a half-blood who pretty much chose to start his own company despite the market being pretty much saturated with new versions of brooms every year. He took a few years off the study physics at a muggle university, just to improve his craft. It was a common thing when it came to guilds, but for someone to do it on his own was a testament to his dedication.
But what pleased Harry the most was the fact that the man didn't take the easy way out. He could have made a decent broom that just had a couple of upgrades and presented it to Nimbus or some other broom making company as a job interview, and he would have gotten in easily. Just look at Nimbus who just adjusted the design and adjusted the wind resistance enchantments a bit on the Nimbus 2000, and released the Nimbus 2001, which really put experienced players off who often gauged their speed using the wind resistance on their faces. Harry had asked Flint permission to fly one of them after practice, and it was honestly awkward to fly. You could probably get used to it, but the learning curve would be very steep indeed.
Terrence Smythe had created something new. Alas, innovation was only half the race. The man was, of course, not willing to let him on his secrets, which was smart, but now came the big question, "Alright, then why are you here?"
The broom maker looked perplexed for a second before replying, "I don't follow. You're the one who arranged the meeting…"
"Look, if what you're saying about your broom is correct, then you should have been set for life. You would have gone to one of the distributors, sold your design or just asked them to invest in it. Trust me, they would have been all over this. You should have been batting away investments left and right with a stick. Now, if that was the case and someone randomly offered to invest, you would just ignore them. But you didn't. You came to this meeting, hoping to secure an investor, and I would like to know why no one else tried to grab you up."
The man looked like he was sweating and just took a deep breath, "The problem was the production cost. The moment I said how much it costs for every single one to be manufactured, they just clammed up and did their best to kick me out."
"And how much does a single broom cost?"
"Around five hundred galleons in materials. And it takes about a full day of work for me to do it."
Harry frowned, "And how much does a Nimbus 2000 cost in terms of materials?"
"Around fifty galleons, I guess. I could probably enchant a similar broom in an hour or so. The total production cost should be around a hundred galleons."