Architect Archive

As a fairly new architect i've really noticed the "undercut" problem, people selling houses/harvesters at a loss just to sell them, thus rendering architect goods overall worth less (as it appears to the buying public). So in order to try and combat this, I have a idea that may help everyone involoved. If you hear of someone selling small houses for 5k, buy all of them they have, same goes for harvesters, you hear of them going for 10k or some super low number, buy them, every last one of them (or as many as you can afford). Then turn around and sell them for a decent price, i.e. you make a profit. Not only does this solve the undercut issue in a sence, but it a) increases profits with little to no work and b) may help promote those low sellers to actually sell those small houses for a decent value to avoid being taken advantage of. I've been doing this for the past few evenings and it seems to really be making a (on a small scale at least). Yet think of how we could actaully control the market if many architects started doing this. Follows the golden rule of economics "buy low, sell high..." and if the undercuters want to sell low, then I have no problem making a tidy profit off their hard work and resources. Just an idea, thanks for your time.

Snova Eclipse Galaxy

I never sell at a loss...... I would have to sell at less than 1/2 a credit per resrouce to sell at a loss. I obviously sell for less than you do, but I make a solid profit on every sale.

Selling a small hosue for 5k makes a nice tidy profit! lately I have been charging 8k but thinking of reducing to 7k There is a strong market for Small houses at 7k cr

I will be glad to be your wholeseller

Less than 2 cr/unit is just a little crazy if you ask me, but that's just me You can sell cheap if you mine all your own materials, but if you have to buy even one lot of materials off the bazzar the cost of production is greatly increased. Perhaps a "wholesaler/retailer" relationship may be what the architect profession needs right now. Let the new architects sell the small items to established architects with store fronts. This would help keep everyone happy as I see it, although there may be some out there that don't like to have to deal with "the middle man". I'm always looking for a good wholsesaler so anyone on eclipse that is interested in setting up some sort of agreement, please send Snova an email and we can try and work something out.

Snova Eclipse Galaxy

I understand how you feel, but I can decide what profit margins will work for my business, thank you. 2cr per resrouce price would be a400% profit margin, very profitable.

There is one small flaw in your reasoning, architect goods are not consumable. Every item you sell pushes the market that much closer to saturation. I've read some of your posts on other threads, and you are fortunate to have the available resources/friends/time to run your little buisness on a "Sam Walton" mentality. Yet I pose this question too you, doesn't walmart rely heavily on repeat buisness and volume? Every crit fail you have increases the price of your resources per unit, and you are apparently giving your time away. Be advised though, we are not selling to a market that will be sustained forever, houses/harvesters/furnishings don't go away. So what are you plans once you've saturated the market with cheap goods and you have to keep reducing the price to sell anything? If you truly do work in buisness in the RW, then you know it's all about reoccuring revenue and your buisness strategy appears to have very little long term scope. The original intent of this post was to try and help bring the architect profession out of the down hill spiral of prices that it has become. Best of luck to you, and let us both hope our revenu stream will be steady long enough for the elite-elite profession to come out so we will still haveanother virgin market to destroy.

Snova Eclipse Galaxy

I hired on an apprentice, a novice arch, supplied him with medium harvesters, and he makes me wall modules at 6k each. He makes a tidy profit, gets great xp, and I have my wall input increased by at least 25%. I am considering hiring on one or two more. Everyone is happy.

Yes I do realize I am funding future competition, but I welcome competition. A lot of arguments in threads here about what to charge for everything really lead me to the conculsion that there is plenty of room for all kind of architects.Some archs will cater to those requiring fast turnaround of large orders, and others cater to bargain hunters. Those are the opposite ends of the spectrum, and there is plenty of businessto be had in between.I have people offering medium houses on my server for 30k (even though he cant make them yet), yet I still run a steady business charging a couple of credits over the MARKET VALUE of the raw materials. I did not create the market value of 3cpu, but thats what it is right now, and as soon as it goes up or down my prices will reflect that.

When market values on ore go up past 5cpu (which for some reason they have lately), I focus on mining instead of building, since 5cpu is more than a lot of people will pay for structures. For some reason, the useful life of a crafted item is inversely proportional to its price in cpu. So a weapon that lasts a month will cost 20cpu while a structure that lasts forever can't be sold for 5. Why? Who cares it doesnt matter, 2 million credits later the archs will still have beachfront property next to the weapon and armorsmiths.

So dont worry, put together a business model that works for you and the time that you wish to put into the game and into architecture, establish a customer base, come up with a standard price that YOU consider fair for your time and effort, and you will do well. I was not in Beta, missed the factory XP bug, did not make master until a week or so ago, but my business has me in a position now where if I didnt make another sale for a month my harvesters would still be fed and I would still have cash to spend on....nothing. This holds true even though I have at least 3 other Master Archs within 5k of my shop.

So I guess my point is don't worry about the undercut. Archs selling structures for less that the market value of the resource will only be able to build what they can resource themselves. Archs selling for 1 or 2cpu above market value of the resource will be able to build at a profit indefinately, and will never see themselves in a bind for resrouces, because they can just call a supplier and purchase what they need. Customers exist for both kinds of architects.

When I send someone a quote, I get 2 responses (more or less). One is 'how soon can you have it?' The other is 'So and so can make it for this much'. My answer to the former is 'within an hour, what planet are you on?' My response to the latter is 'Thats a great price, I would talk to him.' I get 100% of Customer A, and 25% of the time customer B comes back becuase he doesn't want to wait a week.

If you can make more selling it on the bazaar you're not thinking right.

And as a master architect I hire these folks to make walls for me. xp for them-cheap ore for me

They probably do realize it is a saturated market, they're just selling cheaper because they know the market will dry up, so they might as well make a profit while they do. It's good business strategy, why would they not do it?

Gearless I think I know that better than you do,why do you think I am building market share, we live in a declining market. I am getting my name passed around the customers as someone that sells for less.

Poeple specifically as for me from other planets, I tell them I deliver. I KNOW my characters name ( it isnt Dayln ) is becoming better known. A declining market is the nature of our busniess, those that are not competitive will end up strugeling in that market.

Excellent post McedSolo, I appreciate the input. Currently I make walls for a master architect myself, for more cash in that then the small house market.

Snova Eclipse Galaxy

dayln...ill pay you 2 credits for every bit of ore you mine.. all of it.. ill resell it and make "a tidy profit" .lol

DayIn, I completely understand why you are getting your name out there. It's an excellent buisness practice, I guess I'm just looking down the road. Market share is great, but you still have to be able to maintian a reasonable price, as well as being able to keep up with your customer base. Structure factories take 2 lots, and now produce only 10 walls a crack, that means a longer turn around time for higher end structures, and the ability to provide to the available market share is decreased accordingly. You posed on another thread that you have 1 account and coop with 2 friends, down the road you may be traiding some of those harvesters in for factories and then your amount of cheap resources decreases and the time to produce increases. This is the scenario I have run into, and is exactly why I resorted to the "retail" strategy listed in the begining. Perhaps i'm over reacting though, as I have yet to see a real decline in the high end architecture goods, due to the time/resource/lot limitations listed above. DayIn, I do appreciate the discussion and input, Thanks

Snova Eclipse Galaxy

Yes.. and I have enjoyed it too.

My busienss may fail, but I dont think it will. I want to try it. That and I am having a blast doing it. If I learn the hard way, then so be it. I guess the bottom line for me is what one unit of resoruce costs, the base value is a 1/2 cr to me. Others seem to think it is 3cr. It is just an arbratrary number.

You may be right, and perhaps the market wont decline, I could be wrong about that, the future is hard to see. ( is there a Jedi Archetect that can see the future? )

I am not really out to ruin others fun, I do apologise if that happens, but business is indeed war, and PVP war to boot. Only time will tell. I know what a good business is in the real world, it is kind of fun to translate that into SWG, in this artificial environment good business might be different. But I dont think so, I think most of the same axioms can apply.

I intend to find out.